Clownfish contracted velvet

[Salty87]

Ok im at my wits end with this. My initial stocking of a 17gal reef consisted of two super red ocellaris clowns and a red Firefish goby. As stated in a previous thread, fish displayed signs of velvet on day 2 of qt so started on treatment regimen with chloroquine phosphate at 15mg/ltr for a period of 4 weeks with api ammo lock to combat ammonia and ammonia alert to monitor. Treatment went without a hitch and after the chloroquine ended fish were clear so I continued treatment for internal parasites with general cure for two weeks. Main display was fallow for the entire period. Total fallow period for display was 60 days. The clowns were healthy albeit for a minor fungal infection that cleared after introducing to display. The Firefish goby succumbed during the general cure treatment as it was emaciated and too far gone.

Meanwhile the display I assume bottomed out on nutrients.... Phosphates at 0.04 (Hannah) and nitrates undetectable (salifert). The reason for this is my running a chaeto refugium on a night cycle with gfo. Tank started to develop a brown coating on the rocks which the trochus don't eat and that I assume is dino. Anyways, the two fish were introduced back into the display and were absolutely fine, feeding well and clear bodied. Day 3 (today) : both seem to be reclusive from the light, the male clown is struggling with the flow and mostly keeping to himself behind the WaveMaker. Flashing and irritable swimming noticed on both fish. While the female is mostly clear bodied, the male seems to have a fine dusting appearance that suggests velvet to me. I did notice a velvety appearance around the mouth Region yesterday but I wanted to wait it out and see how it would progress.

Are there chloroquine resistant velvet strains? Since velvet is a type of Dino flagellate, could the dino that is on the rocks have spread to the fish? Was really looking forward to having healthy fish in the display finally and now this! I'm thinking of trying the hybrid tank transfer method with peroxide as I have lost complete faith in chloroquine now. Please advice on how to proceed next. @Jay Hemdal provided valuable input during the whole previous process and would be grateful for more help.

 

[HankstankXXL750]

I successfully treated a lion fish and porcupine puffer with the humblefish TTM for velvet. I didn’t use hydrogen peroxide during treatment but have used his hydrogen peroxide treatment in a DT once for what I thought was velvet but Jay said from a pic it was ich. Totally covered a purple tang overnight with very fine dots.
I found the TTM to be very time consuming, but effective.
There seems to be a question on how long velvet can remain in you aquarium. I’m not sure where I found the information, but a Texas university did a study that said velvet can remain for like 11 weeks of something. I placed the above mentioned fish in a tank that had an outbreak after going fallow for 6-8 weeks and a harlequin Tuskfish came down with it within 48 hours. I lost him during a paraguard bath and freshwater dip prior to treating with TTM. Lost my eel because he escaped on of my transfer tanks lid not being sealed enough. But the other two are doing great and ready to go into a new DT I set up and cycled all new. Just need to complete the water change and it is ready to go.

 

[Salty87]

I successfully treated a lion fish and porcupine puffer with the humblefish TTM for velvet. I didn’t use hydrogen peroxide during treatment but have used his hydrogen peroxide treatment in a DT once for what I thought was velvet but Jay said from a pic it was ich. Totally covered a purple tang overnight with very fine dots.
I found the TTM to be very time consuming, but effective.
There seems to be a question on how long velvet can remain in you aquarium. I’m not sure where I found the information, but a Texas university did a study that said velvet can remain for like 11 weeks of something. I placed the above mentioned fish in a tank that had an outbreak after going fallow for 6-8 weeks and a harlequin Tuskfish came down with it within 48 hours. I lost him during a paraguard bath and freshwater dip prior to treating with TTM. Lost my eel because he escaped on of my transfer tanks lid not being sealed enough. But the other two are doing great and ready to go into a new DT I set up and cycled all new. Just need to complete the water change and it is ready to go.

I was really hoping that the chloroquine would take care of the velvet and instead it's gotten worse this time around. Hopefully the hybrid ttm with peroxide works as I really don't like losing fish to disease if I can treat it. Thanks for your input. I appreciate it.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Please provide pics under white lighting to verify what you have

 

[Salty87]

Please provide pics under white lighting to verify what you have

I'm so sorry, I have already transferred them to an opaque qt after doing the hydrogen peroxide bath for 30mins, so it won't be possible to take pics now... Its literally like a velvety dusting on the fish. Not like the granules seen on ich. No excessive mucus seen on the body either as seen in brook. No external sores either.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I'm so sorry, I have already transferred them to an opaque qt after doing the hydrogen peroxide bath for 30mins, so it won't be possible to take pics now... Its literally like a velvety dusting on the fish. Not like the granules seen on ich. No excessive mucus seen on the body either as seen in brook. No external sores either.

Can be brooklynella and trying to determine

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Ok im at my wits end with this. My initial stocking of a 17gal reef consisted of two super red ocellaris clowns and a red Firefish goby. As stated in a previous thread, fish displayed signs of velvet on day 2 of qt so started on treatment regimen with chloroquine phosphate at 15mg/ltr for a period of 4 weeks with api ammo lock to combat ammonia and ammonia alert to monitor. Treatment went without a hitch and after the chloroquine ended fish were clear so I continued treatment for internal parasites with general cure for two weeks. Main display was fallow for the entire period. Total fallow period for display was 60 days. The clowns were healthy albeit for a minor fungal infection that cleared after introducing to display. The Firefish goby succumbed during the general cure treatment as it was emaciated and too far gone.

