My Prized Muelleri Butterflyfish has bumps all over body

[tylersarah]

Be sure to feed sparingly as well and siphon out any uneaten food.

Are you sure the hypo is working against the ich? Have the spots lessened. If not, I'd be inclined to restore the normal water conditions and start using cupramine, it has worked every time for me.

I've never had ich, so I don't know exactly how fish decline. Can heavy breathing come before visible spots, no spots and straight to death? I don't have experience there. The butterflyfish was the only one to show symptoms and he's cleared up significantly and doing well. The tang never showed spots, so I suspect stress or ammonia before ich. Feel free to chime in.

 

[snorvich]

FWIW, I have had a purple tang in HT with .4 copper for over a week now. No more ich spots and still eating like a pig. I travel too much for work to be in a position to do TT properly.

A couple of caveats. Copper must be maintained at the therapeutic dose which requires daily testing. Hypo probably requires twice per day testing minimum but remember that some cryptocaryon irritans strains are insensitive to salinity treatment. "Lack of spots" is no indication that cryptocaryon irritans is gone.

 

[tylersarah]

Snorvich,

Your previous post:

To the finer points:
Hypo is a fine treatment but not always effective, ime. There are resistant strains;some crptocaryon adjusts to brackish water within a generation and a generation turns over quickly. These strains seem to appear ever more frequently in the hobby. Prolonged exposure(5 to 8 weeks) to low sg may also have longterm effects on internal organs like the kidneys. Care needs to be taken not to drop sg too far. Below 1.008 will be less than the fish's internal sg and will cause a loss of homeostasis since the fish can osmoregulte to sgs lower than it's own. I think hypo is fine much of the time if it's done long enough and carefully . Sometimes it fails and the ich starts to show up once the sg is adjusted upwards.

Was the exact reason I initially thought TT, but I didn't want 4 QT tanks, I have experience with hypo and I thought it would be less stressful to not move the fish every three days. Not bashing either way, my fish are going to spend 3 months in QT that should allow enough time for me to treat the ich one or various ways.

Additionally, you posted:

Copper is quicker(14 days) but there are issues with some fish and reported sensitivity.Overdosing or mixing a bound copper like cupramine with an ammonia detoxifier causes serious toxicity.

I like tank transfer. No meds; quick(12 days). Easy to deal with ammonia since the tank is used for only 3 days and detoxifier can be used if needed unlike with some copper meds. A quick and gentle capture and transfer of the fish to a tank with matched water is easy in a relatively bare qt tank, especially when you drop the water level first. It takes a little work and some extra salt water but it's not as hard as I originally thought.

I thought this was so helpful I saved it to my desktop.

 

[tylersarah]

Yesterday my qt pH was 8.1, today 7.8, could this be causing the blenny and hawkfish to breathe heavily? There is a large sponge filter with an air hose in the tank creating a lot of aeration. I was thinking of dissolving some kalk and adding it to the tank...any thoughts?

 

[caribfan]

I might try to change the pH more with a water change, as opposed to adding straight kalk to the tank, but I don't have much experience altering pH with Kalk.

One thing to caution with C. Irritans and you probably know this, but it is a very cyclical parasite and comes in waves as the different life cycles start and end. So although your Muelleri looks good now, it could be a lull in between life cycles.

How are the other fish doing?

 

[tylersarah]

I might try to change the pH more with a water change, as opposed to adding straight kalk to the tank, but I don't have much experience altering pH with Kalk.

One thing to caution with C. Irritans and you probably know this, but it is a very cyclical parasite and comes in waves as the different life cycles start and end. So although your Muelleri looks good now, it could be a lull in between life cycles.

How are the other fish doing?

I opened a window to possibly help raise the pH, although, 7.8 isn't extreme.

I'm aware of the cyclical nature, it was a relief to see the Muelleri improve as I've read stories of finding them dead the next day and like I stated I'm new to Ich and didn't know what to expect.

The hawkfish seems to have improved slightly, he's still breathing a bit heavily and won't eat and the blenny is still critical, breathing really heavily, but he is perching on things in the tank. The clown pair in the same tank are doing very well. None of the fish currently have spots. All I can think to do is tape some paper to the side of their tank to help ease some stress.

 

[tylersarah]

Here's the Muelleri very early in the morning the day I ripped the tank apart. He doesn't eat the clam, he inspects it thoroughly.

 

[tylersarah]

Update

Update

Today is the 5th day of hypo qt, the Muelleri is breathing slightly heavily and only ate a couple blackworms, he chased them around and I had to net the rest from the tank. I'm assuming this is the ich attacking their gills on the next cycle causing discomfort, heavy breathing and lack of appetite? Is that what happens before the spots are visible?

I tested for ammonia, still none.

 

[caribfan]

Well I am going to start this off with the caveat that I have no experience with Hypo, so I'm not completely sure how that affects the breathing of fish or the pH of a system - though I seem to remember reading that it can lower the pH of a system.

