About 2 weeks ago I added some copepods for my mandarin gobie and it caused major ph and orp drop within 30 min orp went from 340 to 50. The PH was steady dropping I tried adding some buffer because my dkh was 8 it got up to 11 with me trying to keep ph above 7.8. So the water changes started after about 4 25% changes The first one right away the second one the next day and the third one about 4 days later. It was still messed up so 6 days after the third change I did the last one. It really upset my corals. I think I am going to lose my large torch and my large acan. I thought it was over but nope My blue tang got ich. So I started using ginger which has worked for me in the past. After 3 days the tang looked bad so I gave it a freshwater dip to try to get them off so the fish could try to fight it off. That helped get them off the fish. Two days later he died that was last night. Now my clown is dying and others look ruff so at this point not sure what to do my iso tank is not ready yet it's still cycling. Not sure where the ich came from it's been two months since I put anything in the tank. I try to be careful about what I put in my tank but I guess not careful enough. I really take it to heart when this kind of stuff happens. I know I'm not the only person who has had a bad go. What should I do from this point being though they all have it now? Some people say feed them good and they will fight it off and build up a good slime coat. Others say pull them out and put them in a copper freshwater dip and put them in another tank. I can't put all my fish in my 29gal iso tank they would try to kill each other in such close corridors. How many of you find it hard to go look at your tank when things go majorly wrong. It is tough when things go south.
When things go wrong
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ScottR
Surfing....
Where did you get the pods from? If this was your only addition to your tank, could have come from that. Sounds like bad quality water came with the pods.
Brett S
Valuable Member
How big is your tank and how much water did you add with the pods? It seems very unlikely that a small bag of pods could cause that much of an effect on the pH in a tank that would be big enough for a blue tang. I suspect there might have been something else going on.
I think often the panic reaction when things start going wrong can make things worse. Hindsight is always 20/20, but adding a ton of buffer and raising your alkalinity was probably worse than just letting things stay where they were... it’s likely that the pH would have come back on it’s own with some time. Doing some water changes at that point might have been a good option too.
As far as ich goes, if you quarantine and treat *all* of your fish before they are added to the tank then it is possible to have no ich in your tank. But without doing that then it’s likely that ich will always be there. When the fish are healthy and not stressed then it’s possible to keep ich under control without seeing any signs or symptoms of it for a long time.
But when something like this happens and the fish get stressed out it allows the ich to get control and once that happens it can be difficult or impossible to stop. Things like garlic and ginger are pretty ineffective against ich. The only things that will truly treat ich are not reef safe. There are already a number of threads on treating ich, so I won’t get into details on that here.
But at this point the options you have are to leave the fish in your tank and let it take it’s course. It’s likely that you’ll lose some fish, but some may recover and you can get back into the state you were in before. However ich will remain in your tank and if there is another event that stresses out the fish it’s quite possible that ich may come back with a vengeance.
Or you could take all of the fish out of the tank (you can even put them in Rubbermaid totes if you don’t have enough room in your quarantine tank) and treat them for ich to actually kill it. You will need to leave them out of your display tank for 72 days to make sure that any ich in the tank dies off as well. After that you can put them back in and as long as you quarantine and treat any new fish (and potentially inverts) before they are added to the tank then you can keep your tank ich free.
I think often the panic reaction when things start going wrong can make things worse. Hindsight is always 20/20, but adding a ton of buffer and raising your alkalinity was probably worse than just letting things stay where they were... it’s likely that the pH would have come back on it’s own with some time. Doing some water changes at that point might have been a good option too.
As far as ich goes, if you quarantine and treat *all* of your fish before they are added to the tank then it is possible to have no ich in your tank. But without doing that then it’s likely that ich will always be there. When the fish are healthy and not stressed then it’s possible to keep ich under control without seeing any signs or symptoms of it for a long time.
But when something like this happens and the fish get stressed out it allows the ich to get control and once that happens it can be difficult or impossible to stop. Things like garlic and ginger are pretty ineffective against ich. The only things that will truly treat ich are not reef safe. There are already a number of threads on treating ich, so I won’t get into details on that here.
But at this point the options you have are to leave the fish in your tank and let it take it’s course. It’s likely that you’ll lose some fish, but some may recover and you can get back into the state you were in before. However ich will remain in your tank and if there is another event that stresses out the fish it’s quite possible that ich may come back with a vengeance.
Or you could take all of the fish out of the tank (you can even put them in Rubbermaid totes if you don’t have enough room in your quarantine tank) and treat them for ich to actually kill it. You will need to leave them out of your display tank for 72 days to make sure that any ich in the tank dies off as well. After that you can put them back in and as long as you quarantine and treat any new fish (and potentially inverts) before they are added to the tank then you can keep your tank ich free.
Mastiffsrule
Where ever you go, there you are, so be nice 2 you
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/treatment-options-index.247573/
Good food will help, but at this point medical intervention is needed. Brett touched on what should be done. Fresh water dips will not help ich. Ideally QT and treatment should be done.
I suggest read thru this and see if someone avail from #reefsquad or maybe @HotRocks or @ngoodermuth
Good food will help, but at this point medical intervention is needed. Brett touched on what should be done. Fresh water dips will not help ich. Ideally QT and treatment should be done.
I suggest read thru this and see if someone avail from #reefsquad or maybe @HotRocks or @ngoodermuth
HotRocks
Fish Fanatic!
I also find it hard to believe that the pods were the sole cause as well. Sorry to hear about your issues.
The pods were likely where the parasite introduction came from unfortunately.
It's strange that pH and ORP both dropped. They usually work against each other. My ORP always increases as my pH decreases.
Maybe there was some sort of toxin in the pod water? Where did you get the pods from?
I'd recommend pulling all fish and treating all of them. I prefer copper. I also worry you may be dealing with velvet based on how quick you lost the tang.
The pods were likely where the parasite introduction came from unfortunately.
It's strange that pH and ORP both dropped. They usually work against each other. My ORP always increases as my pH decreases.
Maybe there was some sort of toxin in the pod water? Where did you get the pods from?
I'd recommend pulling all fish and treating all of them. I prefer copper. I also worry you may be dealing with velvet based on how quick you lost the tang.
