New PBT QT

[cham]

Day 17 Update:

She prefers NLS pellets to nori, I'm not sure that I'm happy about this but she will pick at the nori from time to time. I finished a second 6 day round of prazi pro, I don't see any more parasites on her. My goal now is to start feeding this girl quite a bit more. The past 2 1/2 weeks I was feeding twice a day, I just installed an Eheim auto feeder to feed NLS pellets four times a day (noon, 2pm, 4pm and 6pm) and on top of that I will be putting garlic & Vit C soaked nori in twice a day for a total of six feedings a day. Good news is that my Deltec is up to the job. I just started running 4 cups of lignite carbon thru my BRS reactor to remove the prazi and keep the water clean during the heavy feeding. The discharge of the carbon goes into a filter sock to make sure minimal (if any) dust gets in the tank.

There is a bit of algea on the rocks and the glass and I can see that she does graze on that but now that my filtration is back online I cleaned the front glass so I could watch for parasites/issues better. She is extremely angry at her reflection so I've decided to leave the tank lights off and open the window that is right next to the tank. Exterior light keeps the reflections away.

 

[SDguy]

The NLS pellets will keep her nice and fat. Mine doesn't care for nori either, don't sweat it

 

[cham]

The NLS pellets will keep her nice and fat. Mine doesn't care for nori either, don't sweat it

Great news. I knew the NLS stuff is pretty good but I was hoping for more variety/veggies in her diet, especially as she's going through recovery. I imagine the parasites that she had pulled blood directly from her blood stream which would rob her of protein and iron, both of which I believe are in higher levels in NLS meaty formulas.

Here is an interesting before & after only 2 1/2 weeks apart. Both photos were only adjusted using "auto color" in picasa so no playing around with colors.

Before:

After (with flash, glass is dirty):

These were also taken today, I'm not happy seeing the spine and some ribs but I hope that I can get her fattened up with these NLS

Best belly shot I could get

 

[davez104]

I don't have much to add except to say that my powder blue doesn't eat a lot of nori either. It eats NLS and my home made seafood mix mostly. It does pick at the nori, but doesn't show the same enthusiasm as the mimic tang or the scribbled rabbitfish.

Good luck with it, they are a beautiful fish.

Cheers,
Dave.

 

[scuzy]

Well my new pbt is eating mysis, h2o frozen mix, nls pellets , formula one/two flakes and lots of nori strips.

Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

 

[cham]

I respect some long time members like SDguy and some others. I did some google research and I've found many many people that have kept difficult fish like PBT, Moorish Idols and others on NLS alone.

What shocks me is that I've been reefing for over 5 years and I've heard rumblings of NLS from time to time but from what I've been reading they need their own forum. After hours of searching I've not found anyone that has anything bad to say about it. I read that the makers of NLS say that it has enough veggies to feed a tang exclusively. I thought that to be impossible and just empty self promotion but I've found several tang keepers that keep PBT's and Archilles with NLS feedings alone. With that, I promptly removed the nori clip that was going unused and I'm counting on my NLS to get my PBT fat in the coming week or two before introduction to my DT.

In the past I've fed mostly mysis. Two weeks ago I started using Roggers (I had a chance to meet one of my idol tank owners 143gadets, he highly reccomended it) and I just bought NLS for the first time last week. Moving forward I'm going to start feeding NLS to my DT twice a day (via auto feeder) and Roggers Reef Food at night when I get home.

I've had semi pale SPS colors for a long time, I'm wondering if my almost exclusive mysis diet was to blame.

 

[SDguy]

Best belly shot I could get

Belly looks great. Visible spine, not so much, but knowing you dewormed the fish makes me confident that over time, she will fill out nicely. Mine showed a slight spine when I first got it too.

 

[cham]

Belly looks great. Visible spine, not so much, but knowing you dewormed the fish makes me confident that over time, she will fill out nicely. Mine showed a slight spine when I first got it too.

That's great news, thank you SDguy. I'm going to give her one to two more weeks (or more) in QT with NLS four times a day. When she starts to fatten up I'll put her in the DT.

She destroys the NLS pellets when I put them in. Even if it's only been an hour since her last feeding she acts like it's been weeks. That makes me hopeful that she will fatten up.

 

[SDguy]

Be careful, I've gotten so excited about how well a fish in QT is eating, that I've thrown tons of food in, forgetting how it can impact water quality . Keep a close eye on ammonia.

 

[cham]

Belly looks great. Visible spine, not so much, but knowing you dewormed the fish makes me confident that over time, she will fill out nicely. Mine showed a slight spine when I first got it too.

Advice question


Not sure if you read the whole thread but I not only gave her two rounds of prazi but a 50 minute bath in full strenght formalin before she went into QT. I thought about one more formalin bath as I acclimate her to my DT just to "make sure". Good idea or bad idea?

 

[cham]

Be careful, I've gotten so excited about how well a fish in QT is eating, that I've thrown tons of food in, forgetting how it can impact water quality . Keep a close eye on ammonia.

I may be guilty of this :hmm2:

 

[SDguy]

Advice question


Not sure if you read the whole thread but I not only gave her two rounds of prazi but a 50 minute bath in full strength formalin before she went into QT. I thought about one more formalin bath as I acclimate her to my DT just to "make sure". Good idea or bad idea?

At this point I wouldn't do any more prophylactic treatments.

 

[cham]

At this point I wouldn't do any more prophylactic treatments.

Ok thanks

 

[thelostrican]

I would do a freshwater bath with conditioned tap water for 5 minutes...and inspect the water afterwards, if the water looks good, I would proced to keep him a little longer in qt, to fat him up a little more...his eyes look funny, keep the water clean.

When you transfer him to your main, count his pellets up, a little ich should could present itself, in my opinion as long as his eating and strong he should beat it...in my opinion ich is always present...if by one week he still has ich, change the pellets to another brands, I always have spectrum and formula pellets...my powder blue eats 23 to 25 pellets in the morning and brine at night....

Always qt...

 

[cham]

I learned the QT, like many hobbiests, the hard way. The LFS that you trust that swears they dipped them, run prazi in their tanks and treated with copper have often the same diseases that everyone else has.

I agree that ich is common and usually found in unhappy fish that are malnurished, given the wrong environment or just not fit for captivity. Given the right place ich isn't the ultimate enemy but parasites can be.

 

[geaux xman]

do you have any other tangs in your DT?

 

[cham]

Update:

I'm feeding 100% NLS and she seems to be gaining weight. I'm feeding 5 times a day and she is a very hungry fish. I'll give her another week or more in QT to fatten up and watch for parasites. At that point she will have been in QT for right at a month.

 

[SDguy]

Sounds like things are going well!

 

[cham]

Sounds like things are going well!

I hope so. I took some pictures this morning. It seems like the spine is no longer visible towards the front of the fish but still visible towards the tail. I'm impressed at the level of recovery so far, she seems to be putting fat on quite quickly if you compare pics earlier in this thread where the spine is clearly visible nose to tail

The main purpose of this thread is to document a recovery of a sick delicate fish and to get help & advice from other experienced reefers. I hope some of this information is helpful to others. I know I've learned a few new things one of the biggest is the use of NLS pellets. I had never used them before in my DT or QT and they are now a big part of the diet of my fish.

 

[scuzy]

i feed my fish NLS occasionally and they go at it. But i mainly feed mysis and formula 1/2/prime reef often. So far all my tangs are fat like pigs.