need some advice.

[Juice It]

I just ordered 5 fish online they shipped out already and I just noticed an ick breakout on my two tangs. They seem ok but clearly have ick. My neighbor gave me a purple tang 2 weeks ago and It has been doing great but I am guessing it was stressed and it caused this outbreak. My other fish in the tank are a clown trigger,lunare wrasse, the 2 tangs and 4 damsels. The tank is a 200 gallon and the new fish coming are a blueface angel, a map puffer, 2 yellow tangs and a flame hawk. I just treated the tank with cupermine and now am wondering although obviously not optimal, will it be ok to put the fish in the treated tank? I have no other options at this point. Any advice in this situation is appreciated as I am still new to this hobby.

Thanks,

Jeff

 

[LisaD]

how long has your tank been set up? what are your water quality parameters? sounds to me like you are moving too fast and may have some compatibility/aggression issues, if not now, then soon.

if at all possible, I would not put the new fish in your treated display. can you pay a decent pet store to isolate them for you for a couple weeks, and treat if necessary? does your neighbor have a QT you can use? is it an option to buy a few large Sterilite or Rubbermaid containers and set them up as QTs?

BTW, do you have a copper test kit, so you can maintain the copper at proper levels? Copper is absorbed by live rock and sand, and it is hard to maintain proper levels. I don't use it, ever, because I have fish that are sensitive. I think puffers are sensitive to copper.

you can consider hyposalinity, but it may affect your biofilter adversely. not a good thing with your fish load. I have used chloroquine phosphate to treat a display with large fish I could not quarantine. it seemed to be effective. however, it's not easy to get. I think national fish pharmacy in Arizona has quinine sulfate, not sure if that's advisable for a display. pershaps someone else could chime in here...

also, not trying to be negative, but the map puffer will outgrow your tank, and a blueface is very much not a beginner fish. you may have trouble down the road with aggression from the clown trigger. flame hawk may be too little to handle the mix...

I hope things go okay for you. I really think you need to take it slower, get a QT set up, and be careful not to overload your tank. Good luck.

 

[Juice It]

Thanks for the reply. My tank has been set up now for a couple months and the water tests fine. I have a test kit that tests for copper and as per directions I am supposed to test tomorrow and repeat dose in 48 hours. All the fish are fairly small clown trigger is 3 inches lunar is 3 1/2 purple tang is 3 and hippo tang is 2 1/2. The new fish sizes are puffer 2 1/2 yellow tangs 2 1/2 to 3 blueface angel is 4 inches and flame hawk is 2 1/2. I would feel strange going to the local fish store since I bought the stuff online but the trash cans could work but I would have to use water from my tank unless making up new water would be ok. I have a 100 gallon R/O tank so I am fine on that end. I just don't know if it would be more stressfull to do that or to just put them in. With the trash cans they would most defiantely be stressed as well. I am ok trying the agression issue but don't want to poison anything. I was told from a guy at the fish store that a copper treated tank is fine as long as the levels aren't too high and I put in the exact dose. I just wanted other opinions to feel comfortable.

 

[LisaD]

I'm not sure what is the best course of action. sometimes QT can be more stressful for new fish, and you know you already have some disease.

It's good to know the fish are small, so the bioload isn't too high.

I'm no disease expert, though I have some experience successfully treating disease. I've also had failures. I had a complete tank wipeout in 2005 because I did not QT fish I assumed were healthy. kind of like your neighbor's tang, I took established fish from my mom's tank and added to my established tank. didn't notice until it was too late that they had velvet (oodinium).

you might want to get the new fish slowly acclimated to fresh salt water the same temp, sg and pH of your tank water, in a bucket, then treat in a formalin bath for the recommended time before adding to your display tank.

also, be prepared to do frequent, large partial water changes in your dt. it may be a lot of work, but it will be worth it to keep your fish healthy.

Here's a good two-part article that I have found very helpful:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.php
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-10/sp/feature/index.php

I wish I felt more sure of what is the best course of action. let's see what others might suggest.

It's not ich, but I had another outbreak of oodinium about a year ago. I treated the display with chloroquine phosphate (effective for oodinium, not sure about ich - see the oodinium article by S. Pro on Reefkeeping as well). I did DAILY netting and hourly dips in formalin/malachite green for the two sickest fish, my dogface puffer and pink tail trigger. I did the dips for at least two weeks. I also fed medicated foods. the fish were looking awful, but both made it and are doing fine now.

 

[prime311]

Well I know what I'd do but you won't like it.


First off, you can't treat a tank with Live Rock or Live Sand with copper it kills off the living stuff on the rock, it kills invertebrate clean up crews, its just bad. These types of medications should only be used in barebottom QT tanks and shame on your LFS for telling you different. The most likely result of treating a Live Rock tank with copper is that you will start another cycle and possibly completely crash your tank.


