livcooley123
New Member
Hi all,
I’m in need of some advice. I’ve been in the hobby for only a few months now and I have a 75 gallon fish only tank with two clowns, a damsel, a cardinal, and a coral beauty.
Everyone in the tank has been happy and healthy so far (knock on wood). The only major issue I had prior to these last couple weeks was when I bought a juvenile yellow tang from my LFS. He seemed healthy, had no visible issues and no strange behavior, and we found him dead 5 days after buying him. We immediately tested the water- no issues. (0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, ~15 ppm nitrates, salinity 1.024). All the other fish seemed fine. We figured it was a fluke. Went back to the LFS about a month later and told the owner- he couldn’t figure out why the tang would have died and replaced it for us. We brought the new tang home, drip acclimated him, and added him to the tank. He was very shy, which I know is normal, and didn’t swim around a whole lot. Instead he spent a lot of time hanging under a live rock arch. The coral beauty spent a lot of time hanging out with him (she got along well with the other yellow tang too for the 5 days we had him).
The day after we got the yellow tang, when the blue night lights came on, we watched the yellow tang swim close to the light and saw that he was COVERED in white spots/patches. We freaked out but didn’t have any medication on hand to treat him. Within about 20 minutes of us noticing the white on him (which was completely not visible under the normal light) he was laying on his side on the sand bed. We tried a freshwater dip but he was still struggling to stay upright so took him out and put him in a 10 gallon with a small power head so he wouldn’t die in the tank as it really didn’t seem like he was going to make it after that. He died within a couple hours. My boyfriend also told me he had seen the white patches the night before (the same day we got the fish) but he thought they were microbubbles (we had just gotten a new skimmer and it was making a ton of microbubbles in the tank).
We went back to the LFS (which has a very good reputation and we really like the owner) and the owner says it looks like ich and that it must have been in our tank because he didn’t see any white spots on the fish when he gave it to us. My question is - is this ich or does it look more like velvet? I know yellow tangs are supposed to be pretty hardy so how likely is it that ich would completely overwhelm and kill it in just over 24 hours? And how likely is it that it came from my tank?
We monitored the rest of the fish very closely over the next couple days as we prepared a QT tank to treat them in. (We got a 40 gallon tank and set it up with a power head and HOB filter.) During the first couple days everyone looked and seemed fine, but after a few days while still in the display tank, the coral beauty had a couple white spots on her face and was also seemingly losing color and becoming pale in the face region. We moved everyone into QT and started dosing Cupramine (I dosed half the recommended amount the first day and then half the second day instead of doing one large dose because I wanted to bring the levels up slowly.) Now I’m stuck on how rapidly or slowly to add the second dose based on what’s happening with the CB. She still looks kind of pale, still has little white dots on her face (like grains of salt, nothing like how the tang looked) and isn’t acting normal. She is hanging in one corner of the tank near the top and is constantly pouting her lips (which I’m afraid could be a sign that she’s gasping for air/has something in her gills?) She isn’t swimming all around like she usually does and she just generally doesn’t seem comfortable/content. I know part of this could be stress because she’s in quarantine and doesn’t have her normal surfaces to graze algae from (which she normally does all day long) so I put an algae sheet in there but she isn’t eating it. (She never ate it when I offered it to her in the display either.)
I’ve read CBs can be sensitive to copper so I don’t want to ramp up the levels too quickly but if she is suffering from ich or velvet I don’t want to lose precious time fighting it off. I took a black light flashlight and tried to see if I could see any white near her gills and I don’t - the only visible white is the spots on her face.
I’ve attached pictures of the tang right before it died (which is about 36 hours after we got him) and the coral beauty now.
I am monitoring ammonia levels in the tank and doing small water changes daily. I have some bio balls from the old tank in the HOB and have also added quick start to the water to help the nitrifying process.
If you’ve taken the time to read this whole post I really appreciate it and could use some help! What should my next steps be to help the coral beauty and any insight on the tangs?!
Editing to add: per API copper test kit (which I only found out isn’t totally accurate for Cupramine after I bought it) the copper level is currently very low (less than 0.25?) probably because I’ve done a couple small water changes to control for ammonia. I’m going to add a small amount of Cupramine now (half the second recommended dose.)
