Copper treatment almost finished

tcoyle · Jun 7, 2016

I am just a day away from finishing my copper treatment on my wrasse using Copper Power. Fish has already been in QT for over 30 days and 2 rounds of Prazi.

Should I do a water change and run carbon for a few days before putting him in DT, or just catch him and put him in DT?

Humblefish · Jun 7, 2016

tcoyle said:
just catch him and put him in DT?

^^ If you are SURE Cu has been at therapeutic levels for 30 days and the fish looks flawless, this is what I would do. DO NOT lower the copper level prior to transferring.

tcoyle · Jun 7, 2016

well I am doing the 14 day treatment for copper. I am still not sure on the different schools of thought on 30 day vs. 14 days. Might just wait until Saturday then and that would be closer to 20 days.

Humblefish · Jun 7, 2016

tcoyle said:
well I am doing the 14 day treatment for copper. I am still not sure on the different schools of thought on 30 day vs. 14 days. Might just wait until Saturday then and that would be closer to 20 days.

14 days gets the job done for ich & velvet, but only if you tested the Cu level every single day to ensure it never dropped below therapeutic. Cannot stress the importance of this enough! And then you don't want to lower the Cu level (i.e. the shield) before transferring the fish into your DT or into a HT for observation.

The "30 day rule" for copper came about because we figured most people would mess up and not maintain the copper at continuous therapeutic levels. So, there's a bit of a safety net built-in when you treat with copper for 30 days, but even 30 days is not foolproof.