45 Day Fallow periods

[Jay Hemdal]

But I mean...at what point after adding fish back to display do we consider our own treatment process successful?

Without adding a single thing...how long would (could) a failed fallow/hospital tank process take to manifest itself?

When I see issues, it is almost always within 2 weeks. You're right, moving the fish is the one big stressor that can kick the parasites back into high gear.

Jay

 

[gunflintcamper]

This helps a ton. Good to know.

i really appreciate all the experiences you are willing to share and am thankful that you all take the time to respond!

 

[OdinPrime]

So 45 days fallow did not work for me. Went through all the effort to take the fish out, set up a 40gal breeder, kept the copper dosing at therapeutic levels for 30 days, and let my 90gal reef sit empty.

Within 2 days of reintroducing my fish, Kole tang broke out in Ich. He is on his last leg of life right now, and I'm too scared to move him out to a hospital tank again as the stress might kill him. No signs of Ich on any other fish, and this is my second kole tang to die within 6 months due to Ich in my DT.

Going to go ahead and say 45 days is too short. Im going to try this again, but with a 70+ day fallow. I hate taking my fish out of their home and sticking them into a QT for so long, but Im at my wits end with Ich. Im almost ready to just dump $600+/- into a serious UV sterilizer and just switch to ich management

 

[DaddyFish]

So 45 days fallow did not work for me. Went through all the effort to take the fish out, set up a 40gal breeder, kept the copper dosing at therapeutic levels for 30 days, and let my 90gal reef sit empty.

Within 2 days of reintroducing my fish, Kole tang broke out in Ich. He is on his last leg of life right now, and I'm too scared to move him out to a hospital tank again as the stress might kill him. No signs of Ich on any other fish, and this is my second kole tang to die within 6 months due to Ich in my DT.

Going to go ahead and say 45 days is too short. Im going to try this again, but with a 70+ day fallow. I hate taking my fish out of their home and sticking them into a QT for so long, but Im at my wits end with Ich. Im almost ready to just dump $600+/- into a serious UV sterilizer and just switch to ich management

I feel your pain and unfortunately totally agree with you. I run UV in every single system, even my QT.

 

[nereefpat]

So 45 days fallow did not work for me. Went through all the effort to take the fish out, set up a 40gal breeder, kept the copper dosing at therapeutic levels for 30 days, and let my 90gal reef sit empty.

Within 2 days of reintroducing my fish, Kole tang broke out in Ich. He is on his last leg of life right now, and I'm too scared to move him out to a hospital tank again as the stress might kill him. No signs of Ich on any other fish, and this is my second kole tang to die within 6 months due to Ich in my DT.

Going to go ahead and say 45 days is too short. Im going to try this again, but with a 70+ day fallow. I hate taking my fish out of their home and sticking them into a QT for so long, but Im at my wits end with Ich. Im almost ready to just dump $600+/- into a serious UV sterilizer and just switch to ich management

What did you do with the copper levels in the hospital tank after the 30 days?

 

[jaganshi066]

What did you do with the copper levels in the hospital tank after the 30 days?

Yea it always worked for me

 

[OdinPrime]

What did you do with the copper levels in the hospital tank after the 30 days?

45 days total in QT
1-2 days to get the copper to therapeutic levels
30 days held
last week and a half I did a 20% water change, followed by several 10% ones to ensure that copper was 0 before transferring them back into DT

 

[nereefpat]

45 days total in QT
1-2 days to get the copper to therapeutic levels
30 days held
last week and a half I did a 20% water change, followed by several 10% ones to ensure that copper was 0 before transferring them back into DT

I would say that the problem was not with the fallow, and that the issue was dropping the copper in the QT, thus letting any ich to reattach to the fish before going into the display again.

I know that the common advice is to keep the fish in 30 days of copper. But ich can leave the cyst stage and infect fish after that if kept in the same tank.

 

[jaganshi066]

45 days total in QT
1-2 days to get the copper to therapeutic levels
30 days held
last week and a half I did a 20% water change, followed by several 10% ones to ensure that copper was 0 before transferring them back into DT

Just curious which copper medication did you use? And what level was it at

 

[Jay Hemdal]

So 45 days fallow did not work for me. Went through all the effort to take the fish out, set up a 40gal breeder, kept the copper dosing at therapeutic levels for 30 days, and let my 90gal reef sit empty.

