Clowns losing color in QT

Idoc · Oct 6, 2017

Ive had these clowns in my QT for over a month now... completed 10 days Metroplex, 30 days copper, and one dose of PraziPro (2nd dose coming tomorrow). Their beautiful black accent colors have faded drastically...1st pic is when I fittest brought them home. 2nd/3rd pics are their colors now.

Will their color come back once all meds are done and they are living in their new DT home? Is this caused by stress of the meds or possibly from their food?

Pictures now (smaller clown top pic, larger clown bottom pic):

nautical_nathaniel · Oct 6, 2017

What are you feeding them? They look fat but a varied and healthy diet will usually help with coloration. It could also be due to their environment, not a whole lot of colors or light in that quarantine tank so they may be naturally toned down too in order to blend in a little.

Idoc · Oct 6, 2017

pensacola-aquarist said:
What are you feeding them? They look fat but a varied and healthy diet will usually help with coloration. It could also be due to their environment, not a whole lot of colors or light in that quarantine tank so they may be naturally toned down too in order to blend in a little.

I'm feeding them frozen food. The bag tore so i had to discard it, so I don't recall the brand name... friend have ut to me to try. I do recall it was chopped up mysis shrimp and a bunch of other stuff. I feed once a feat in the evening and have to tear up the food into smaller pieces for them.

I didn't think about them changing color to their environment. Maybe that's the case since their stress level for environment has to be pretty low... but they have had several prophylactic meds did far.

Idoc · Oct 8, 2017

pensacola-aquarist said:
What are you feeding them? They look fat but a varied and healthy diet will usually help with coloration. It could also be due to their environment, not a whole lot of colors or light in that quarantine tank so they may be naturally toned down too in order to blend in a little.

I'm convinced... it was the stress from the 30+ days off copper that caused my Clowns to lose their color. I'm a week out from completing the copper treatment and their dark colors are returning! My research was showing stress as the major cause of fish losing their color. I guess the copper treatment was stressful to their systems.

nautical_nathaniel · Oct 8, 2017

Idoc said:
Im convinced... it was the stress from the 30+ days off copper that caused my Clowns to lose their color. I'm a week out from dripping the copper treatment and their dark color s are returning! My research was showing stress as the major cause if fish losing their color. I guts three copper treatment was stressful to their systems.

Nice to know, thanks for the update. I'll keep this situation in mind if it ever comes up again!