Saving a Neglected Passer, Help!

[odst223]

Hello Everyone,

I need help with a combination of advice to heal a sickly passer angel. Before I start, I just want to say I work at a LFS and this website has been my sole learning experience for giving wholesome and ethical fishkeeping advice, so thanks!

About three weeks ago we got in a "Show Size" Passer Angel around 9-10" on shipment. It was placed in a 72 bow of predators and had a nice chunk bitten out of it by a 12" Triple Tail Wrasse. It was moved to the available 24x18" Copper system and that's when I knew noone was going to buy a non-reef safe Angelfish over three hundred dollars in Pensacola. Lo and behold, it started laying on the bottom, but was very active when I visited it and I fell in love. I bought it for cost above $200 in an attempt to rescue it from its terrible treatment (I am not management so I couldn't get it a bigger tank).

I take the Passer home to my 90 gallon FOWLR (I am getting a 180 or 240 as soon as I move in three months, I just couldn't let the fish die in a two foot tank. I have started varying treatments and don't have room for a quarantine in the apartment, all understand I am treating in the DT.

So Here it goes.

1. How old is this aquarium?
9-10 weeks

2. If less than six months old, what is ammonia level?
0, nitrite 0, nitrates stay under 20ppm

3. What is SG of this aquarium? How measured?
.023, IO and Fluval hydrometers

4. When was the last fish added to this aquarium?
Passer Angel, three days ago. He is housed with a 4" Macucepileps tang, 3" Yellow Tang, and 2' Zebra Moray. Tank has 50 pounds of live rock (Live Rock shipment comes in this week to finish it out, once I cure it in a Rubbermaid). Filtration is a fluval 406 filled with rubble rock, no pads, and I removed chemipure to start Cupramine.

5. Was it quarantined? If so, how? And how long? Was it prophylactically treated? How?
Freshwater Dip, 7 minutes (matching ph, temp, bubbler, so on) and an uncountable number of Flukeworms came off

6. If you are using a copper based medication, which one? How often do you measure level? When?
Started cupramine after reading carefully three days ago. Testing daily, crushed coral (was advised to be siphoned for a FOWLR but not during copper treatment) is soaking it all up thus far. I was shooting for .25 as not to hurt the angelfish

7. If you are using hyposalinity, how did you calibrate your refractometer?
N/A

8. Please describe in detail, the appearance of the fish? If there is one or more pimples, are they lumpy? What color?
One mostly cloudy eye and one partially cloudy.

9. Please describe the behavior of the fish as best you can. Is it acting reclusive? Is it always up towards the top of the aquarium? Is it avoiding light? How active is the fish?
Very outgoing, no more laying on the bottom once I FW dipped. Im assuming the flukes cut off oxygen. Swims well, eats well, does whatever he wants and runs the tank after only two days. No unusual behavior thus far.

10. Is the fish eating? What?
I decided to do as much research as possible and found this article: http://animal-world.com/encyclo/marine/angels/king.php GREAT READ. I am feeding Formula Two Medium Pellets once to twice a day with one drop kent garlic, one drop kent Zoecom, and metronidazol. I will be buying and feeding sponges when they come in on shipment and avoiding meaty foods. Nori every other day. Rods Fish only every third day.

Finally, how do I continue to treat Flukes and cloudy eyes? Do I continue Cupramine? Do I buy a UV sterilizer? I read that epsom salt will treat the eyes. I emailed seachem and they said I could mix cupramine and epsom salt.

Thanks again! pictures soon to come.

 

[HumbleFish]

First, the flukes - you need to treat with Prazipro, 2 rounds 5 days apart. Do a 20-25% WC in-between rounds 1 & 2. You might even need to do a 3rd round. You can use Prazi w/Cupramine, but it cuts down on Prazi's overall effectiveness so it would be best to remove the Cupramine (for now)..

The cloudy eyes are probably being caused by the flukes as well. There is a possibility that it's a bacterial infection setting it, but deal with the flukes first. See how the fish looks after 2 rounds of Prazi before plotting your next move.

 

[Newsmyrna80]

+1 on the Prazi. Are you still using copper? If so why? What symptoms, other than flukes, is the angel exhibiting? I could be wrong but I don't think angels like copper all that we'll. BTW kudos on rescuing this poor fish!

 

[odst223]

I was initially using copper to fight ich on the macucepileps. After day 4 of copper the the ich was all gone but broke out on the angel. He got rapidly worse (head to toe ich and laying down, I read after that copper is terrible on angels supposedly) so I removed the copper with carbon and he is mostly better except for the eyes. Im ordering prazipro tonight and I also bought Doctor G's antibacterial yesterday to start feeding for the eyes. The angel has currently swollen eyes and light ich. The tang, while showing no bodiy ich anymore is hiding by the heater and rubbing. The yellow tang is symptom free as is the zebra moray.

