Blue Tang

No need to use mineral water lah. Just test your tap water for NO2 and NO3 and make sure they are very low. My tap water once have high NO3. Complain to PUB and they immediately come and take sample but they calm water was above "water standard". Sometime NO3 peak can be due to monsoon season or dirty water tank at the roof. Just ask the PUB and Town Council to clean up their act. Water quality will return to acceptable level over long run.

Frequent outbreak of ICH always means there is one or more underlying problem. From my experience, its usually because of pH swings. Check your KH and it should be 8-10. Anything less than 7 means your pH will be dropping by night and bouncing back by daytime. Inadequate gas exchange (ie. exessive CO2) is always the cause of constant low KH. Add Kalk to bump up KH and review your filtering setup to encourage more gas exchange. Sometimes adding new fish or LR can also bring in new outbreak of ICH. If you can, put new fish/LR/corals in hospital tank for at least 2 weeks before introducing into main tank ( I have one 3' main tank and one 2' hospital tank. Hospital tank is maintained on long term basis..not to be torn down and re-setup).

Hi HH, 10 fishes is a lot for a 2' tank assuming all 10 are small fishes. I only kept 6 for my 3' tank (2 of 6" tangs, 2 damsel and 2 clown). Tangs has been in the tank for close to 2years. Careful of the box fish, they can catch ICH easily due to their scaleless body. Two suggestion: One... to speed up the NO cycle...buy a bottle of NOcycle bateria which can be found in any fish shop and dose it into the tank. Two...direct the output jets of water from the 2210 into the surface. This will agitate the water surface and increase the gas exchange tremendously (ie. get rid of CO2 and NH4, increase O2). Your top hung filter should be filtering at least 4-5 times the tank volume per hour. Any waste on the 1st layer of filter/cotton should clean every 3 days. The other layers of filter/cotton should not be touch for at least 2 month. If need to wash these layer, wash them one at a time, one week apart. Hope I helped!

As long as your LR don't smell, don't need to "brush" them. Just rinse them to get rid of loose dirt. Small worms, sponges, etc are fine..they contribute to the tank's life form diversity. They are part of the "Life" in the rock (aka Life Rock) Some people however get rid of crabs and mantis shrimp as they like to pick at corals. Algae can be a secondary source of food for fishes like Tangs. So no need to treat them like enemy...they can be unsightly though. Reefers don't like them cause algae are accused of choking their corals. LR also need some maintenace every 3mths or so. Just blow the loose dirt off their surface.

Hi Norvin, From my experience, main cause of ICH is from degrading water quality. Of course, new live stock (fish or coral or live rock) can also introduce ICH. Take note that there are few types of ICH. Some respond well to copper, and some to Malachite green, some combination of both. Firstly, check your KH. Most of the time, ICH breaks out in my tank when KH drops below 7. Slowly increase your KH over 2-3 days to 9-11 will help a lot. Secondly check for nitrate (assuming nitrite and amonia is fine). Generally, "fish only" setup can tolerate quite high nitrate (50- even 120ppm in my case) unless its sensitive species like butterflies or angels. Cheers! William Mooi