I want to provide an update with running lower dose chloroquine phosphate. I tested it on 2 powder blue tangs and 1 clown tang. As most of you know these fish are parasite magnets. All three were purchased from an online vendor, sight unseen, which has a reputation of sending out whatever they have regardless of health, but they do offer a guarantee. Both powder blue tangs came in skinny. One of the powder blue tangs presented with bilateral elevated, inflamed, red circular areas at the base of the pectoral fins. This could have been trauma, but I wouldn't expect it to be bilateral. It could have been a bacterial or parasitic infection. The tank was dosed at 9-13mg/gallon CP. The powder blue with the pectoral fin defect passed away within two days. The other powder blue was VERY skittish and constantly hid. The first few days he was only by the bubble wand and by high flow, which makes me believe he may have had a parasitic infection, but I did not see any physical signs. The clown tang was big and fat, but also very skittish. By day 3-5 the powder blue was no longer only in the high flow/bubble wand area, but hiding at a low flow area. After 7 days API general cure was added. After 9 days the fish were moved to a DT as my QT is very sterile with some PVC, one power head, one heater, and a bubble wand. Most sensitive fish do not thrive in this environment. Also the reflection off the glass was causing unneeded stress on the fish, and they were not eating. I did not do a second dose of API general cure. We are on day four in their isolated DT area, and so far they have started eating and are less lethargic. I wanted to keep them longer in QT, but it seems the stress would have caused premature death. The QT is still running in case they need to be pulled and remedicated. Currently I am not seeing any signs of a parasitic or any other infection. The clown tang is mostly eating live black worms and a little bit of frozen mysis. The powder blue tang is only eating film algae off rock and glass. He did eat some mysis but then quickly spit it out. I think it will take a few more days before he will eat prepared food, but I think it is definitely possible.
At this time I am not planning to add any more fish into my tank. If I would there are a couple of things I would change.
1. Add sand and rock to the tank and add a little more CP to make up for any absorption that would happen.
2. Daily smaller water changes, rather than 30-40% every three days.
3. Would have liked to get 10-14 days minimum in medicated QT.
4. Would have liked to do a second dose of API general cure 5-7 days after the initial dose.
Overall I am content with the level of CP that I used, and time will only tell if the fish have any lingering infection.