If the feeding response has lessened, I might be somewhat concerned, but that usually happens when I use cupramine as the treatment goes on - I would continue to monitor that closely.

I wouldn't necessarily assume the parasite is attacking their gills. I've had fish with a few spots on them eat and show little signs of stress while still being infected. If the fish are infected, it seems for me that it most often shows up on the pec fins initially and will eventually cover the body.

I am more inclined to think it's an issue of condition in the tank, either the lower S.G or maybe just a lack of O2 in the water. I'm kind of old school, but I put an airstone in my QT, not completely sure it helps, just something I do though.

I wouldn't be seriously worried about the pH, but if you can alter it, I would try to do that to see if it helps.

In case you are wondering, if you don't trust your Ammonia Test Badge, you can take it out of the water and put it near the mouth of a household ammonia bottle. Often just blowing air across the mouth of the bottle onto badge will cause it to turn green. It's a good way to be sure your badges are still active.

To summarize, I would monitor the feeding response and the breathing and if it gets worse, I would restore normal S.G. conditions and see if that improves the condition of the fish. If it doesn't you can always use Cupramine, it usually starts to take effect on the parasite in two days or so of reaching the therapeutic level.

Not sure if that was helpful, good luck.

 

[tylersarah]

Thanks for the response, it was helpful. I have an airstone, it's always been part of my qt practice. The Muelleri is swimming around when he sees me, but the breathing isn't normal. I just lost the blenny. I'm going to do a small w/c and observe.

If I restored SG to 1.025, that would take a couple weeks, wouldn't that be backpedaling at this point? The Muelleri has been through a hypo qt before and he was fine this round until today. I left the window open overnight to help with pH, this morning it is 7.7, so I don't think the window helped.

 

[caribfan]

OK, so a couple of things. At 7.7, I think I would do a water change and raise the pH for sure.

Did the Blenny have any sign of C. Irritans on it prior to dying? In my experience, if a fish isn't covered in the little white dots, a fatality is not usually imminent. Some may argue with me on this, but like I said, its been my experience that if the fish isn't covered, it's not in imminent dange of perishing.

So on that note, if the blenny was not heavily covered, it would lead me to believe that it may be the hypo or low pH that is causing the difficulty breathing. I'm not an expert on hypo and have no idea what it does biologically to a fish - maybe Snorvich can comment here, he seems to be the resident expert.

Additionally, i'm sure you know this, but just because the white dots are not visible, is no guarantee that the Ich has been erradicated. This is the main reason that I like Copper, I can easily and accurately monitor the levels and know that after 4 weeks, there will be no parasite in the system.

As far as the S.G. It seems to me that you could probably take it back to 1.020 or 1.021 pretty quickly without hurting the fish. Maybe do it over the course of a day. Again, please let me reiterate that I have no experience with Hypo, so before raising it back that quickly, please seek another source to make sure that an increase in that amount of time is an acceptable thing.

If I was going to do that, I think I'd put the fish in a bucket of their current tank water, have some premixed water at the correct S.G. and drip it over teh course of 6 hours. During that time, you can amend the QT water to the correct S.G.

I'll keep following along to see how things are going, C. Irritans is such a frustrating parasite - hang in there.

 

[tylersarah]

The blenny had no visible symptoms other than heavy breathing. I did a small w/c to help pH and dilute trace amounts of ammonia or nitrite. I don't believe I should raise SG more than .002 per day.

What about flukes?

Thanks for posting

 

[caribfan]

Heavy breathing is definitely a symptom of flukes. A FW dip is not a bad idea if the fish is relatively strong. Many sources recommend as long as 20 minutes, but you should start go see flukes coming around the three minute mark if the fish is infected.

Have you done a FW dip before?

 

[tylersarah]

Yes, but it was on a clam (it cured the clam btw).

I read that Prazipro is a cure for flukes, I have some and I would imagine it's not nearly as stressful as a freshwater dip. Where flukes would come from, a snail? I have no idea. It's extremely disheartening to watch the fish you've had for so long die one by one.

 

[caribfan]

Prazi is definitely the right treatment for flukes and should be, IMO, part of every quarantine process.

The nice thing about a FW dip Is that for a heavily infected fish, it will provide immediate relief. Sometimes Prazi will not act quickly enough if the fish is completely covered.

I once got more than 20 flukes off of a purple tilefish from a 5 minute dip. Had I not done that, I'm not sure the fish would have lasted long enough for the Prazi to kick in.

It's important that the fish is strong enough to sustain the dip though, if its on its last legs, the dip could kill it. Also, it's important to match temp and pH. I also like to oxygenate the water with an airstobe prior to performing a dip.

You didn't mention, was the Benny heavily infested with ich when it died?

