Losing fish at night

[TexAg09]

I see possible ich or velvet on the tang. You may try a freshwater dip to begin with. Copper based treatment likely needed at least for tang.
I also ask - How old is tank and how often were you adding fish ? How did you acclimate fish also?
MAY I SUGGEST , TAKING A WATER SAMPLE TO A TRUSTED LFS TO HAVE THEM TEST FOR YOU AND SEE WHAT READINGS THEY COME UP WITH .(ph, ammonia, salinity and nitrates)
What test kit(s) are you using ?

Also, assuming you purchased live rock- After lights out, grab a bright flashlight and see if any possible hitchhikers such as a worm, eel, crab or shrimp have appeared in which you did not purchased, out and exploring the tank )

Most of this is answered in the first post but its been running 4 months and started with dry rock. Test kits are salifert, hanna, and red sea pro. Fish were added somewhat gradually. Cardinals were the first in followed by the clowns about 3-4 days later. After that I waited about a week or two and added the kole tang and blenny. Another week or so passed and I added the hawk and angelfish. All the fish were drip acclimated
Any tips on catching the tang (or other fish) without having to tear down the tank?

well at night you also get ph swing. test first thing in the morning when lights come on once mid day light cycle and then at night. I am wondering if a big ph swing along with ick could be stressing them out. do you have a refugium with a light running opposite schedule it tank light or 24/7? but yeah I would totally up the water changes.

I have an apex so i can monitor the pH constantly. Before starting 2 part it would fluctuate between 7.8 and 8. Since starting 2 part it stays between 8-8.2 (i have the dosing to do mostly at night to offset the nightly swing). No refugium at this time.

As far as the water changes, I was going by Randy's article on constant water changes and it showed diminishing returns past 1% water volume per day. I decided to increase to about 1.5%/day just in case. I may up it some more though as it really doesn't seem like much. The larger water change today definitely seemed to help though so thats kinda a sign it wasnt changing out enough.

One thing i forgot to add is that I did put in a new filter sock about a week ago. Its a mesh sock that i had left over from my last tank (~10 years ago). Figured it would still be good but i soaked it, and a few others, in RODI for about 48 hours. Maybe it had something on it after all that time. Completely forgot about that until i was going through the sump earlier. It has since been removed

 

[vetteguy53081]

I wanted to verify 4 months as it seems like a LOT of livestock quickly over the 4 month period assuming you cycled at least a month. . . . a 3 month period.
Tang- either at night when it is in sleep mode or Fish Trap which trap has worked well for me

 

[TexAg09]

I wanted to verify 4 months as it seems like a LOT of livestock quickly over the 4 month period assuming you cycled at least a month. . . . a 3 month period.
Tang- either at night when it is in sleep mode or Fish Trap which trap has worked well for me

Never knew there was a fish trap like that. Cool
The cycle took about 3-4 weeks. Cant remember honestly. I did use prodibio start-up, dont know if that helped or not but after the cycle i haven't seen any ammonia or nitrite from testing. That probably was a lot of livestock to add that quick but i thought everything was good until now. It was rushed a little as i wanted to have the tank relatively set up before we had our little girl... i knew i wouldn't have much free time after that and so far thats been a correct assumption. The tank may be suffering from that.

 

[King Turkey]

I find that every system is diffrent with water changes o e guy might find one amount works for him but wont for anouther system. If bigger changes helps your system then I'd stick with that.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Never knew there was a fish trap like that. Cool
The cycle took about 3-4 weeks. Cant remember honestly. I did use prodibio start-up, dont know if that helped or not but after the cycle i haven't seen any ammonia or nitrite from testing. That probably was a lot of livestock to add that quick but i thought everything was good until now. It was rushed a little as i wanted to have the tank relatively set up before we had our little girl... i knew i wouldn't have much free time after that and so far thats been a correct assumption. The tank may be suffering from that.

probably and not necessarily a bad things but this hobby invites impulse and generally this is the impact from that. Water management is key when stocking quickly.

 

[TexAg09]

Hi there! Sorry for your loss. There is definitely parasitic activity on the tang. It looks more like ich but it could possibly be velvet, the pictures shows light dusting but it could just be the lighting or angle.

Velvet kills quickly vs. Ich that certain fish can build a temporarily immunity towards... some don't and the parasite takes a foot hold of the immune system.

You'll need to qt all fish with copper solution for 3-4 weeks in separate hospital tank. In addition you need to run your display fallow for approx. 3 months to starve out the parasite.

Do you have the means do this?

I dont have a QT setup currently but it sounds more and more like thats what needs to happen to save the rest of the fish. What kind of time frame or urgency am i looking at to get this set up? Since this will be a long term QT does it need to be set up with a skimmer and live rock? I know the rock cant be put back into the DT after meds, just thinking about what filtration itll need.

 

[TexAg09]

Does velvet look more like a dusting rather than just spots? The lights on the tank are off now and i was looking at it with a flashlight to see if anything was out of place. The tang definitely looks like its covered in a dust

 

[TexAg09]

After looking into velvet that sounds like what's going on. All fish have been removed. Will go to LFS tomorrow to see if I can find treatment. Might be too late but figured I'd at least give it a shot.

 

[LAReefer4Life]

Does velvet look more like a dusting rather than just spots? The lights on the tank are off now and i was looking at it with a flashlight to see if anything was out of place. The tang definitely looks like its covered in a dust

Agreed it looks like velvet and it does kill very quickly if not addressed with copper treatment in separate QT. Sounds like you have a plan to take them to LFS that hopefully has solid QT setup. Do not add any LR or anything from your display as it will cross contaminate the sterile environment. If you end up setting up your own, you'll need get yourself a 20-30 gallon tank, heater, HOB filter, ammonia badge, and bottle of biospira.

 

[Halal Hotdog]

Kole tang definitely has a fine dusting, more indicative of velvet. I strongly believe many deaths associated to ich were actually velvet related. Velvet works quickly and often shows very little sign. Many times the behavior of the fish gives it away. Velvet impairs gas exchange so you see the fish swimming into high flow or fixated to the area with high oxygen content. You also see rapid breathing. If it is velvet then time is of the essence.

 

[Greg P]

If you have time tonight, consider a freshwater dip or better yet an H2O2 dip

Hydrogen Peroxide

** This information was originally posted here: https://humble.fish/community/index.php?threads/hydrogen-peroxide.21/ ** Hydrogen Peroxide *** The information contained here is subject to frequent changes as I experiment and learn more about the usefulness of H2O2 *** What It Treats – Provides...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[BeejReef]

good luck w your fish rescue

 

[TexAg09]

Well this couldnt really have picked a worse time to happen, but thats how it works. I got all of the fish out of the tank yesterday evening. Then our power went out last night from a cold front so we took our daughter and dogs over to my parents house for the night to stay warm. Came back this morning and everything is still alive, but not looking the best. I went out and got a QT tank and cupramine. Thankfully petco has their dollar per gallon sale right now but unfortunately all they had left was a 40b. I got it but may return it as that seems pretty large for a QT, the fish are in a 29 gallon tub at the moment which should last a while. Have RODI warming to do a FW dip then ill look into how to use the cupramine.