I’m in need of some advice. I’ve been in the hobby for only a few months now and I have a 75 gallon fish only tank with two clowns, a damsel, a cardinal, and a coral beauty.
Everyone in the tank has been happy and healthy so far (knock on wood). The only major issue I had prior to these last couple weeks was when I bought a juvenile yellow tang from my LFS. He seemed healthy, had no visible issues and no strange behavior, and we found him dead 5 days after buying him. We immediately tested the water- no issues. (0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, ~15 ppm nitrates, salinity 1.024). All the other fish seemed fine. We figured it was a fluke. Went back to the LFS about a month later and told the owner- he couldn’t figure out why the tang would have died and replaced it for us. We brought the new tang home, drip acclimated him, and added him to the tank. He was very shy, which I know is normal, and didn’t swim around a whole lot. Instead he spent a lot of time hanging under a live rock arch. The coral beauty spent a lot of time hanging out with him (she got along well with the other yellow tang too for the 5 days we had him).
The day after we got the yellow tang, when the blue night lights came on, we watched the yellow tang swim close to the light and saw that he was COVERED in white spots/patches. We freaked out but didn’t have any medication on hand to treat him. Within about 20 minutes of us noticing the white on him (which was completely not visible under the normal light) he was laying on his side on the sand bed. We tried a freshwater dip but he was still struggling to stay upright so took him out and put him in a 10 gallon with a small power head so he wouldn’t die in the tank as it really didn’t seem like he was going to make it after that. He died within a couple hours. My boyfriend also told me he had seen the white patches the night before (the same day we got the fish) but he thought they were microbubbles (we had just gotten a new skimmer and it was making a ton of microbubbles in the tank).
We went back to the LFS (which has a very good reputation and we really like the owner) and the owner says it looks like ich and that it must have been in our tank because he didn’t see any white spots on the fish when he gave it to us. My question is - is this ich or does it look more like velvet? I know yellow tangs are supposed to be pretty hardy so how likely is it that ich would completely overwhelm and kill it in just over 24 hours? And how likely is it that it came from my tank?
We monitored the rest of the fish very closely over the next couple days as we prepared a QT tank to treat them in. (We got a 40 gallon tank and set it up with a power head and HOB filter.) During the first couple days everyone looked and seemed fine, but after a few days while still in the display tank, the coral beauty had a couple white spots on her face and was also seemingly losing color and becoming pale in the face region. We moved everyone into QT and started dosing Cupramine (I dosed half the recommended amount the first day and then half the second day instead of doing one large dose because I wanted to bring the levels up slowly.) Now I’m stuck on how rapidly or slowly to add the second dose based on what’s happening with the CB. She still looks kind of pale, still has little white dots on her face (like grains of salt, nothing like how the tang looked) and isn’t acting normal. She is hanging in one corner of the tank near the top and is constantly pouting her lips (which I’m afraid could be a sign that she’s gasping for air/has something in her gills?) She isn’t swimming all around like she usually does and she just generally doesn’t seem comfortable/content. I know part of this could be stress because she’s in quarantine and doesn’t have her normal surfaces to graze algae from (which she normally does all day long) so I put an algae sheet in there but she isn’t eating it. (She never ate it when I offered it to her in the display either.)
I’ve read CBs can be sensitive to copper so I don’t want to ramp up the levels too quickly but if she is suffering from ich or velvet I don’t want to lose precious time fighting it off. I took a black light flashlight and tried to see if I could see any white near her gills and I don’t - the only visible white is the spots on her face.
I’ve attached pictures of the tang right before it died (which is about 36 hours after we got him) and the coral beauty now.
I am monitoring ammonia levels in the tank and doing small water changes daily. I have some bio balls from the old tank in the HOB and have also added quick start to the water to help the nitrifying process.
If you’ve taken the time to read this whole post I really appreciate it and could use some help! What should my next steps be to help the coral beauty and any insight on the tangs?!
Editing to add: per API copper test kit (which I only found out isn’t totally accurate for Cupramine after I bought it) the copper level is currently very low (less than 0.25?) probably because I’ve done a couple small water changes to control for ammonia. I’m going to add a small amount of Cupramine now (half the second recommended dose.)
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