 

[odst223]

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[HumbleFish]

Four days of copper isn't long enough to completely eradicate Ich. IMO & E; it takes at least 30 days. And any fish that shared water with the infected must also be treated. Even if they aren't showing any spots. With Cupramine, the minimum effective dosage is 0.35 mg/L - and that dosage might be better tolerated by the angel. Take 3 or 4 days to get it to 0.35; that will help the angel adjust to it.

The swollen eyes are likely a secondary bacterial infection from the Ich.

 

[HumbleFish]

You would need a couple of large tanks to do it, but another treatment option is tank transfer. Maybe you'd have access to a couple of large tanks working at a LFS.

Look here: http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1996525

 

[odst223]

Four days of copper isn't long enough to completely eradicate Ich. IMO & E; it takes at least 30 days. And any fish that shared water with the infected must also be treated. Even if they aren't showing any spots. With Cupramine, the minimum effective dosage is 0.35 mg/L - and that dosage might be better tolerated by the angel. Take 3 or 4 days to get it to 0.35; that will help the angel adjust to it.

The swollen eyes are likely a secondary bacterial infection from the Ich.

I had read the sand/CC bed would soak up the copper, so my thought is that after 4 days (the forums said 4-5 average) that the copper would stop being absorbed and be in the water column. As soon as the fourth day came the angel got super worse and I had also read the angels can be severely sensitive even with time so I panicked and ran carbon.

The tank change method is arguable from what i've read because it can't fully wipe it just mostly destroy ich. And no, I can't use large tanks for personal use or I would.

disclaimer: As soon as I move out of my 2nd floor apartment and into m house in 3-4 months I will have a much larger DT and a proper 9-week QT.

EDIT: I will research this thread more and use it as a way of dropping as many parasites off as possible.

 

[odst223]

One last question, If I were to use tank transfer, since my DT is infect, do I dry out all my Live rock to kill off all the ich but lose my bacteria?

 

[HumbleFish]

One last question, If I were to use tank transfer, since my DT is infect, do I dry out all my Live rock to kill off all the ich but lose my bacteria?

You never want to use rock or sand when doing TT. Just a bare bottom tank, a heater/thermometer, and something to provide gas exchange (air stone or powerhead). An eggcrate cover is also a good idea to keep the fish from jumping out - but try to keep everything as simple as possible.

When you do TT, everything has to be sterilized & thoroughly dried in-between transfers. Which is why you need two tanks, and two sets of equipment. Some sterilize with bleach - I've always used vinegar. Failure to be thorough about this is probably why some people say TT doesn't completely eradicate Ich. You even want to go so far as transferring as little water as possible with the fish.

Your only other treatment options would be hypo (no experience with that) or Chloroquine Phosphate (very hard to get).

 

[lagatbezan]

Hey, I think Petco still has their $1 per gallon sale. see if you can pick up a 30-40g tank and put all the fish in it and treat them (or get two tanks and do the tank transfer method). It requires less medication, less water you need to make for water changes and easier to control since the rocks and substrates absorb a lot of the medications.
I would start treating again with a very low dose of cupramine and slowly over a week raise it up to .35-.4. like others say the swollen eye is probably from a secondary infection due to the ich and could be treated with antibiotics. again i think you would have an easier time with a smaller qt.

 

[MitchSutherland]

Buy some Chloroquine Phosphate($15). Treat with prazi and any other antibiotics needed for the time needed and then hit them with CP. It doesn't get sucked up by live rock or sand. And it will rid you tank of ich including your rock.

 

[odst223]

Hey guys just wanna hop in with an update, I started Dr. G's 2 days ago and all symptoms except for the swollen eyes on the angel have disappeared. We will seoe how they are doing in a week but since I don't have an RO unit and have to transport it all this may be the alternative.

 

[lhm nole]

Hey guys just wanna hop in with an update, I started Dr. G's 2 days ago and all symptoms except for the swollen eyes on the angel have disappeared. We will seoe how they are doing in a week but since I don't have an RO unit and have to transport it all this may be the alternative.

I have used maracyn for cloudy eyes on angels with great success seems like when they get ich the cloudy eyes comes shortly after... BTw I have meet you at Petland you bagged some corals for me a few weeks back.. Also I would drop the salinity down to 1.018 or so if you have no inverts and just base rock