Urgent help needed.

peiloy3196

peiloy3196

New member
I guess that my QT procedure isn't up to mark and I will have to review it but I now have somewhat of crisis on my hands. On the weekend I noticed my hippo tang seemed to have ich. I didn't do anything as I have seen small bouts of ich come and go on the hippo and fast forward to today I have lost one regal angel, one bicolor blenny, three anthias. They didnt show any symptoms until yesterday when all the death started. The only symptom being lethargy and not eating. Left in The tank I have one yellow tang, the hippo tang, one anthia, one pygmy angel, two firefish and one mandarin. The anthias fins look tattered and the yellow and hippo have a white powdery film over them. The pygmy, firefish and mandarin do not show any symptoms. Is this ich or velvet? I know I need to catch all and medicate at this point also going through a fallow period, but how do I deal with the mandarin. Also any suggestions on catching firefish? It's a 225 gal and all the rock is joined together so pulling is not an option.
 
When was the last fish introduced? Crypto (ich) doesn't usually kill quickly, velvet does. The rapid onset of multiple deaths would indicate velvet, but more information is needed.
 
The last fish was added about three weeks ago which was the regal. This is where my QT practice failed me. I did a two week observation QT with it and put it into my reef. I did this because I know they are fragile and now I have paid dearly for it. Is there any other info that you need that I maybe omitting?
 
Thanks guys. Any ideas on how to catch firefish. Also I have been through the stickies so I must be missing it, how do I handle the mandarin feeding and copper wise?
 
For the mandarin, tank transfer is probably the best method assuming you have ample supply of pods for nutrition (unless it takes prepared foods). Also, two weeks is nowhere near sufficient for QT. Observational QT is 8 weeks minimum; somewhat less if you have a proactive treatment protocol for ich and flukes.
 
I agree about the QT. It was my mistake and I've paid the price. As to the tank transfer method, I thought that only worked for ich? I can use this method for velvet also?
 
Ok so the saga continues. I've been in reef keeping for over 15 years and never had this much trouble. So in a nutshell two weeks ago my tank brace cracked and I was in crisis mode. I had to break it down and so had to move my coral. I have a coral qt with live rock that I have a few fish in it that I had to move the coral to. The tank that I had to pull was the tank I had been running fallow for suspected velvet while my fish from that tank are in another hospital tank. So I have read that the fallow period for velvet was 6 weeks and at that point I had reached 7 weeks so I figured that it was safe to move the coral without risk of velvet transmission. Well I was wrong two weeks later which is this morning, my blue headed wrasse and flame angel in the coral qt had labored breathing and were on their side. I quickly intervened and moved all fish (wrasse, flame angel, flame hawk, three anthias) from that tank to the hospital tank with the other sick fish with a freshwater dip in between. The wrasse did not make it, the angel is hanging on lying on its side with laboured breathing. All others look fine. I did not see any other symptoms other than this morning with the labored breathing and listlessness of the two fish. The wrasse had a lesion on its side but I am not sure if this was from getting pulled into my vortech as he was barely swimming when I saw the tank, or if this was a symptom. So I guess my question at this point is am I dealing with velvet or something else as I am a little surprised that after 7 weeks it was transferred on my coral. Or did I misenterperate the time needed to be fallow for velvet.

Also on another note the fish that have been in hospital for all these weeks have not been cured. I was using cupramine at 0.5 tested daily and my blue tang kept showing flashing and white sheen every couple of weeks. I removed all copper and started chloroquine phosphate in the form of ich shield powder four days ago as the cupramine was not working. I am stumped at this point and would appreciate any help as how to move forward.
 
Copper doesn't work reliably against Amyloodinium (velvet). Some strains of velvet can actually develop immunity to copper concentration of up to 1.2 ppm, more twice the maximum therapeutic level fish can handle.
CP should always be the treatment of choice when velvet is suspected. There is also a more than good chance that CP will treat Cryptocaryon, Brooklynella and Uronema. So it is a good choice in case the diagnosis isn't certain.
 
Thanks. For the help. Is it strange that the velvet survived for 7 weeks fallow period and was transferred on coral at that time though? If by chance it is brook or Uronema is there a fallow period for my coral or will they forever be infected?
 
Brook and velvet should have the same fallow period of 6 weeks.
But no fallow period will eliminate uronema from a system - uronema is opportunistic and able to live just fine without a fish as host. It actually lives most of the time "peacefully" of bacteria and I have a bit of suspicion that uronema infections of fish start of as bacterial infections of wounds and that uronema initially feeds of those bacteria before actually attacking the fish itself.
 
So if uronema only attacks fish with bacterial infections then I guess I could rule that out. If brook and velvet have a six week fallow period then what could it be if I was fallow for seven? How should I proceed from here?
 
ImageUploadedByTapatalk1432418276.327875.jpg

So a lesion has appeared on the head of the angel. Does the attached picture help identify anything? His fins are tattered too.
 
That is a possibility with this as my yellow tang kept swimming up to it when I put it into the hospital tank. It still doesn't explain what I am dealing with though. I've pretty much decided since my tank is broken down to bleach my live rock and start fresh. I don't know what to do with my coral though. How long do I wait before reintroducing to my system? How can I be sure it doesn't bring back in whatever I am dealing with?
 
From the original DT the surviving fish are still in treatment in a separate room in a hospital tank. The fish that were in my coral qt have been there for over a month without any issues until I had to unexpectedly move coral from the DT into that tank. The DT was fallow for 7 weeks at this point. Within two weeks of moving the coral into the QT the symptoms that I originally battled in the DT started. I lost a flame angel and a wrasse (both on the same morning). The surviving fish from the QT (Anthias and hawkfish) were moved to the hospital tank with the other medicated fish and are going through CP treatment. They are all fine at this point.

Yesterday since my DT is already down I bleached all my liverock etc as I dont want to battle this again. I am in the process of moving my coral QT to an area remote of my DT so that there is no risk of cross contamination. My issue now would be can I ever move the coral back to the DT if I dont even know or understand what I am battling?
 
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