I recently had a possible case of ice or marine velvet in one of my quarantine tanks. I dosed the tank with copper but I may have overdosed on accident. This led to the deaths of several fish unfortunately but I was able to save my marine Betta. I moved him to another quarantine tank but from the start he had cloudy eyes and had to expend his energy struggling not to float to the surface. That was two days ago. Yesterday I added a half dose of prazipro since I wasn't sure whether his symptoms were disease caused or from the copper ( cupramine) and I wanted to make sure he didn't have flukes. At first he seemed to be pooping more and his color came back a little so I upped it to three fourths a full dose. Today I saw him floating at the top of the aquarium, his eyes are so cloudy they're almost opaque. Is there a way for me to save him, if not what could have caused this? I don't think he had any marine velvet and I'm fairly sure the prazipro wouldn't have caused his condition to worsen.
Can Marine Betta be saved?
- Thread starter Megalonyx
- Start date
SAT
Premium Member
A lot of things going on here and I'm having to guess at a lot of it, but here goes... An overdose of copper will damage the gills, possibly beyond healing, so anything which further stresses the fish will cause more problems. For instance, after a couple of days you may be getting an ammonia accumulation, which would be really bad in this circumstance. Have you been testing for it? Personally I would have waited a while, or gotten a more positive diagnosis of flukes, before dosing with Prazi.
I'm going with the Ich diagnosis simply because it's the most common. It would be normal for a fish with Ich to start looking better for a few days after being moved. The move will have temporarily broken the life cycle and some of the parasites will have been falling off, providing some relief. For that reason I suspect the Prazi did not make the fish feel any better.
After 3 days the Ich will continue reinfecting the fish. You will need to continue Ich treatment if you wish to save the fish. Given the copper poisoning, I suggest using hyposalinity or TTM instead of copper for the next phase.
It is likely you have a secondary bacterial infection causing the cloudy eyes and other distress. I suggest an antibiotic (I like Maracyn 2) as part of the regimen.
Good luck!
I'm going with the Ich diagnosis simply because it's the most common. It would be normal for a fish with Ich to start looking better for a few days after being moved. The move will have temporarily broken the life cycle and some of the parasites will have been falling off, providing some relief. For that reason I suspect the Prazi did not make the fish feel any better.
After 3 days the Ich will continue reinfecting the fish. You will need to continue Ich treatment if you wish to save the fish. Given the copper poisoning, I suggest using hyposalinity or TTM instead of copper for the next phase.
It is likely you have a secondary bacterial infection causing the cloudy eyes and other distress. I suggest an antibiotic (I like Maracyn 2) as part of the regimen.
Good luck!