Within 2 days of reintroducing my fish, Kole tang broke out in Ich. He is on his last leg of life right now, and I'm too scared to move him out to a hospital tank again as the stress might kill him. No signs of Ich on any other fish, and this is my second kole tang to die within 6 months due to Ich in my DT.

Going to go ahead and say 45 days is too short. Im going to try this again, but with a 70+ day fallow. I hate taking my fish out of their home and sticking them into a QT for so long, but Im at my wits end with Ich. Im almost ready to just dump $600+/- into a serious UV sterilizer and just switch to ich management

What temperature was your DT at? 81 degrees is the minimum that works for 45 day fallow periods. back in the day, we ran our tanks at 82 - 84, but now days, people keep their tanks cooler.

Jay

 

[OdinPrime]

Just curious which copper medication did you use? And what level was it at

Cupramine at .5 read with the hanna checker.

What temperature was your DT at? 81 degrees is the minimum that works for 45 day fallow periods. back in the day, we ran our tanks at 82 - 84, but now days, people keep their tanks cooler.

Jay

Tank temp varied from 78-80. Wasnt sure if raising the temp would negatively effect my corals and BTA

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Cupramine at .5 read with the hanna checker.


Tank temp varied from 78-80. Wasnt sure if raising the temp would negatively effect my corals and BTA

80 would probably be ok, but I've only done this at 81+. I do know that 78 is too low. I'm not sure why a couple of degrees seems to make so much of a difference. We used to use 35 days at 82 degrees back in the 1980's. I believe that was based on some work by Paul Chueng.

Jay

 

[MnFish1]

I've been doing some research into the "76 day fallow period". I never heard of that prior to coming to Reef2Reef this past summer. I had always used 32 days as the maximum time for a tomont to remain viable under tropical conditions, and then I would round up to 45 days to help ensure that Neobenedenia was eradicated at the same time.

Turns out that the 1997 article written by Colorni and Burgess just references his PhD thesis which isn't available for review. Then, his co-author Burgess was also the editor for the journal that published it - certainly a conflict of interest! This paper then got referenced by Noga 2010 (he lists 72 days).

Things get a bit murky from there - if you read between the lines, there is some reference to one case at 68 degrees where they found viable tomonts in a xeric culture (no bacteria). Colorni himself seems to doubt his results apply to the real world, saying that at warmer temperatures and in the presence of bacteria, the tomonts probably don't last nearly as long.

I say that at 81 degrees F., 45 days is an appropriate fallow periods for Cryptocaryon, Amyloodinium and Neobenedenia....this coincides well with a 30 day copper treatment followed by two weeks of copper-free observation.


Jay

I believe you can access the original thesis (I have a copy). You're right - there are a number of issues with the study - and then everything piles on after that. I am curious, though - what is your opinion about CI surviving prolonged periods in hypoxic environments (which I have heard is another reason people have used a longer fallow period) - and also as a potential reason for the seemingly unexplainable tank that has been 'fallow' for a long time (76 days) - and fish appropriately qT,d, nothing else added and CI or some other parasite 'pops up' after a period of stress?

 

[MnFish1]

Sorry, metazoan is just a technical term for multicellular life, so worms, arthropods, etc.

For TTM, a number of people's fish are damaged by the process - either the frequent netting and moving, or people not realizing how fast ammonia can build up in the containers. In terms of stability and freedom from stress it would go: DT > QT >TTM containers.

Timing with TTM is so critical, and people sometimes make mistakes. I also have a strong suspicion that Amyloodinium (velvet) tomonts may ride through on the fish's gills, and never actually drop off of the fish, so TTM doesn't screen them. I have no proof of this, but I think it is likely.

Problems with copper revolve mostly around people starting too late, running lower than normal doses, taking way to long to achieve a full dose and improper testing (API test kit is difficult to use for example). I haven't seen true copper toxicity myself in literally thousands of fishes I've treated in the two decades since I stopped using copper/citric acid mixes. I have seen some issues with organically bound coppers not acting fast enough to treat acute protozoan infections - lets say the fish are within 24 hours of death, but the copper is going to take 72 hours to effect a cure....that isn't going to end well. Not sure TTM would save them either though.

