FOWLR ich treatment.

[Miami Reef]

Hello. If someone had a FOWLR (fish with LIVE ROCK) in a large tank. No corals nor inverts.

What is the best way to treat for ich? Rocks will absorb copper and will be expensive and risky to dose FYI.

How effective is hyposalinity in tank? How would you treat ich in a FOWLR tank?

With a lot of live rocks, obviously.

 

[captainbeardly]

A lot of tanks in my area run hypo tanks to keep ICH down as they tend to fall off and die due to the low salinity

 

[dedragon]

humblefish or jay hemdal may be able to help if you hit them up, not an expert like them but they are very friendly and knowledgable

 

[srcleary]

I have heard good things about Hypo. But you have to follow the system perfectly and preferably have an auto top off to maintain the salinity. And if you have a lot of life on the live rock, it will die and possibly spike the tank. Some people have learned this the hard way. Personally I would do the Hypo but research carefully and make sure there is nothing that can spike the ammonia.

 

[Miami Reef]

I have heard good things about Hypo. But you have to follow the system perfectly and preferably have an auto top off to maintain the salinity. And if you have a lot of life on the live rock, it will die and possibly spike the tank. Some people have learned this the hard way. Personally I would do the Hypo but research carefully and make sure there is nothing that can spike the ammonia.

I do have a lot of life in the rocks, but I think seachem prime works in “freshwater” correct? I can do large water changes daily if needed.

 

[srcleary]

I do have a lot of life in the rocks, but I think seachem prime works in “freshwater” correct? I can do large water changes daily if needed.

While prime will lock the ammonia for 48 hours, I would not recommend depending on it. The ammonia spike, even with large water changes could cost you loss of fish. I have researched this a bit because I have three eels that were exposed to ICH and I have to "clean" them before putting them into the display. I have the option of TTM or Hypo. If I use the Hypo, I will have to remove my live rock as it has too much life on it. But most of the life I don't want anyway, So I will dry it out and start over.

Most of the horror stories I read are from people leaving the live rock in the tank (live rock with lots of life and/or algae) and having the tank spike. Some used prime but still lost fish and said they would never do it that way again. Do you have another bio media source other than the live rock? Could you take out the rock and put I a tub for 30 days?

 

[Miami Reef]

The whole purpose is treating the fish without removing the rocks. If I need to remove the rocks, I’d rather just catch the fish while I’m at in. But that’s not going to happen.

Has anyone used COPPER in a FOWLR? I know it had to be done before.

 

[Pimba]

Bump as I'm keen on this

 

[Miami Reef]

Well, I’ve been doing it for over a week and it’s been working for me. The rocks do not absorb an absurd amount of copper. It’s very minimal and testing daily and topping it off will ensure copper never ever dips below therapeutic.

A lot of the information on the forums is just repeated information that people heard. The people that never tried to dose copper in DT are the ones that sound like they’ve had a disaster from it.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

The whole purpose is treating the fish without removing the rocks. If I need to remove the rocks, I’d rather just catch the fish while I’m at in. But that’s not going to happen.

Has anyone used COPPER in a FOWLR? I know it had to be done before.

I've used Coppersafe in FOWLR, but not ones with lots of rock. Do you intend to keep corals in this tank later on? If so, be wary, but if not, then there is little to worry about - the amount of copper that could be later released won't harm fish unless the pH plunges drastically low for some reason.

Hyposalinity at a specific gravity of 1.009 for 35 days is another option, as you mentioned.

Jay

 

[Joeyh1986]

The whole purpose is treating the fish without removing the rocks. If I need to remove the rocks, I’d rather just catch the fish while I’m at in. But that’s not going to happen.

Has anyone used COPPER in a FOWLR? I know it had to be done before.

I’m kinda looking for some answers as well… I’m currently running fritz coppersafe at 2.0ppm in a 75 gallon maybe 60lbs of rock tank is only 10 months old as I’m a newbie haha. But I didn’t QT fish and bought a powder brown tang boom got ich I moved him to a 20 gallon bare bottom emergency situation and used the fritz copper safe. He cleared up colors great eating like a horse stopped all flashing and scratching kept him in there for 30 days problem was I had no luck finding a bigger drilled tank or anyway to house 6 fish while I fallowed tank so I gave up (no inverts or coral and barely would call my rocks live but I dosed main 75 gallon out powder brown back in so far no signs but I wouldn’t do this unless you have a Hanna copper tester and can keep at 2.0ppm but one thing you have to weight in. I’ve been told it will likely never get the cooper back out of that system or it will take water changes and waiting for it to seep out of rocks and sand and that’s probably never gonna happen haha but I was desperate. But it is working all fish seem healthy with no more ich. Oh also remove poly filter if you have it but the bottle does say use normal filtration.

 

[Joeyh1986]

Oh also that’s 2.0ppm with coppersafe the harsh copper I think is only like .25ppm you can kill fish with to much copper I was told but yeah big learning curve for me QT all new fish and I wouldn’t do much as even use a net from anyone else’s tank haha