No sick fish Ich treatment

[mattleycrue76]

Well I haven't been on the boards in a while so I thought I'd take the oportunity to share my experience with others on this topic.

Disclaimer: This is just my own personal experience in ONE single case so in no way can it be called representative of anything

I started my tank a little over a year ago and although I read and researched alot I made my share of mistakes. I will admit that I don't quarantine fish mainly because I've tried it and I suck at keeping the parameters in the QT stable enough.

Anyway, one of the things I was blissfully unaware of until late into the party was ich. By the time I had an outbreak I had a hippo tang, three chromis, a pair of clowns and a sixline - way too much for my 10g QT.

The Ich came in waves or cycles that would appear, seem to get better and then reapear a week or two later and seemed to get worse each time.

I first heard about a product called No sick fish from an employee at a LFS. It was sort of a second hand report and when I looked the stuff up It was expensive ($55) so I didn't think much about it. Then a week later I'm at another LFS and am whining about my ich problem. The girl opens the drawer and pulls out a bottle of no sick fish and tells me she has used this on their 400g display tank that is full of corals. Then she informed me that they don't carry it so it wasn't like she was trying to sell it to me.

I went home and rearched the stuff but didn't find a whole lot of plausible information. Mainly there were a ton of people who were against it but no one who could report having used it and having had a bad result. In the end I just decide to try it and I was quite amazed at the result. I dosed the recomended 3 drops twice a day and didn't see much change for about a week. then after 7 or 8 days I saw the ich subsiding and after 12-13 days it was gone. I kept dosing for another 3 or 4 days and that was it.

Mind you I fully expected the ich to just be on another cycle and assumed it would reapear in about 2 weeks. Well I'm happy to say that I've been ich free for 8 months now. I know some people will say that the ich is still in my tank but not active or something like that and this may very well be true. However even if this is the case it's perfectly acceptable to me. My fish are fat and happy and none of my SPS LPS or softies have taken any harm from it. I would love to hear from anyone who has used this stuff what their outcome was. I don't actually know anyone who has.

And please lets not make this a flame war about the best treatment for ich. I am aware that QT/hypo/copper are the proven ways to treat ich.

I have waited this long to post about it because I wanted to make sure the ich was gone/subdued/inactive or whatever.

I'm curious to hear your stories

 

[Octupus]

what was the exact name of the chemical? was it No Sick Fish? i used something similar No Ich and it claimed it has no impact on corals. It saved my purple tang. it was heavily infected and thought i will lose him. Some on this forum doubted it will have an impact but honestly it worked for me. thanks for sharing.

 

[mattleycrue76]

yes it's called "No Sick Fish"

Did you have corals and inverts in your tank when you dosed?

 

[Saltyfish]

You can read about and buy it at

http://www.nosickfish.com

Some swear by it some swear at it....

 

[Octupus]

i had plenty of corals, inverts, and big clam.. none were affected.

 

[returnofsid]

My only concern with these types of products is that Ich is an invert. Just like beneficial inverts in our system. These products may be "reef safe" as far as corals go, but are they truly reef safe? It's my belief that if they'll kill Ich, they'll also kill other beneficial inverts in our systems. If they won't kill the beneficial ones, they won't kill Ich...IMO

 

[ac7av]

I have never used any of these products but I don’t know if I can believe the statement (if they won’t kill the beneficial ones, they won’t kill ich.) Now I am not expert by any means and I probably don’t know what Im talking about but I think it is possible to find a cure to the ich without killing every other beneficial invert in the tank. After all I think I read some ware that ick is the most researched fish infection out there and I think the experts have probable figured out something about them and how to control the pest chemically with out using a nuclear bomb to do it. Does anyone know what is in the ick control that you are talking about? Maybe a chemist can decipher what it is and if it will damage other inverts in your system. I know we have some people in the field on the board that could probably answer that.

 

[returnofsid]

ac7av, I think enough professional and well known reef aquarists, including several who are published, have made it clear enough, at least to me, that most of those "cure all" and "reef safe" medications are Voodoo in a bottle. Most are completely worthless and some are quite harmful. Off topic, but take Purple Up, for example. It's great for kick starting coralline growth...thousands of people swear by it. Those thousands don't know, and obviously, they aren't going to print on the bottle, over time, it can build up damaging levels of trace metals and become toxic in our tanks. Most of the "miracle cures" in a bottle are similar...IMO. Yes, Ich is one of the most studied fish ailments...and most of the trusted studies DON'T suggest treating medically. Most of the trusted studies, those NOT done by medicinal companies, suggest Hyposalinity and a fishless display treatment.

 

[mattleycrue76]

This is precisely why I didn't post about this for so long. All I could find on the internet was a bunch of "experts" or people quoting "experts" that would give every reason in the book as to why it couldn't work. Sometimes the most experienced people are just that - experienced. They've tried things that haven't worked and have been sold a bunch of useless crap over the years. They know better. But sometimes the most experienced people are also the least likely to believe that there is another possibility besides the tried and true ways (especially when the new way requires less effort or skill)

As I stated in the beginning of this thread I only had one experience with this product but it was a good one. Standing on its own merit it means squat. But what if there were other people out there who had actually tried it and could share their experience with it - good or bad - instead of their opinion ? Seems like that's what this hobby is all about.

Just to be clear I am not promoting, defending, or recommending this product. I'm simply curious about it.

 

[returnofsid]

Totally understand where you're coming from!

 

[ac7av]

Sometimes is a matter of following the instruction exactly. Wavering from them the least bit can make it not work like the copper treatment for example, too much you can just kill everything too little it does no good, just right and it works most of the time. I for one have made a note of it that you had a favorable result using the product. Thank you for posting your findings on the medication.