Jay

Though its considered 'rare' - is there not some evidence that CI can also hitch-hike longer than might be controlled by TTM? I.e., in the gills, where it might be invisible in low numbers.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I believe you can access the original thesis (I have a copy). You're right - there are a number of issues with the study - and then everything piles on after that. I am curious, though - what is your opinion about CI surviving prolonged periods in hypoxic environments (which I have heard is another reason people have used a longer fallow period) - and also as a potential reason for the seemingly unexplainable tank that has been 'fallow' for a long time (76 days) - and fish appropriately qT,d, nothing else added and CI or some other parasite 'pops up' after a period of stress?

I've read the original papers EXCEPT Colorni's thesis, I'd like to see that. He talks about CI living in xeric culture, but that isn't our aquariums, not by a longshot. In terms of hypoxic environments, not sure how that would work - think about this; the tomont is sequestered in a crevice with no oxygen. That in turn limits the heterotrophic bacteria that would otherwise degrade it. At some point though, the tomont forms tomites and these turn into theronts that can somehow maneuver out of the crevice that bacteria were unable to get into?

Jay

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Though its considered 'rare' - is there not some evidence that CI can also hitch-hike longer than might be controlled by TTM? I.e., in the gills, where it might be invisible in low numbers.

I think that is possible, but TTM does seem pretty effective for controlling CI for a lot of folks, so if that happens, it is pretty rare. I think the life cycle of Amyloodinium makes that a more likely culprit for surviving TTM. I'm more worried about the secondary issues with TTM - not controlling flukes, physical damage to the fish, etc.

Jay

 

[MnFish1]

I've read the original papers EXCEPT Colorni's thesis, I'd like to see that. He talks about CI living in xeric culture, but that isn't our aquariums, not by a longshot. In terms of hypoxic environments, not sure how that would work - think about this; the tomont is sequestered in a crevice with no oxygen. That in turn limits the heterotrophic bacteria that would otherwise degrade it. At some point though, the tomont forms tomites and these turn into theronts that can somehow maneuver out of the crevice that bacteria were unable to get into?

Jay

This was reported by Humblefish some time ago - Might have been from the article below from U. Florida (I included some of the temperature data as well for interest):

"Temperatures for optimal growth of most strains of Cryptocaryon appear to be about 23–30°C (73.4–86°F) (Dickerson 2006; Yoshinaga 2001), although active infections at 15°C (59°F) have been documented (Diggles and Lester 1996). Encysted stages, off the host (tomonts), were also observed to survive for 2–4 weeks under experimental hypoxic conditions (24% oxygen saturation); these released free-swimming infective stages (theronts) 10–11 days after excystment (Yoshinaga 2001).

A more recent study demonstrated that two life stages of one strain of Cryptocaryon (trophonts, i.e., the feeding stage during which the parasite can be found on the fish, and tomonts) survived dormant for 4–5 months at 12°C (53.6°F), and, after the water temperature increased to 27°C (80.6°F), developed and infected fish (Dan et al. 2009)."

FA164/FA164: Cryptocaryon irritans Infections (Marine White Spot Disease) in Fish

University of Florida, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Extension outreach is a partnership between state, federal, and county governments to provide scientific knowledge and expertise to the public. The University of Florida (UF), together with Florida A&M University (FAMU)...

edis.ifas.ufl.edu

 

[MnFish1]

I think that is possible, but TTM does seem pretty effective for controlling CI for a lot of folks, so if that happens, it is pretty rare. I think the life cycle of Amyloodinium makes that a more likely culprit for surviving TTM. I'm more worried about the secondary issues with TTM - not controlling flukes, physical damage to the fish, etc.

Jay

Thanks - agree with this. Another issue (to me) - is that if you believe the polls here - 60-80 percent of people 'do not QT at all' and have 'no problems'. So - that would suggest (to me- assuming those numbers are correct) - that 60-80 percent of people doing TTM - or QT are also going to have 'no problems'. I'm just curious what you think about that thought?

 

[jaganshi066]

Thanks - agree with this. Another issue (to me) - is that if you believe the polls here - 60-80 percent of people 'do not QT at all' and have 'no problems'. So - that would suggest (to me- assuming those numbers are correct) - that 60-80 percent of people doing TTM - or QT are also going to have 'no problems'. I'm just curious what you think about that thought?

Wow 60-80 percent of people don’t quarantine and don’t have any problems? That’s crazy to think about

 

[MnFish1]

Wow 60-80 percent of people don’t quarantine and don’t have any problems? That’s crazy to think about

Well - the reason I put 'no problems' in quotes - is that there are also a lot of people who have said 'I never quarantined until I added Fish X and my whole tank was wiped out'