Fallow to March 26, 2017

[Valkyrie]

Yesterday at 3pm PST my 55 gallon began it's 76 day fallow period. The fish were removed and put into 20g tanks and tonight their copper treatments started. One tank will be called the Clown Tank (CT) and the other will be The Tang Tank (TT).

Each 20g tank received 5mL (1tsp) of Coppersafe (CS) and a capful of Stability.
It was after I added the copper that realized that I can't add any more to TT until I catch my long nosed hawkfish. He's a wiley little devil.

Tomorrow night when I get home I'll test the copper level and add the next dose.
If I were to follow the instructions on the bottle of 5mL/4gallons then to reach the "therapeutic" copper(Cu) level I would need to add 25mL of the CS. So I'm splitting up the dose to go over the next 3-5 days. I'll keep going until I reach the therapeutic level of 1.5-2mg/L recommended.

Unfortunately, the temp on the CT was 80F when I got home so I turned down the temp right away. I want to get it down to about 75F. The TT is already at 75F

While at work I was given access to VIN (Veterinary Information Network) by one of the vets I work for and I was able to find some pretty interesting stuff. Google "SRAC publication 4705 July 2011" there's a pretty good article regarding Amyloodinium ocellatum.

Well!! I just caught the hawkfish! YAY! One of the peppermint shrimp was in the darn trap and so when I got him out I thought, what the heck I'll give it one more shot. LOL So now the 29g can start its fallow period, too. I'm glad it'll only be a day behind the 55g.

That's it for now. I'm getting a headache and I need to be to work in about 10 hours. I should have more time tomorrow night since I won't be trying to catch a hawkfish.

 

[Diesel]

Nice write up young lady.
Keep up the treatment process and many members will follow this as it will be a learning process for them as well.
Can you explain........... if you have more time how your QT looks like, pics will be great as well.
Thanks in advance.

 

[melypr1985]

great job! You've got a great plan and execution. Keep up the good work and we'll be here if you need any help along the way

 

[Humblefish]

Good job!

 

[Valkyrie]

Home an hour later than normal, heavy patient load for morning surgeries. Oh well, I just didn't bother changing out of my scrubs and set my focus to the fish.

Sadly, my husband texted me today when he got home that the hawkfish had died.

I fed everyone, the clowns are pretty scared still but I saw them nibble their mysis.
The two tangs and the lawnmower have some nori and I sprinkled a tiny bit of "Seaweed Extreme".
I also dosed the tanks with the Stability and using a turkey baster I sucked up some of the fish poo.

Using the API test kit I tested both tanks. The results have a yellow cast, so I'm not positive what the result were. I am confident that neither is 2.0mg/L. I apologize for the blurry one, obviously I was concentrating more on keeping my shadow out of the picture more than the focus. Looking at the test results now, I'm willing to say that it's 1mg/L.

From there I dosed with the Cu and I'll test again tomorrow night. I would test in the morning, but I just don't have time. Depending on the results tomorrow night, I may have to skip adding any. Thursday night I can stay up as late as I need to dose and test until the wee hours.

As requested I took some pics of the tanks. Each tank has a heater, some pvc for the fish to hide in if they want, a Fluval AquaClear HOB filter system and a thermometer. One of the tanks has an airstone and the other has a small powerhead. I feel far more confident about having enough aeration with the airstone so I'm going to pick up another air pump for the other airstone I have. I'm leaving the lights off all day.

For a bonus, here's my sweeties Voodoo & Tecumseh.

I'll have my husband pull the clip with the seaweed when he gets up in a few hours. That should get it before it gets ratty and gross.

After the fishies were all tucked in for the night. I set to feeding the 29g, I have some nassarius and peppermint shrimp that needed a speck of mysis, too. I also use Coral Vital and dose that a few times a week. Tomorrow night I'll give them a smidge of Oyster Feast and I'll feed the nassarius in the 55g. Everyone who eats algae should be perfectly fine during the fallow period.

Speaking of which, I'm trying to figure out why I'm going for the 76 days instead of 6 weeks. I must have a reason, but darned if I can remember what it was. I lost the two clowns in the 29g to brook and I lost the damsel & Kole tang to Velvet (both were swimming into the powerhead current). I haven't had any ich that I'm aware of, but maybe I'm being cautious? Maybe I'm just tired and I'll remember later why I chose the 76 days.

Ok folks, that's it for day 2.

 

[DLHDesign]

I'm sorry for your loss. :-(

Great detail - appreciate the effort and care you are taking!

Cute fish!

76 is the "magic number" for ich and velvet and such to get all the way through it's various life cycles. I figure that if you go fallow for 6 weeks, you may as well get to 76 and know you are clean; it's only a few more weeks, after all.

 

[Humblefish]

Sorry for your loss.

 

[melypr1985]

Sorry for the loss For the record I agree that the test results aren't reading 2ppm.

