Blotchy skin on leopard wrasses

impur · Aug 11, 2016

I moved my tank a little over a year ago. I have not added anything but snails in the year since, my fish are all over 3-4 years in my tank and all have been QT'd and treated prior to going into my tank. About 4 months ago I woke up to my Potters angel covered in what looked like white dust, cloudy eyes, scratching. I figured it was velvet somehow, maybe came in on the snails. As I setup my QT tank over the weekend, I woke up to my 13yr old female clown thrashing on the surface of the water, unable to swim and covered in the same white dusting. I was able to save her 10 year old mate and got him into QT with cupramine but he died the next day.

I have not been able to catch my 3 leopard wrasses, but they have shown no ill signs until yesterday when I noticed they have some blotchy spots on their skin. Now I am wondering if it is flukes. Can someone please help identify this for me?

Right above the stomach

4FordFamily · Aug 11, 2016

Quite a bunch of male and transitioning male leopard wrasse!

Certainly sounds like severe velvet to me, perhaps brook. Any more photos of other fish that are/were affected?

I've not seen this in leopards, @evolved @eatbreakfast @Humblefish @melypr1985

melypr1985 · Aug 11, 2016

It sounds like the others did, in fact, have velvet. It follows that these wrasses (who have thick slime coats and a lot of protection from it) also have it but are the last to show any sign. I haven't seen this in leopards before, but my take is that this is the way velvet is presenting on them. They will need treatment as well and the tank needs to go fallow. I'm sorry for your losses.

Triggreef · Aug 11, 2016

I agree with them. It's going to show different and the fact that they bury in the sand at night when velvet is most likely to infect, proves the point that it would show on them last and in the least. I would start treatment asap.

Triggreef · Aug 11, 2016

I would also make a Valliant attempt to find chloroquine phosphate before starting cupramine.

impur · Aug 11, 2016

Dang that is unfortunate. I just got an Aqua Medic fish trap as my next attempt so here goes.

Thank you everyone

Humblefish · Aug 11, 2016

Triggreef said:
I would also make a Valliant attempt to find chloroquine phosphate before starting cupramine.

Or chelated copper (exs. Coppersafe, Copper Power) for Leopard Wrasses. I suggest following this protocol to save them: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/velvet-amyloodinium-ocellatum.217570/#post-2499437

During the FW dip look for tiny white specks to fall out of the fish. This is how you can check to be sure flukes are not in play.

domination2580 · Aug 11, 2016

I'm going with velvet as well. Humble gave you awesome advice. Coppersafe is what i would use.

impur · Aug 12, 2016

I have been able to catch one! Pretty excited. I have curpamine on hand and could start treating now, but would have to wait until tomorrow eve to get to some coppersafe.

melypr1985 · Aug 12, 2016

impur said:
I have been able to catch one! Pretty excited. I have curpamine on hand and could start treating now, but would have to wait until tomorrow eve to get to some coppersafe.

Up to you... I would try for the coppersafe but it's pretty darn important that treatment start asap. I realize it's late now and there's no possible way to get anything much done today without going with cupramine, so that's why it's your call. You've gotten good advice in this thread so you'll have to take what you know, what you've been told and what you need, and make that decision on your own. good luck and keep us posted!

impur · Aug 12, 2016

I had already dosed the cupramine

I have a copper test kit on hand as well so I feel confident.

Still only able to catch the one, gonna have to hope I can get the other 2 tomorrow.

Thanks for all the help everyone.

eatbreakfast · Aug 12, 2016

When using copper with leopards I recommend going slower to bring the copper levels up. Wrasses can be sensitive to copper, but if it is raised slowly, I have found that they can handle it.

Triggreef · Aug 12, 2016

Also make sure to give them some sand to bury in while in qt.

impur · Aug 15, 2016

Yep I have a large tub in there with sand. I caught the 2nd meleagris last night, still having troubles catching the remaining Vermiculite, my fav naturally

. Seems too smart for the trap and she sleeps under the largest rock in my tank so i can't scoop her out of the sand. Gonna try again tonight of course.

Triggreef · Aug 15, 2016

impur said:
Yep I have a large tub in there with sand. I caught the 2nd meleagris last night, still having troubles catching the remaining Vermiculite, my fav naturally . Seems too smart for the trap and she sleeps under the largest rock in my tank so i can't scoop her out of the sand. Gonna try again tonight of course.

If you use a flashlight and look from the bottom of the tank you can sometimes find them that way. I've found them before to remove them from QT this way. You may not see a body though. Sometimes it will just be a line in the sand like what you would expect their mouth will leave as they are trying to go deeper into the sand and just slide over the glass. Hopefully that makes sense to you, tough to explain in writing.

impur · Aug 16, 2016

Triggreef said:
If you use a flashlight and look from the bottom of the tank you can sometimes find them that way. I've found them before to remove them from QT this way. You may not see a body though. Sometimes it will just be a line in the sand like what you would expect their mouth will leave as they are trying to go deeper into the sand and just slide over the glass. Hopefully that makes sense to you, tough to explain in writing.

Yah I can see her through the bottom, but she sleeps right under the largest rock in my tank so I can't get to her that way unfortunately. I even tried a small fish hook with the barb cut off, won't go near it. I'm just trying with food in the fish trap every day after work at this point.

impur · Aug 19, 2016

I was finally able to catch her Wednesday night! The Aqua Medic fish trap worked great. All 3 are in QT at .5 mg/l concentration of cupramine and doing as well as can be expected. They are all still active and eating so very promising.

Thanks again for the help everyone.

impur · Sep 13, 2016

Thought I would give an update. I did a WC and added carbon to the QT over the weekend. The wrasses come out sporadically in the QT so the only time I get to see them is on the weekends, or when one is randomly still out when I get home from work. I guess they are coming out and eating up the pellets that I feed each morning so thats good. Its hard for me to tell if the velvet is gone, the vermiculite still has some blotchy skin but I assume it needs some time to heal as well.....she has been in the QT with cupramine for 3 weeks. I'll keep an eye on her in particular for the next month though.

impur · Oct 26, 2016

Last update. The skin blotches have healed up completely. My trio go back into the display next weekend. I was a bit worried about the female Vermiculite, her color was still off even though she was eating and acting normally. Turns out she is now turning male!