Need help at wits end.

[flfireman1]

So about 3 weeks ago I added a powder blue tank to my fish population against my better judgment. Low and behold he infected the entire aquarium with Ich. I was able to remove what fish I could and began treating with copper in a 55 gallon hospital tank. I'm using coppersafe and was originally dosing at 1 ppm.
After further reading on how complicated the coppersafe dosing actually is I've slowly picked up the level to about 2 ppm.
I was planning on releasing the fish back into the display after the 4th week. But about 2 days ago I began noticing very heavy breathing in the fish and swimming up against the power heads. I dipped a couple of the fish in freshwater and saw a couple of flukes. So I treated with Prazipro.
Today the fish look no better and have developed what appears to be Ich or velvet. See pictures.
Would a freshwater dip help alleviate some of there symptoms? They are still eating well. What else could I treat with?

 

[DeepBrew]

Maybe @melypr1985 or @4FordFamily can help you.

Also, #reefsquad may have someone around this morning.

 

[PSLReefer]

Look bad. Sounds like it may be too late to save them. If they are swimming into the powerhead stream there's not much time left, unfortunately.

 

[aykwm]

It looks like velvet and not ich, you need to treat all your fish in the tank and not just the tang with infection. Symptoms of velvet are heavy breathing and swimming to the flow.
Copper treatment using coppersafe should be administered at 1.5-2, below that its ineffective, i advise do it again or track how many days the fish has been since you raised the level to 2.

I also advise doing formalin acriflavine bath, if thats not available then FW bath. This will remove some parasites from gills and skin providing relief for fish.

Be sure to act fast and treat all fish as velvet is very fast.

Best of luck.

 

[aykwm]

Sounds like it may be too late to save them. If they are swimming into the powerhead stream there's not much time left, unfortunately.

as long as its still breathing its not too late. The best thing to do right now is a bath in formalin or acriflavine or FW. This will remove a lot of the parasites and in most cases save the fish (you still need to treat with copper)

 

[jsker]

I am thinking Ich, an I would suggest treating with metroplex, seachme focus, vitamin C, and Mr @Humblefish great suggestion B-12. Mix these with your frozen and the focus will bind everything to the food so that the fish will ingest the meds and vitamins. The Vitamins are good for boosting the immune system, healing, stress and antibiotics are good for treating the infection.

 

[lilchris_357]

Sorry to hear you are having troubles. Here's what I would do but I'm no expert. I would give them a 90 min Acriflavine bath via Ruby Reef Rally or if that's not available you can use Fungus cure. Then I would get your copper to a therapeutic level, 2 ppms and last I would hit them with the trifecta Metroplex, Furan 2 and Kanaplex to address what appears to be a bacteria infection on your Vlamingi. Also I would wait for the advise of the experts @Humblefish, @Melpyr1985, @ngoodermuth

 

[flfireman1]

Actually I do have Acriflavine from fishvet. I prepared a 5 gallon bucket and as per instructions did a 5 ml dose. How long should they stay in there?

 

[lilchris_357]

90 mins is good unless they are showing signs of distress.

 

[aykwm]

90 minutes would be enough, make sure you have a lot of aeriation as it depletes oxygen. Remove if fish is stressed

 

[flfireman1]

Ok. I'm doing this just to rule out velvet. Since when they originally started showing symptoms was 2 days ago. I'm assuming velvet is much quicker acting

 

[melypr1985]

Yeah, that appears to be velvet with a secondary bacterial infection. I also suggest starting over the clock for copper treatment. This time around keep the level at 2ppm and be sure to dose the new water for waterchanges with copper before adding it to the hospital tank.
The acriflavin dip will help arrest the infection before it gets worse and hopefully allow time for antibiotics to take effect. You'll need kanaplex and possibly furan2 + metroplex to take care of that infection.

 

[flfireman1]

Yeah, that appears to be velvet with a secondary bacterial infection. I also suggest starting over the clock for copper treatment. This time around keep the level at 2ppm and be sure to dose the new water for waterchanges with copper before adding it to the hospital tank.
The acriflavin dip will help arrest the infection before it gets worse and hopefully allow time for antibiotics to take effect. You'll need kanaplex and possibly furan2 + metroplex to take care of that infection.

Ok I have Furan2, kanaplex and metroplex. Can I dose all of this together with the coppersafe treatment?? I understand Mettoplez and Kanaplex can be added directly to the food.

 

[prsnlty]

Another medicated food that even the finicky eaters will eat is dr. G's anti-parasitic caviar or the frozen and frozen anti-bacterial RX. Powder blue tangs seem to be susceptible to flukes at any minor little stressor. Mine is a very good example of that and this is what I feed when issues arise. I suggest that you do as instructed above but this is just added help since it has spread so far.

 

[melypr1985]

Ok I have Furan2, kanaplex and metroplex. Can I dose all of this together with the coppersafe treatment?? I understand Mettoplez and Kanaplex can be added directly to the food.

Yes, you can do all of them together and it's best to do them in the water for this. Just be sure to add plenty of O2 to the water while this is happening since the meds will use up oxygen.

 

[lilchris_357]

Ok. I'm doing this just to rule out velvet. Since when they originally started showing symptoms was 2 days ago. I'm assuming velvet is much quicker acting

Nah, don't rule it out because that's what it appears to be. Are the spots raised? If they are raised spots its ick, if its more like the fish have been dusted with sugar, it velvet. Any case you need to act fast and get them in therapeutic levels of copper.
The trifecta, you need to run them for 10 days. Also when you do your water change, make sure you get the new water to therapeutic levels BEFORE you add it to the QT.

 

[flfireman1]

I think there is where my problems started. I would add the new QT water and then treat it.
The fish that are in QT are
Dussumeri tang
Clown tang
Purple tang
Maroon clown
Cuban hog.

 

[aykwm]

Velvet didnt act fast because you were already running copper at low level, this will kill some of the parasites but not all of them. At subtherapeutic levels of copper parasites sometimes doesnt even show any symptoms and fish will look healthy, once they are out of copper they will start gradually appearing over few days or weeks. Suggestions above regarding antibiotic treatment are great since it looks that the tang has some bacterial infection. Best of luck and hope they get well soon.

 

[flfireman1]

I would really like to just thank everyone for the wonderful advice and prompt response. This truly is a wonderful forum.

 

[4FordFamily]

This is most certainly velvet. All great advice here, I cannot add anything of value other than another ID of velvet. Good luck, please keep us posted!