Hello, first post from me and some advice from you please :)

[tofu]

Hello all, and thank you in advance!
I would like some advice on the subject of ich on a clown.
First saw it last night. Looks to be size of a grain of salt or smaller. There was 3 on him/her last night. I only see 1 on the clear part of the tail tip today. I'd post a pic if my shutter could keep up with the fish.
I am tempted to do a fresh water dip followed by hyposalinity. I guess I can't post a link or pic as this is my first post.

Please help me out, my LFS is closed Mon and Tue.
Fish doesn't show any signs of illness except for the cyst right now. Eats good too. Should I feed garlic?

OK, so now a bit of background of what I have going...Tank has been setup about 8 weeks now.
The clown is the only fish and has been in for a month.
20G tall
16# live rock
black and white live sand
Had 3 hermit crabs, but down to 1 I can confirm.
Had 8 snails, but down to 4 that I can confirm.
2 black maragrita snails died (threw out last night)
Not sure what the other missing snails are.
I do have 2 nasarius (?spelling) that are doing very well, and a pink Astrea that was awesome, but is falling sometimes now. Also, a little purple one that's in good health.
From the rock, I have a couple bristle worms, about 6 brittle stars, lots of tiny starfish, and some other things.

Kit is from Marineland.
Penguin 150 biowheel
Seio 530 powerhead
salinity is 1.024
ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
nitrate 0
ph 8.0 (I have a hard time keeping this up)
temp 77.5

OK, for those of you still with me.....thanks again.
This isn't my idea of an ideal setup, although I need to start somewhere. (Looking in hindsight, I think this is costing me more than what I would have wanted in the long run)
I hope to have a t5 light and coral in the next month.
If I succeed, I will have 2 clowns, 2 goby, 2 shrimp, maybe a blenny, and coral in this 20G tank.
I see this setup growing. Like maybe pickup a 55G and use my 20 for a sump after I figure out some more on what I'm doing.
Right now, I'm not sure if I should get a hospital tank setup, or invest in a canister filter and use my biowheel in the hospital tank. I think I'm looking at about the same cost. I do have a 10G never used tank to through the biowheel in.

Geeze, I'm long winded....some many questions
I jammed a lot in here, and maybe crossed 3 threads doing it :/

 

[TJL]

Hey Tofu, first off a BIG :welcome: aboard Reef Frontiers then onto your ?'s. If it is indeed ICH I'd do one of two options, #1 set up the 10g as a QT to house the Clownfish in for the 6-8 weeks of Hypo treatment while leaving the DT fallow. #2 remove? the inverts and go Hypo on the DT for the same time period, bring S.G. back up before adding/replacing ionverts. IMHO would go with #1 and start off right with getting yourself in the habit of QT-ing any and all livestock before placement into your DT. The Bio-wheel filter would be fine/great for a QT but would not suggest buying a canister filter and instead apply $'s toward better lighting. Your tank is still relatively new and on the smaller side so not very stable yet, go slow-n-easy and you will have greater success with this your first Reeftank. This experience will help you out immensely in preparing for a larger more advanced system in the future. Thier are some great Sticky Threads here in Lee Birch's Fish forum on ICH identification and treatment which should answer most all yoour ?'s 24/7.

Cheers, Todd

 

[user 26995]

Welcome to RF. There is a lot of great info here like TJL said, in the forum Marine Fish Discussion with Lee Birch
I have a hang on the back filter on my 20 gal long qt. It works just fine. However if I understand it correctly, (correct me if I'm wrong) on the biowheel filters, you want to remove the wheel be cause they can trap too much detritus and cause nitrate levels to go up.
I too would go with option #1 that TJL mentioned.

 

[tofu]

Thanks for the feedback on this

I am following your first suggestion TJL

I got a "deluxe" 10G kit from Petco for $41.
I also pickup an Instant Ocean Lifeguard therapeutic treatment for marine fish.
I hope the clown responds to the hypo and I can return the meds.

Now I'll have a box with rocks and a box with a fish...
This is shifting the gears on my patience

Gal at the store suggested I pull 50% of my DT water into the quarantine, does that sound about right to you?