Urgent help needed Lieutenant tang has white spot!!!

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Good morning guys!

Sorry if this is a noob question but i actually still am just a beginner. My Lieutenant tang (tenetti) has the case of the white spot. Noticed it last night, he is still eating but he is not himself. Please help!! How and with what can i treat this? Dont want to loose this guy or any other fish or that matter.:eek:

Kindest Regards and thank you in advance for the help.
 
Dude if you dont treat this properly you will always have whitespot in your tank.
JUst always reasearch a fish before you buy it. Tangs from the acanthurus species are generally more prone to WS then the zebrasoma species.
The link listed above should sort you out, and good luck
 
My tank and all my fish was perfectly happy and very healthy until i bought some mixed salt water that i did a water change with from a dealer... 5 days after the wc my sailfin got sick but was fine the next morning when i wanted to treat him... now its fish number 2 and he seems to not do that well... But all is under control now... i started treatment today!
 
did you make sure that all the parameters of the water you brought were the same as what you tank water was??
 
Except for temp that was out by about 1 degree everything was the same...
 
U had ws in the tank even before the waterchange that i can assure u of as i am sure that u did not qt any of your livestock.
All u need is a change to trigger it.in ur case tge water change was the catalyst
 
Hi try Metronidazole
1 spoon of Metronidazole mixed with frozen food ie: Mysis or super shrimp or bloodworm or Marine pellets and soak this in Garlic Guard for about 15-20 min before freeding. Please read the instructions before using the product) don't use Focus with the mix.
Good luck.
 
@ziyaadb you are wrong about one major thing in your whole theory, and that is the fact that all my fish actually do a 4 week session in a QT setup before introduced to my main tank... I may only be a newbie to the hobby (marine specifically) but stupid I am not...

Whitespot has been treated around 4 weeks ago... just been so busy that i couldn't get the time to post. Thanx for all the help guys, my tangs thank you :thumbup:
 
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I see the outbreak was on the 5th of July?
Did your Lieutenant made it? And the other fish?

And 4 weeks is just too short. Longest WS cycle I had was 28 days. Rather go for 6 weeks. Take note that the whitespot on the fish can take 3 to 7 days to fall off. So that is maximum 1 week after you bring the fish home. Then the cyst stage can be from 3 up to 28 days, depending on the water temperature and the species of whitespot. Also, when whitespot hatch, they are minute 0.025mm. No way you can see it. When almost grown, its about a quarter of a mm. That you can see. The problem is that by the time you can see it, the whitespot is at the final days of that stage. Close to falling off. So that is up to another week. Total 6 weeks.
 
Hi @RiaanP

Yes it is completely gone in my tank and all the fish made it. Its been more than 3 months since i last introduced fish into my aquarium because just before i wanted to introduce the new chromis the WS hit... they are still living happily in the QT tank as I want to make sure that the whole outbreak won't happen again.

If i refer you to my tank's thread, you can see that my babies are doing well and are in good health. The three chromis in there is the ones that was in the tank from the very beginning, I have another 3 that is waiting in the QT tank to join them as soon as I feel secure enough to introduce them...

My first Marine (nano to 300L) - Marine Aquariums South Africa
 
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With what did you treat the display tank? Or did you just wait for it to cycle itself out?
 
I treated the display with Herbtana from Microbe Lift... It worked wonders, my fish were actually doing visibly better within two days and its coral and invert safe...
 
Unfortunately Herbtana doesn't work. There is no 'reef safe' medication that will kill white spot, but not anything else in a reef. The fish can perhaps combat most of the white spot with their own immune system (which Herbtana could assist with perhaps), but any stress will cause it to return again.

Even if you can't see it, it is still dormant, and there will still be one or 2 parasites on the fish's gills that will reproduce in the background and only become visible again with a stress situation (power failure, temp drop etc). But if you keep the tank stress free, it will most probably be fine, fish have an amazing immune system if they are happy.

I have also read that white spot can only reproduce a certain amount of times, so if you don't add any new strains of the parasite to the tank, viable parasites should peter out after a year or so.
 
Herbtana helps the fish to eat. and that is the number one method to help the fish to survive, by making sure its still eating. Reason for garlic being advocated.

But it does not do a lot against the whitespot itself. Apparently there are studies that proof that it does irritate the whitespot parasite. But irritate and kill are 2 different things. I haven't seen those reports or studies, just been told about them.

For mild cases, then it will work. and seeing that you last saw an outbreak 3 months ago, you could be lucky. For severe outbreaks, rather remove the fish and use the bucket method to rid the fish and environment from the parasite.

Fish do build up resistance to whitespot. And there are a study that found that the natural cycle of the parasite in a closed environment stops after about 10 to 11 cycles. Either the fish got al immune and they could not find a host. Pity I lost that link.

Problem is that the fish are just the same as us humans with the common cold. One of the family members gets it. Give it to everyone in the house, and eventually 2 weeks later all is cured. You do not get it back directly. Until next winter.
 
Whitespot is not always as bad as it seems...

Keep your fishes immune system strong with vitamin enriched food and keep them fat and you should not have problems...
 
True. Just be prepared to act if you see the fish are starting to struggle. Lost too many fish to this disease in the past to know you need to act very quickly when you see the fish struggling before it is too late.
 
True. Just be prepared to act if you see the fish are starting to struggle. Lost too many fish to this disease in the past to know you need to act very quickly when you see the fish struggling before it is too late.

Yes 100% correct...it sucks so bad losing all your fish...
 
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