 

[Valkyrie]

Got home with some more time to spend tonight. Cleaned up poo and fed them all. The nori doesn't seem to be holding much interest for the tangs & blenny, but they are eating the Seaweed Extreme, so I'm ok with that. The clowns are nibbling at the mysis. I think tomorrow night I'll give them something from the variety pack.
Nobody has broke with any spots, Yay! Even Dante doesn't look as bad as he did just 3 days ago.

Did the Cu testing. Scared the bejeebus out of myself. The tang tank was off the chart. I moved on to the clowns and their water tested nothing like the tangs. Hmm. So I tested the tangs again and it was fine. Good grief, I have no idea what I did the first time.

I think the tangs are really close to 2.0 so I only added 1mL of Cu. I'd rather dance on the edge than trip over it. The Clowns look to be somewhere in between 1 and 2 ppm, but again, it seemed too close for comfort so I added only 2mL of Cu. Lighting is a real pain in the bum when it comes to this test.

Dropped some Oyster Feast in for the corals in the 29 and fed a pinch of mysis to the nassarius in the 55 (there's 2 or 3 I don't remember exactly) and at least one of them came up from the sand bed almost right away.

My weekend is coming up, just one more day of work and then I can get some things taken care of for all 4 tanks. Also, need to set up our coral quarantine so it's ready in a month.

 

[Humblefish]

The nori doesn't seem to be holding much interest for the tangs & blenny

Nori will absorb copper (its negligible though for testing purposes); however it causes the nori to taste bad so the fish won't usually eat it.

 

[Valkyrie]

Nori will absorb copper (its negligible though for testing purposes); however it causes the nori to taste bad so the fish won't usually eat it.

Oh yea! I forgot about that.
That's one of the things about new adventures. You can read and prepare yourself but it's not "habit" yet, your brain isn't quite wired for the new info to be put into practice until you're actually doing it.

Thanks!

 

[Swoody]

Curious as to what led up to this fallow period. New fish not QT'd or something else... sorry you lost the hawkfish!!

 

[Valkyrie]

Curious as to what led up to this fallow period. New fish not QT'd or something else... sorry you lost the hawkfish!!

Thanks.

Brief history. Lost everything in the 29g this past August to a defective heater.
Late September we started adding fish until early November. A damsel, then a pair of clowns (with a rose bubble tip anemone), later a Kole Tang and the last was the hawkfish. None were quarantined, all came from the same shop.
After that the only things added had been coral, snails and a lilac condy.

On to what led up to the 76 day quarantine for both tanks.

December 22nd we lost one of the clowns. December 21st I had worked 12 hours, came home late and saw the mess he was in and the next morning he looked worse. I took pics of him and went to my lfs. That's where I learned it was brook. He assured me it was a clown disease and the other fish would not get it. Great, but his mate was a mess, too. So I tried the freshwater dip, the next day was he was gone and the day after Christmas so was his mate.

The Friday before Christmas we drove 1.5 hrs to a late night sale at a store we had visited once before. We picked up some coral that went in the tank with those fish and 2 fish that went into the other tank. No fish for the 29g, I told my husband (thinkin' I'm bein' all wise and stuff, *snort*). Not until I was sure that none of the other fish were going to get brook. I was most worried about my Tango, the Kole Tang. 4 days after the second clown had died, he was swimming into one of the power heads, hiding behind the rocks more than usual, but was still eating. Then one day he wasn't eating and was pale. New Years Eve morning my husband woke me up to tell me Tango was gone. I was furious, I was sure it was brook. But then I started reading and figured out that it was marine velvet.

It was after the new year and I went back to work. January 4th when I came home I noticed the damsel was looking "dusty". Ya know, those sparkly blue damsels are hard to see anything on! But I was pretty sure she was dusty looking. Darn it. The next night my husband texted me that Blue was gone. That's it. I am so done. First brook and now velvet. I need to let the 29g go fallow. I was even willing to wait to see if the hawkfish died, too. I was just so dang frustrated and guilty.

Then Friday afternoon as I'm sitting in front of the tanks looking at the two tanks, pondering the universe and wondering why I was stupid, I saw spots on my scopas tang in the 55g tank.

And here we are now.

 

[Valkyrie]

ok
The ammonia badges finally came today and I got them hung up right away. Lo and behold, the ammonia was high. 25% water change. I checked the salinity in both tanks before the water change so that I might be able to lower it if need be. Which it did. Tested the Cu level afterwards and with the water change it was about the same as last night. I added more Cu and Stability. If I have to change the water again tomorrow morning I'll add the Cu to the new water before I add I it. I want to get it up to 1.5 in the next day or two.

