multicolor angelfish

[meanpressure]

Hi

I have a question for all of the experienced angelfish people.
I have gone through two multicolor angelfish now in quarantine.
The first one died in 11 days and the second one died in 17 days. Both
times the fish showed no signs of any disease on its body and up until the
day they died they both ate fine. The levels this last time in the QT tank were ammonia-0 nitrate 5.0 nitrite 0.25 and ph 7.8. Both fish looked great up until they died. Any thoughts or suggestions on why the fish died or what i could of done differently. The temp in the QT tank is 78.3 I also put a little metronidazole and garlic in with the food when i feed my fish.

Thanks for any help

 

[sandwi54]

first, your QT is not cycled as you are still having nitrite. you may want to make sure it's fully cycled before another attempt.

when you put metro in the food, do you dump out the water where the food is soaked? or do you dump all that water into the tank? if the latter, the metro could accumulate over time and cause an overdose. for internal worms, i would use prazipro first, and if that doesn't work, then try metro.

your pH is also a little low. do you have enough surface agitation to oxygenate the water?

 

[meanpressure]

I will wait until its totally cycled next time. Other than using some water from my DT tank and a piece of live rock in the QT do you have another suggestion to cycle the QT tank? When i use the Metro i dont have any water that i dump in when feeding. I mix the metro in with the frozen food almost like a paste.
I dont have a powerhead in the QT tank because its only 10 gallons, what do you recommend for agitation of the water? Do you have a favorite brand of prazipro?

Thanks for your help

 

[sandwi54]

cycling the tank really just requires waiting and not much else. you can add a piece of cocktail shrimp to generate enough ammonia, much like how you cycle a DT. QT doesn't necessarily have to be cycled, but you'd have to keep doing large water changes to remove ammonia and nitrite. i don't recommend people to put fish in uncycled QTs simply because most don't have the diligence of doing frequent water changes.

prazipro is the brand of the drug. it's made by aquarium solutions (a subset of hikari i believe). you should be able to find it at most LFS as it's a common medication for flukes and internal worms.

for a small 10 gallon QT, you may just use a small power head such as the koralia evolution 240. put it close to the water surface to cause surface agitation or waves. this would oxygenate the water and drive out the CO2.

 

[sporto0]

Multicolor Angelfish are a deepwater fish, they prefer cooler temperatures, it is never a good idea to QT them in a 10 g tank, they are not as hardy as most dwarf angels, they are best kept in a deeper tank & skip the QT if you want them to survive. I know they are kept successfully, I have kept them, but they are a bit quirky.

 

[Plato]

I have found they do quite well. One in a 45, an 29 Bio Cube, a 275, and for deep water a 525 7' tall cylinder. I treat them like the rest of the dwarfs and feed New Life Spectrum flake and pellets.

 

[zhewitt04]

I also am qt'ing in a un cycled tank. I have a large naso in a 29 gallon. He is doing fine. Something I do for uncycled short term tanks like my qt tank. Is add am quell water conditioner as well as water changes. I do a 5 gallon water change every other day and add the am quell every day to cut back on the nutrients. I also dip my new fish in a medication but i don't who makes it or what its called. I do this in a mixture of tank water and medication (mixed by directions) in a 5 gallon bucket after acclimation for an hour then I place the fish in the tank without dumping in to illiminate the medication from getting in the qt tank. I want to try to eliminate it so if i give/sell the tank it isn't ruined from holding inverts. Just my two cents

 

[meanpressure]

So if i do purchase another multi, you are saying dont quarantine is this correct? And thanks everyone for the replies.

 

[pnavarro170]

i had one in my 120 for about a year. great fish, no quarantine. random food. no problems, temp around 78.

 

[jeff@zina.com]

I never cycle a quarantine tank, at least not on purpose. I rely on water changes to keep parameters in check. As for the angel, are they from the same source? Have they been in a LFS tank for a while? I've found angels seem to have more trouble making the shipping/acclimating/shipping/acclimating/purchase/acclimation series than other types of fish, but when I switched to a different supplier they were fine.

Jeff

 

[billsreef]

Multicolor Angels are very high on the list of fish that are collected with cyanide and suffer other shipping and handling related stress problems. I'd suspect the source, particularly with that time line and the fact that your QT is showing as 0 ammonia. That small amount of nitrite is totally inconsequential in sea water I'd also recommend QT'ing any and all fish. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure

 

[that0neguy1126]

For a QT, to reduce the cycle time, keep a sponge in your sump of your DT. This will allow bacteria to colonize it. Then you can move it into your QT and no cycle. Also use water from your DT to start the QT.