coppermine and falme angels

[flowergirl]

i just bought a new flame angel, put him in qt and he now has ick on his 2nd day on there. i dripped him for 2 hrs before putting him and tried to keep all stress levels down but he still ended up with it. he is eating and i soak all his food in garlic.

i read that copper is not safe for angles..is this true?

any advice would be great

thanks

 

[hanas]

Flame Angels are especially sensitive to copper, I would advise against using any type of copper with them. I learned the hard way a few years ago.

 

[flowergirl]

alright, i'm just not sure about how to do hypo properly (i'll have to research it) my problme is i don't have a refractometer, only a swing arm. i have to do water changes everyother day to keep the ammonia down seeing how i only have a 10 gal qt and i think it will be hard to make up the water at different sal levels each time. it easy to do normal water changes because i just tanke the water form my display but that won't work anymore.

is there another way to treat him??

 

[slathrum]

you pretty much have to have an accurate way of measuring salinity, but lowering the salinity is pretty easy because if you add water without salt in it that will of course lower it to where you want it, which is 1.009-1.011 or so. Gradually doing this should also be better as you will be able to gradually lower the salinity as opposed to doing one massive water change that will stress your fish, to get it where you want it.

 

[flowergirl]

what about formalin..has anyone has success with using that?

 

[RandalB]

I have a flame being treated for Ick in QT right now and I am using Seachem Copper, Formalin and Metronidozole with no ill effects.....

RandalB

 

[BTTRFLYGRL]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6627941#post6627941 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by RandalB
I have a flame being treated for Ick in QT right now and I am using Seachem Copper, Formalin and Metronidozole with no ill effects.....

RandalB

How long? I don't imagine your flame will make it..Why formalin and copper both? If your treating ich, copper will cure it all your doing is poisoning your fish


Flowergirl, I would really suggest buying a refractometer, otherwise hypo will not work
If you do decide on copper, use Cupramine by Seachem

 

[Rondelet]

I would agree with Kim. Without a refactometer, chances of success with hyposalinity are very low, and could even be harmful (if your water quality parameters get out of control). I would go with Cupramine if you want to ensure the treatment is effective. However, I would add that you should get a test kit to measure the actual copper concentrations achieved in your tank. The therapeutic margin of copper is narrow, thus it's easy to make mistakes if you estimate the dose. Measuring the actual treatment concentration will go a long way to minimising this risk. Note: all treatments carry a risk, so you should keep an eye on your fish and watch for signs of trouble during the treatment period. Be prepared for a quick, large, water change if your fish show obvious signs of stress.

 

[LargeAngels]

Seachem Cupramine is a very affective and can be used with more sensitive fish.

RandalB: Are you actually putting formalin in with the Cupramine or just doing dipping. Here is a FAQ from Seachem's website.

Q: Is there is any problem with using Formalin in concentration of 25mg/l with Cupramine ?
A; YES! Do not use Formalin with Cupramine or any other copper medication. It will reduce the Copper +2 to Copper +1 which is highly toxic at even small doses.

 

[RandalB]

Excuse me for the rush post,

For Clairity:
Dips with the formalin, SeaChem (Cupramine) Copper for 2x Weeks with no Problems. Metro for support because I have tons of it around (A primary Discus Med...)

Fish are non-symptomatic for Ick at this time and I'll keep the treatment up for 4-6 Weeks.

Flame, Potter's and Rusty Angels are all doing just fine. We'll see what happens.

Let's really hear from the uninformed: I started out the treatment with a 5PPM Potassium Permanganate dip...


RandalB

 

[flowergirl]

randalb.. at what strength did you have the copper at?

for the last few days i thought i'd just leave him be and feed garlic and do reg water cahnges (of course) and he didn't seem to get any worse. one morning when i turned the lights on he had spots all over him and when i got home that night they were all gone...?? the lfs told me that he had "morning ick"..who knows? lol
he had no spots on him at all until this morning, he woke up with about 20 spots on him. however he is still eating.

i bought a uv steralizer last night and hope to hook it up tonight to his tank but i'm worried about him. i really don't want to lose this fish.

i'm tempted to start copper tonight at a low dose...?

 

[RandalB]

Use at your own risk but I've been keeping it between 0.25 and 0.50 with no problems....

RandalB

 

[flowergirl]

the angel is doing fine in qt so far but he still has one white spot on him and i'm not sure what it is. i'm going to try and take a pic of is because the it is bigger then the reg ick spots that he sometimes will have. the lfs gave me something called organi cure and it has copper and formaldihide in it and i'm wondering if anyone has used this medications before. the amount of copper that is in it is 1.25% so i didn't know if this could be used with him instead of the coppramine.

thanks a gain

 

[TerryB]

Cupramine is the only copper that is safe and effective for small angels. If you keep Cupramine at .25ppm that may be too low to cure the fish. The directions on the package say to use .5ppm. However, I have used .4ppm Cupramine tested twice a day with great success. I don't use copper for ich anymore, because hyposalinity works great without stressing the fish like copper does.

Terry B