Secondly, once introduced the only way to get ich out of a tank for sure is to remove the fish. Return the other fish you purchased. You should take your other fish, put them in QT tanks and treat them there. After about a month with no fish in your display and 2 weeks of no signs of ich you can put the fish back in the tank. Do this slowly though, no more then 1 fish per week


After all your fish have been back in your display for at least 3 weeks, then you could begin getting more fish, but not 5 at once, that is awful. You have to remember it is bacteria that keeps your tank safe from ammonia and nitrite. If you have x amount of bacteria handling x amount of load and then double the load all of a sudden you have x amount of bacteria handling 2x load. Makes sense, right? This is why you should add fish slowly to a tank, probably no more then one a month. This allows the bacteria to grow to accommodate the larger load brought on by your new buddy. Also, keep a close eye on your pH and Nitrate, only when you know the bacteria in your tank is handling your current load well enough and if Nitrates are low(5 or less) and pH remains solid then know this is the case.



You don't want another ich outbreak right or any other disease? Ok, any new fish you get(1 at a time!) go into your QT. This way you can find and treat any disease prior to letting the fish in your tank. This is why people qt, to prevent diseases from getting into and crashing a tank. The more fish/livestock you have, the worse a disease outbreak is going to be on your pocketbook. And again, once the tank has disease in it, the only way to surely get rid of it is to remove all the fish and you are back to m first point.


I know this seems like a daunting task, but quite frankly, you are on the fast track to a complete crash of your tank which will likely lead you to either do things the safe way or quit the hobby and I'm just trying to save you more pain down the road.



Rule #1 in Saltwater fishkeeping is to be patient and take things slowly, in the end you, your wallet, and your fish will be all the better off for doing so.

 

[Juice It]

I will see if my local fish store can keep these fish until I get this resolved. On a positive note I know it isn't to some peoples liking but my liverock and corals are "living color" artificial stuff so I guess that helps in this situation. Also no clean up crew in this tank. Thanks for the info and hopefully this will work out.

 

[prime311]

Yes, that definitely does help the situation quite a bit as the copper has nothing to kill off in the tank, assuming your sand isnt live. So you should be fine treating your tank with the copper, just take it slow with the new fish

 

[LisaD]

What is your biological filter if you are not using live rock? Do you have the filtration capacity to support the bioload you will be putting on this tank? While it is probably fortunate that you don't have LR/LS in this tank at this time, I think you will have a better and more stable system down the road if you use live rock of 1-1.5 lbs per gallon for your biological filter. If you haven't already, buy "New Marine Aquarium" by Mike Paletta for the basics on FOWLR systems.

It would be useful if you could describe your system/set-up and provide all your water parameters, recently tested:

sg
pH
temperature
ammonia
nitrite
nitrate

I agree with most of Prime's advice/points, but I don't think it is necessary to take out the fish already in the tank. just treat the tank until the fish are healthy through several generations of the parasite life cycle, and do some large, successive, partial water changes. you don't have to let the tank lie fallow, IMO and IME. ich is never really totally eliminated. healthy fish with good immune systems and suitable environmental conditions can usually avoid coming down with it. ich is associated with stress.

The Steven Pro articles are a good guide, read them both thoroughly. also, make sure it is ich you are seeing, and not velvet or Brooklynella. these are much more serious than ich and harder to deal with.

 

[prime311]

Yes, sorry i actually meant he had to take the fish out to treat if he had LR in the tank. Now I feel kinda dumb not asking if he had LR.

 

[Gotsoup]

I have had success with Copper Power. It did not kill my hermits and my fish handled it very well, including a yellow tang and a Porcupine Puffer. It seems to be less toxic and it does not stain seals. It "claims to be "non binding" to rock or sand. After running Cuprisorb (which is a fantastic product) I was able to keep a shark in my tank, which is incredibly sensitive to copper. I copper powered my tank twice and actually kept the product in it for about 3 month until removing it. Hope this helps a little.

 

[LisaD]

That's interesting. I haven't heard of Copper Power, though I have treated with copper in the past and had some inverts (hermits) survive. I'm leery of copper because some of my fish are sensitive, so I no longer ever use it, but it is very effective for treating ich.

 

[reefer334]

I am a firm believer that all fish carry ich.
You can never get rid of it out of your system if you have fish in it period, even if you run copper all of the time there is ich out there that is immune to copper.

Stress caused by poor water quality and other fish or there environment, can and will cause ich out breaks.

So you can take a fish out qt in copper then put it back in the tank ich free and back it comes due to stress that made it come out in the first place.

I would suggest getting cleaner shrimp to help you out.

How much flow does your tank have?

Also make sure you do not have gill flukes as those are the worst of the worst but easy to take care of I found out after losing a 300 gal full of fish to them.
Use Formalin3 for flukes best to treat them in a qt with this ,but I have had friends add it to there reef tanks with no ill affects but I am not brave enough to try that.

If you use copper use cupramine by seachem, it is the best copper on the market and is easily removesd with seachem's coppersorb.

Also got to the marinedepot.com forums and look for Kelly Jerdlicki's forum on fish disease she is a awesome source for knowledge on that subject .

Remember this is just my opinion and my experiences that I have found that work for me.


HTH



Chris

 

[LisaD]

great points.