Treating Velvet

[Bob_Loblaw]

First off, I am inexperienced and my DT has only been up and running for a couple of months. Its a 68 gallon tank with a 22 gallon sump with skimmer and refugium. I've gotten a lot of good information from searching this forum and have based what I've done so far on that.

Yesterday, I discovered that my Goby has Velvet. It had been acting strangely for a couple of days and in hindsight, I realize that I need to be more on the lookout for disease symptoms. The Goby was going crazy the other day, racing around the tank and acting like she wanted to jump. She also started hanging out on the highest rockwork in the tank. She also stopped eating. The funny thing is that until yesterday she looked healthy. She is acting more normally now but has the white dusting with discrete spots yet.

The problem is that I have been unable to catch her yet. In the mean time, I have moved the other four fish into a QT treated with Cupramine. None of the others are showing any symptoms yet but I decided to get everyone out and let the DT go fallow. The Goby is driving me nuts because she is so good at hiding in holes. In the mean time I have started treating the DT with Reef Rally. The water is radioactive green but the inverts, coral and Goby seem unaffected. The skimmer is turned off. My plan is to try to catch the Goby again today and do a freshwater dip then into the Cupramine treated QT.

Any advice will be appreciated!

 

[JasonK84]

May need to drain the tank down and remove some rock to catch him. Good luck catching him and treating.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

May need to drain the tank down and remove some rock to catch him. Good luck catching him and treating.

I got him after removing pretty much all the rock. Everybody is in the QT soaking in Cupramine and looking OK so far.

 

[JasonK84]

Not surprised that you had to go to that kind of effort to get it. They're quick little buggers. Glad to hear that there are no casualties thus far. Keep the updates coming.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

The day before I discovered the velvet I finally got an accurate Alkalinity test kit and started the process or raising it .5 per day per the Red Sea instructions. I've treated two days so the Alk should be up a full point. I tested today and it measures one point lower than before all this started.

After removing the fish to the QT two days ago, I decided to treat my DT with Reef Rally in hopes of cleaning up the velvet without waiting the full 75 day fallow period. I'm on my third day of dosing with Reef Rally. Seems to me that the Reef Rally must be driving the alkalinity down. It's super low, like 1.3. Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[JumboShrimp]

My go-to method for catching either difficult fish, or many/all the fish: Create as much of a ‘low tide’ as you can by using as many pails / containers / buckets as you can to siphon your water out. As for the rockwork, it might start to work to your advantage. Many passageways will become dead-ends; others can start to be block by nets, sheets of plastic or pieces of glass—anything you can use as dividers to cut off escape routes for your fish. I have used gallon jugs (weighted with water) to cut off escape routes for the fish. You would be surprised that what seems like a virtual impossibility (netting fish with rocks in the tank) when the water is high, can become vastly easier with only 3, 6, even 8 inches of water left.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

The day before I discovered the velvet I finally got an accurate Alkalinity test kit and started the process or raising it .5 per day per the Red Sea instructions. I've treated two days so the Alk should be up a full point. I tested today and it measures one point lower than before all this started.

After removing the fish to the QT two days ago, I decided to treat my DT with Reef Rally in hopes of cleaning up the velvet without waiting the full 75 day fallow period. I'm on my third day of dosing with Reef Rally. Seems to me that the Reef Rally must be driving the alkalinity down. It's super low, like 1.3. Has anyone else experienced this?

Ignore this earlier Alkalinity post from yesterday. I was having a major brain fart. My Alk is just fine.