I'm not too worried about the scopas anymore. I keep wondering if I over-reacted. Maybe it was normal scopas spots. How often do I say to others, just because you hear hoof beats doesn't mean you go looking for zebras? Often. BUT, what if I'm not over-reacting? Let's just do this thing and in March we'll have 2 nice clean tanks. We can put the two clowns in the 29g then and my husband can get the Clarkii clowns he wants for the 55g....AFTER they've gone through quarantine.

 

[DLHDesign]

Lo and behold, the ammonia was high.

Make sure to check them occasionally with an actual test - I've found them to be finicky when it comes to accuracy. Good things to use, but still worth double-checking.

Thanks for the updates! At the end of it all, you'll have piece of mind in your current tanks and the ability to handle far more situations that may occur.

 

[Valkyrie]

Make sure to check them occasionally with an actual test - I've found them to be finicky when it comes to accuracy. Good things to use, but still worth double-checking.

Thanks for the updates! At the end of it all, you'll have piece of mind in your current tanks and the ability to handle far more situations that may occur.

I have 2 goals for posting.

1. So that it might help someone else. The devil's in the details and you can read/study/research until you're blue, but the actual experience is where the learning settles in the grey matter.
2. Keeps me honest. No cutting corners, no back sliding, no giving up. I suspect as the days wear on I'll post less, but it won't be due to lack of interest, but that things will be static.

I don't kid myself and post so that it might save someone else the heartache. I know it won't. I'm an intelligent human and I still did things my own way. That's what we do. You'd think I'd know better with my medical/science background. Not.
I come from freshwater, though. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

I'm going to get that test that still works with copper in the water. I can't live with not knowing for sure. I'm too detail oriented for it.

 

[DLHDesign]

Awesome goals and very well grounded!

I'm going to get that test that still works with copper in the water.

I've got a "rule" that I don't add anything to my tank that I can't test for. I supposed that would also mean I don't add anything that would prevent me from testing things I want to test.

 

[Empress]

I have 2 goals for posting.

1. So that it might help someone else. The devil's in the details and you can read/study/research until you're blue, but the actual experience is where the learning settles in the grey matter.
2. Keeps me honest. No cutting corners, no back sliding, no giving up. I suspect as the days wear on I'll post less, but it won't be due to lack of interest, but that things will be static.

I don't kid myself and post so that it might save someone else the heartache. I know it won't. I'm an intelligent human and I still did things my own way. That's what we do. You'd think I'd know better with my medical/science background. Not.
I come from freshwater, though. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

I'm going to get that test that still works with copper in the water. I can't live with not knowing for sure. I'm too detail oriented for it.

I like your style. And your choice of words. Nice. [emoji227]

 

[Valkyrie]

After the update I have questions and then a bit of whining.

Update: I'm happy with how the 2 clowns are adjusting to life in the hospital. They're finally acting a little more normal and they're excited to see me getting ready to feed them. The tangs are happier with what I fed tonight and although they weren't exuberant about eating, they still swam to the food and ate it. I'm still worried about Tecumseh (lawnmower blenny) as he still seems miserable. I'm confident he's eating but it's nothing like his joyful ripping out of algae he was doing in the 55.

I could be wrong, but I think I'm there with the copper level. The clowns Cu level (right) is lower than the tangs (left), but it looks therapeutic to me. I'm seeing the tangs as being 2.0 and the clowns at about 1.5. What do you think?

Questions:

In my coral tank, now that there hasn't been a tang to pick at the algae, I'm getting a little growth on a few of my coral. At first I thought it was a big concern until I saw one cleaned off later today. It had to be a snail or maybe the emerald crab? My bird's nest still has some algae on it and so does my sponge. How do I go about cleaning them off with making them too angry?

About maintaining the Cu therapeutic level. How does the level drop? I need to test it daily so I'm taking that to mean that it can drop. How will I know how much to add to prevent it going below 1.5 but not exceeding 2.0?

Does garlic really work to encourage fish to eat? I want to pick some up tomorrow to have on hand, but want to make sure I'm throwing away my money. I've done enough of that lately.

Whining:

I had to stop at a big box store to pick up another air pump. I wandered over to the fish tanks and saw this little guy that has been there for a few weeks with his anemone. Wahhhh! I wuvs him.
There. All better. LOL I did take a few pictures.

 

[melypr1985]

How do I go about cleaning them off with making them too angry?

Maybe try blowing them off with a turkey baster.

About maintaining the Cu therapeutic level. How does the level drop? I need to test it daily so I'm taking that to mean that it can drop. How will I know how much to add to prevent it going below 1.5 but not exceeding 2.0?

Copper can be absorbed by many things like rock, sand, plastic ect. It can go down with water changes if not enough copper was added to the new water.

Does garlic really work to encourage fish to eat? I want to pick some up tomorrow to have on hand, but want to make sure I'm throwing away my money. I've done enough of that lately.

It can, indeed entice fish to eat, but it won't work on every fish.