longranger
New member
Anyone have experience with how sensitive to cupramine Watanabei's angels are?
Cupramine sensitivity.
- Thread starter longranger
- Start date
MrTuskfish
Team RC
IMO, this is one of the toughest questions to answer. If many folks have any fish die while copper is in the tank; the copper will be blamed. I have seen, somewhere, just about every group of fish (or individual fish) listed as "copper sensitive". I'm sure some Watanabei's haven't done well with copper and others have. If you are just treating this one fish, and its new,I'd use tank-transfer for ich and Prazi-Pro for various worms. If you're experienced and comfortable with copper; that's what i'd use.
longranger
New member
Thanks Mr Tuskfish. Will stick with Cupramine as raise my levels to therapuetic slowly. Wish me luck.
MrTuskfish
Team RC
Good luck! Increasing Cu to about .30-..40 ppm over several days is the way to go, IMO. SeaChem (Mfg of Cupramine) is fine with this lower level and I think they are going to re-label the bottle. I like to get fish eating before adding Cu,if possible. If eating fish suddenly stop, that is the 1st indication of Cu intolerance. If this should happen, reduce Cu with Cuprisorb, carbon, or WCs and gradually go up again when fish start eating again. This is rare; IME, almost all fish tolerate Cu very well; especially if increased very slowly. Here's some good poop on Cupramine, the FAQ are vital info. SeaChem also has great tech support and I wouldn't hesitate to call them with questions, http://www.seachem.com/Products/product_pages/Cupramine.html
longranger
New member
Thanks so much for the information. So far I have had zero problems treating with cupramine but figured it would be worth asking the question about my Angel. Never have treated an angel before.
kv2wr1
New member
+1
I have a dwarf angel and a puffer which are considered to be sensitive to copper. I did 1 drop per gallon every other day until I got to 0.3-0.4 ppm and will leave it at that level for a month. I wrote down and calculated the total drops per gallon so when I do water changes I'll know how much to add and also tested the water to make sure that what I calculated was correct. I still test after the water changes as well to be sure I didn't add too much. Cupramine is a great product, but with the sensitive fish, it is ok to go slower and not go up to 0.5 ppm if you have fish that can't tolerate it at that level.
Last edited:
tapio
New member
From my one Watanebe experience this fish can take it just fine and better than Centropyge's or tangs. However, I made sure it ate flakes first and I never went above 0.35 Cupramine.
MrTuskfish
Team RC
I think your experience points to the problem with using copper. I think Centropyges are probably the most common angels to be considered copper-sensitive, especially Flames. I've always considered tangs to be very easy with copper. Who really knows?
tapio
New member
Yes, who really knows? I have been treating a Yellow tang and found it to be very sensitive to Cupramine. Anything over 0.35 and the fish started to breath very rapidly. My LFS store guy who is very experienced also says YT's are very sensitive. In the past I have also treated Regal, Powder blue, Powder brown and they had no partical sensitivity like the YT. Then again maybe individual fishes differ like some people are more sensitive to medications.
