Hermits all died - LR Intercepter treated

[o2zen]

I treated my LR in my QT with Intercepter and then moved the LR back to my main display. Everything was fine last night but I woke up this morning with all the hermits dead.

My wife informs me that my cleaner shrimp are now eatting the dead hermits. I left them in the tank because someone else posted that his looked dead after he treated then came back to life. I was hoping mine would but now I am worried that the poisoned hermits will poison the cleaners before I get home in a few hours if they are eatting them.

Honestly I figured my LR which was drained being back in the tank would dilute the drug enough to not bother the hermits. I did forget to put the carbon filter back in the tank last night.

So my questions are - how long until it is safe to add more hermits, how much of a water change should I make, should I do anything else to make my tank safe again for the hermits and shrimp since the LR was treated with Intercepter?

PS I did not treat the entire tank because I could not measure the drug correctly. I left the lights on for 24 hours to make sure the isopods were hiding then yanked the LR and treated it for 12+ hours then put the LR back into the tank after it drained for 1 hour.

/grrrr I miss my little hermits

 

[Hattie B]

Hello,

What Interceptor are you talking about? The one made by who?? Novartis?

What was your original intention of treating?

HB

 

[o2zen]

Intercepter by Novartis is correct and I was treating for Isopods since they were feasting on my Clowns.

After treating just my LR I let the LR drain for at least an hour, then dropped it back in my main tank again thinking the 30gals would dilute any chemical enough to not harm my Hermits. I did a 20% water change and dropped in carbon which is sitting in my overflow so its as active as I can get it without a pump system but I am thinking of rigging up a magnuim filter tonight to really push the water through my carbon and doing another water change but I fear doing too many water changes too soon. So I need to know the rules on water changes.

 

[o2zen]

I am not sure if the Isopods came in with my new fish or have been in the tank since I set it up since I used Tampa LR which had a ton of life on it. I cycled my tank with 5 Damsels which I returned to the store after wards but never did see any isopods until moments after adding the Clowns to the tank.

Picky eaters of what. I did not see the Isopods on the Clowns in the bag and the clowns are a pair already so they traveled in the same bag and lived in the same tank until I picked them up. I might have missed them but I watched the clowns for awhile before I picked them.

I have a QT tank which is what I used to treat the LR after 3-4 days of it sitting in the QT trying to bait the Isopods but was unable to catch any this way. I pulled the LR out of my main tank after 24 hours of constant light hoping they would be deep in the LR by then avoiding the light.

 

[Hattie B]

WOW, your right those are parasitic isopods...

How big is the main tank?

I am familiar with Milbemycin oxime, active ingredient in Inteceptor, but more in terms of pharmacokenetics in blood samples, However,

how much did you add to the tank you treated?

It could be that it leached into the rocks depeding on how much was treated.

However, since this is a paratisic medication that needs to be continually administed (to dogs) to be effective I personally feel that in enough time you probably will not have a problem with inverts given some time. After water changes, and from dillution of the QT tank to the next, I would wait a few weeks have a few water changes in the main tank and try again. Probably best to wait at least a month before trying more.

I don't know the half life of this medication off the top of my head or how it breaks down chemically when continously exposed to water but it is not like copper so I do not believe that you will have have long term failure hosting inverts.

The best thing of course is to get rid of those iso's (I am sure he didn't have iit when you bought it, it would be hard to miss. =) )

IMO.
HB

 

[o2zen]

I used a 30gal QT and I added 25mg per 10gal which was hard to measure. Each pill is 1000mg so I needed 75mg which I tried to measure how in a 1/10 method and then cut back some as well. It made all sorts of stuff die and come off my rocks like some bristle worms I did not know I even had. Rather than treat my whole display and OD the tank I pull the LR after 24 hours of bright light to the QT tank then I spent a few days with no lights in the garage trying to trap them with no luck so I dosed the QT tank.

The main tank is a bc29gal tank. I am pushing carbon now and have done one 20% water change. I need to figure out how many water changes I can do and how far apart they should be without stressing my display tank. I think this has already stressed my Carpet and of course all my Hermits fell over and my wife called me today to say my Cucumber was molting and one of my cleaners was laying on its back (most likely the one who has been eatting my hermits).

Damn Isopods... ruining all my fun.

 

[o2zen]

Thanks for your help btw. This is also a great learning process for me and I am enjoying all of it except those Isopods.

 

[Hattie B]

Sure,

The sounds like is just to much left on the rocks. if you cumcumber is showing probelms maybe the best course would be to take those rocks back out and put the back in the qt. Kinda like starting over again. Any life forms that were on the rock is probably dead like you said especially anyhting in the worm family.

Did you scrub the rocks to remove any dead material?

If you took the rocks out it would probably be better overall. Have you checked your levels today?

You don't want to see any amonia spike from the residule die off.

20% WC and carbon should be good for the time being; if your parameters are within normal limits. If they are high or out of whack someone then you can do more.

Personally, I would do a 20% WC and check the levels, run the carbon. Removing the rocks will probably help, It would be crappy if something worse happended, like another cycle or loss of any of your livestock.

(Ps. if you happen to see anymore on the fish, which hopefully not, a formalin bath is effective in killing these).

 

[NanoLurker]

just as an fyi, many seahorse keepers use panacur (fenbendazole) to kill hydroids. it has been reported that when treating live rock, the treated rock continues to leech enough medication back into the water to kill all inverts for a long time. basically they tell people that if they choose to use panacur on live rock don't count on having snails, shrimp, crabs, etc. again.

i bring this up since both are dewormers and they both appear to have similar effects.

 

[o2zen]

Ouch. Some of my Hermits have come back. One of my Cleaners is acting funny and its the one that ate one of the dead hermits.

My Cucumber did something odd which has me worried so I yanked him from the tank. He is still alive but he spilled his guts.

 

[o2zen]

I think I might trade my LR in tomorrow for some new LR. They just got a really nice shipment tonight from a fellow reefer who is getting out of 500gals of tanks. Since they sold me LR with the Isopods I might just trade them in but I like my current LR.

 

[Hattie B]

o2zen,

ya, if it's still affecting your tank then take it out. Its not worth losing more of your critters..

It might take a long time to dry it out and start over again if you like those pieces.

Good luck...

HB

 

[o2zen]

I picked up some nice LR tonight to replace the ones in the tank. I think that the LR plus the extra 200gph flow with dual carbon active filters should help my tank some. I think I will pick up some Hermits this weekend to test. If they are ok I will stock back up again.

I still have three hermits that lived but they are acting like my cleaner - they do not move until I hit the tank with food then they run about eatting whats floating to the bottom then they go back into shell mode and just sit. If you stick a finger near they hide inside the shell but otherwise seem dead.