 

[tylersarah]

The blenny didn't have any ich spots or symptoms, nor did the Tomini tang that died 3 days ago - they all started breathing heavily and died a few days later, meanwhile I was checking my refractometer, testing pH, ammonia, nitrite, temp, doing small water changes etc. Today the Muelleri is breathing heavily (previously had spots, none currently visible) and that is why I am so concerned.

I did a few gallon w/c this morning and will do a few more soon to make it ~25% and then dose Prazipro.

 

[triggreef]

Without reading the last several posts and FWIW, I would ditch hypo altogether. I've never seen a "proven method" with so many bad results. It seems like every day someone posts a thread that says something like I used hypo but somehow I got ich anyway.

It was probably a bad idea to go straight from your reef to 1.010 - I would try to make that a much smaller increase as you bring it up like maybe .002 per day.

I strongly suggest TTM for your remaining fish. Then quarantine them through your fallow period with no drugs in the tank. Its really only a half hour of work every third day for 4 transfers. Not one bit stressful on the fish as many people use for an excuse. Its not like your tearing down a tank to catch them and throw them in a bag for a half hr ride home and then float them for a half hour and put them in a new environment.... Its a fast catch and toss into another can thats exactly the same as where you just pulled them from.

On a side note, I've done a ton of TTM in the last several months, and never lost a single fish besides one hawkfish who jumped out of my container and unfortunately landed in a bucket of bleach. Otherwise I'm confident I'd still have him as well.

Good luck to you, and anyone trying TTM dont keep your cleaning (bleach) bucket too close while your transferring fish!

 

[caribfan]

I agree on the hypo method, I'm just not sold on it, as i've stated before, I'm a cupramine diehard.

I realize that doesn't help you at this moment. If I were you, I would take my most healthy, robust fish, that is showing signs of distress and give it a 5 minute fresh water dip. If it's not showing too many signs of distress after five minutes, take it to 7 and then 10 if everything looks good.

If you see flukes come off, you'll know that's your problem and then you can make a decision about dipping the rest of the fish. If it truly is flukes, many times a dip can remove the flukes from their gills and help to provide immediate relief. If they are too weak in your opinion to dip, start prazi immediately.

I'm still not convinced it's not just a environmental issue from the low S.G., but like I said before, I just don't know what happens to a fishes biology at the lower S.G. levels.

One thing I am sure of though, if a fish is not showing many signs of ich, it's highly doubtful that a cause of death would be from ich.

Keep us posted, its so disappointing to lose fish.

 

[tylersarah]

Caribfan - I read your profile, what is your first name? (This is Sarah, btw) That is excellent advice and I appreciate all you've contributed, I've been checking your responses all day. Currently, I don't feel the hawkfish or the Muelleri are in a healthy enough state to withstand a freshwater dip. I have prazi in both tanks, all other conditions are optimal and if it is indeed flukes, the prazi should start to work.

I went to check on the fish in the basement, didn't turn on any lights and Ziggy, the Muelleri saw me pop my head around the corner at the top of the stairs and came swimming towards me - what a great fish. He has always recognized me, most likely because I'm the one with the blackworms.

I'm the person that fills 20 empty gallons of RO water at the grocery store for years, even in winter for water changes (eventually I got a new place and hooked up a RO system). I'm the person that would stir tanks with spatulas while the power was out to maintain oxygen. I'm the person that makes homemade food blends because they are the freshest, healthiest I'm aware of. I'm the person that will drop anything (including my VISA) and care for the tank, 12 hours +

And now I'm the person that's failing, it's really hard. I have so much respect for these critters and nature I can't just brush this off. I'm also a volunteer at the local humane society and help rehabilitate wildlife to do my part in reversing what man-kind has ruined. No, I'm not a hippy.

Tyler said that he didn't think we'd lose any of the fish in QT because they are in such good hands. Well, maybe that's precisely the problem, they are in the care of hands, not the ocean.

Sarah

 

[caribfan]

Hey Sarah, my name is Matt. I probably should update my profile and signature, but for some reason I've never gotten around to it, kind of lazy of me for how much time I spend on this site.

My heart goes out to you for your efforts, I too share many of the same sentiments as you do. I recently lost two venustus angels within a couple days of receiving them and was really frustrated with the situation.

If Ziggy is still that responsive, I would be encouraged by that. I've always felt that if you can maintain a fishes appetite, you stand a really good chance of overcoming whatever malady your fighting.

I would focus on keeping the parameters rock solid and continue monitoring the fish. If it's flukes, you can sometimes see them on the surface of the fish if you look very closely-though I will tell you it's very difficult sometimes.

Any chance we could get a video? If you've never done a FW dip on a fish it can be somewhat nerve-racking, especially if it's a fish you are really attached to. Without being there and seeing the fish with my own eyes, I'd be nervous to advise you to do the FW dip if you think the condition of the fish are deteriorating.

Chin up, you're doing everything you can.