For history, the tank I have was given to me by someone who neglected it terribly. My wife and I deep cleaned it with wet cloths, razor blades, etc (no soaps or chemicals). I reused the filters, but replaced the media. He had two pieces of live rock (that were basically dead when I got them) I rinsed them off and kept them - and actually they sprouted new small polyps.
*Tank size: I have a 75g salt
*pH: ?
*ammonia: test to be 0
*nitrite: test to be 0
*nitrate:nitrates tested readable, but in the "safe" zone according to the test
*kH: ?
*gH: ?
*Tank temp: about 84 degrees F
*Volume and Frequency of water changes: No complete water changes; just the addition of water due to evaporation.
*Chemical Additives or Media in your tank:I have a skimmer, two emperor 400's, 4 penguin 1130's with sponges for filtration (a total of about 2200 gph). I don't have real good lighting (it is coming in the next few weeks), just two flourescent tubes. The substrate is a natural black sand about 1 inch deep.
*Tank inhabitants: 6-line wrasse, 3 pyjama cardinals, 2 green chromis, 1 dragon goby and 1 yellow tang) and few pieces of live rock. I have a few hermits and snails, and few inverts came on the rock (aiptasia, small polyps, a clam, few small stars and a couple things that I frankly don't know what they are).
*Recent additions to tank: newest additions were the green chromis about 2 weeks ago.
*Exposure to chemicals: none that I know of
*Fish Symptoms: My tang obviously started out with ich a week and half ago (I had him for probably 2 weeks) - white spots in the gills and face and started to spread a little. I gave it a fresh water bath and it seemed to go away right away and did not effect any other fish. Two days later it came on even stronger and I gave him another bath, which again seemed to really help. But, again, he is getting worse. He has all the ich symptoms but also has brown/gold spots around his eyes (I think they are spreading), not eating very much, his eyes look enlarged (but not like pop-eye, it's weird), he is mostly yellow, but not vibrant, he seems real jittery and his skin is lumpy (it's like something is under his skin pushing out) also blackish spot/small strings on his lower lip. My dragon goby is not eating much, has ich on fins and around mouth, has started hiding on the large conch to get away from the current, and looks thinner and weaker. None of the other tankmates show any major signs of stress, weakness, non-eating, etc.
In addition to the freshwater baths for the tang, I have raised the temp slightly to about 84. Because of cost and danger of copper I am treating the tank via hyposalinity. Over the course of a few days I now have the tank's specific gravity at 1.009. I removed the snails and hermits as I heard the hyposalinity is hard on them.
I have started including garlic - I soak it into the frozen food as is thaws. But I don't know how much to use.
I thought stress would be a major player here as well, but I am coming up with a blank as to what would cause the stress. I feed small helpings a few times a day...mixed flake and formula one frozen food. (I'm going to get some specific spirulina flake for the tang's diet.) I can find no guilty bully - day or night. Water checks out good for what I've tested (which has only been ammonia, nitrites, nitrates).
The tang is gently rearing himself toward the 6-line wrasse and the green chromis as if they were cleaner fish. The wrasse ignores him, but the chromis actually pick some of it off. Are they known for doing that? And should I get some sort of cleaner animal for the tank...a cleaner wrasse or shrimp, etc?
The salinity has not be at 1.009 for but a day and the Tang has more strength and appetite, but is still in bad shape. Can you think of anything else I should be doing...or perhaps something else entirely? To make things worse, I am going out of town for a week and a half and must leave the tank in the care of my wife (she loves the hobby, but she is brand new to it).
Please offer anything.
Sorry, Tang is too jittery for a pic and Goby is hiding.
*Tank size: I have a 75g salt
*pH: ?
*ammonia: test to be 0
*nitrite: test to be 0
*nitrate:nitrates tested readable, but in the "safe" zone according to the test
*kH: ?
*gH: ?
*Tank temp: about 84 degrees F
*Volume and Frequency of water changes: No complete water changes; just the addition of water due to evaporation.
*Chemical Additives or Media in your tank:I have a skimmer, two emperor 400's, 4 penguin 1130's with sponges for filtration (a total of about 2200 gph). I don't have real good lighting (it is coming in the next few weeks), just two flourescent tubes. The substrate is a natural black sand about 1 inch deep.
*Tank inhabitants: 6-line wrasse, 3 pyjama cardinals, 2 green chromis, 1 dragon goby and 1 yellow tang) and few pieces of live rock. I have a few hermits and snails, and few inverts came on the rock (aiptasia, small polyps, a clam, few small stars and a couple things that I frankly don't know what they are).
*Recent additions to tank: newest additions were the green chromis about 2 weeks ago.
*Exposure to chemicals: none that I know of
*Fish Symptoms: My tang obviously started out with ich a week and half ago (I had him for probably 2 weeks) - white spots in the gills and face and started to spread a little. I gave it a fresh water bath and it seemed to go away right away and did not effect any other fish. Two days later it came on even stronger and I gave him another bath, which again seemed to really help. But, again, he is getting worse. He has all the ich symptoms but also has brown/gold spots around his eyes (I think they are spreading), not eating very much, his eyes look enlarged (but not like pop-eye, it's weird), he is mostly yellow, but not vibrant, he seems real jittery and his skin is lumpy (it's like something is under his skin pushing out) also blackish spot/small strings on his lower lip. My dragon goby is not eating much, has ich on fins and around mouth, has started hiding on the large conch to get away from the current, and looks thinner and weaker. None of the other tankmates show any major signs of stress, weakness, non-eating, etc.
In addition to the freshwater baths for the tang, I have raised the temp slightly to about 84. Because of cost and danger of copper I am treating the tank via hyposalinity. Over the course of a few days I now have the tank's specific gravity at 1.009. I removed the snails and hermits as I heard the hyposalinity is hard on them.
I have started including garlic - I soak it into the frozen food as is thaws. But I don't know how much to use.
I thought stress would be a major player here as well, but I am coming up with a blank as to what would cause the stress. I feed small helpings a few times a day...mixed flake and formula one frozen food. (I'm going to get some specific spirulina flake for the tang's diet.) I can find no guilty bully - day or night. Water checks out good for what I've tested (which has only been ammonia, nitrites, nitrates).
The tang is gently rearing himself toward the 6-line wrasse and the green chromis as if they were cleaner fish. The wrasse ignores him, but the chromis actually pick some of it off. Are they known for doing that? And should I get some sort of cleaner animal for the tank...a cleaner wrasse or shrimp, etc?
The salinity has not be at 1.009 for but a day and the Tang has more strength and appetite, but is still in bad shape. Can you think of anything else I should be doing...or perhaps something else entirely? To make things worse, I am going out of town for a week and a half and must leave the tank in the care of my wife (she loves the hobby, but she is brand new to it).
Please offer anything.
Sorry, Tang is too jittery for a pic and Goby is hiding.