Meanwhile the display I assume bottomed out on nutrients.... Phosphates at 0.04 (Hannah) and nitrates undetectable (salifert). The reason for this is my running a chaeto refugium on a night cycle with gfo. Tank started to develop a brown coating on the rocks which the trochus don't eat and that I assume is dino. Anyways, the two fish were introduced back into the display and were absolutely fine, feeding well and clear bodied. Day 3 (today) : both seem to be reclusive from the light, the male clown is struggling with the flow and mostly keeping to himself behind the WaveMaker. Flashing and irritable swimming noticed on both fish. While the female is mostly clear bodied, the male seems to have a fine dusting appearance that suggests velvet to me. I did notice a velvety appearance around the mouth Region yesterday but I wanted to wait it out and see how it would progress.

Are there chloroquine resistant velvet strains? Since velvet is a type of Dino flagellate, could the dino that is on the rocks have spread to the fish? Was really looking forward to having healthy fish in the display finally and now this! I'm thinking of trying the hybrid tank transfer method with peroxide as I have lost complete faith in chloroquine now. Please advice on how to proceed next. @Jay Hemdal provided valuable input during the whole previous process and would be grateful for more help.

The problem is that without a microscope, we can only guess as to if this is velvet on the clownfish, or if the algae on the rocks are dinoflagellates.

There are not chloroquine resistant strains of velvet - for resistance to occur, it requires multiple partially effective treatments (usually in the supply chain at some point) that then allows the parasite to evolve into a resistant form. That hasn't happened with this medication/disease; both are too rarely seen. We see resistance more commonly with bacteria, where fish farms routinely dose every fish with some form and resistant bacteria develops as a result.
What CAN happen is some problem with the treatment - miscalculating the dose, a break in biosecurity, etc.

The TTM method, even with peroxide, has IMO less chance of working well. Amyloodinium (velvet) has a similar life cycle to marine ich, but the thought is that it isn't so cut and dry, and the reproductive phases may not leave the fish, so TTM often fails.

For almost all fish, copper is my go-to for this disease.

Jay


Were the fish breathing rapidly? That is the one key diagnostic tool for velvet.

 

[LeftyReefer]

The clowns were healthy albeit for a minor fungal infection that cleared after introducing to display. The Firefish goby succumbed during the general cure treatment as it was emaciated and too far gone.

Fungal infections are rare in marine fish. it probably wasn't just a fungal infection.

Anyways, the two fish were introduced back into the display and were absolutely fine, feeding well and clear bodied. Day 3 (today) : both seem to be reclusive from the light, the male clown is struggling with the flow and mostly keeping to himself behind the WaveMaker. Flashing and irritable swimming noticed on both fish. While the female is mostly clear bodied, the male seems to have a fine dusting appearance that suggests velvet to me. I did notice a velvety appearance around the mouth Region yesterday but I wanted to wait it out and see how it would progress.

I've learned that if a fish has signs of anything, it doesn't come out of QT.

You were using chloroquine phosphate... what were you using to confirm the CP was at therapeutic levels the entire time? I think you might have reintroduced a still infected fish back into your tank.

 

[Salty87]

Can be brooklynella and trying to determine

I know... And I understand your suspicion but I ve dealt with Brook first hand and I'm not seeing the mucus covered fish and skin peeling off type reaction. I apologise again for not being able to provide images. I ll try and take top down images if it shows something.

 

[Salty87]

The problem is that without a microscope, we can only guess as to if this is velvet on the clownfish, or if the algae on the rocks are dinoflagellates.

There are not chloroquine resistant strains of velvet - for resistance to occur, it requires multiple partially effective treatments (usually in the supply chain at some point) that then allows the parasite to evolve into a resistant form. That hasn't happened with this medication/disease; both are too rarely seen. We see resistance more commonly with bacteria, where fish farms routinely dose every fish with some form and resistant bacteria develops as a result.
What CAN happen is some problem with the treatment - miscalculating the dose, a break in biosecurity, etc.

The TTM method, even with peroxide, has IMO less chance of working well. Amyloodinium (velvet) has a similar life cycle to marine ich, but the thought is that it isn't so cut and dry, and the reproductive phases may not leave the fish, so TTM often fails.

For almost all fish, copper is my go-to for this disease.

Jay


Were the fish breathing rapidly? That is the one key diagnostic tool for velvet.

Hmm. Maybe the fallow period of 6 weeks was not enough? I dosed tablets intended for human consumption and because of the filler present I even dosed slightly extra to be safe. But the dosage I feel was sufficient if a bit extra. And yes I wasn't thinking straight about the resistance to chloroquine, just frustrated that I'm worse than when I started after having the poor fish go through a month and a half of being in medicated water of various kinds and then a further period to a total of two months.

To answer your final question, yes rapid breathing in the most affected fish. He is also exhibiting listless behaviour with head jerks, sudden irratic swimming, flashing and scratching, not yet reaching for the surface but staying behind the wave maker in a low flow area.

The primary reason I didn't use copper is I don't have the hannah test kits to measure copper and also I have practically no experience with the substance.

 

[Salty87]

Fungal infections are rare in marine fish. it probably wasn't just a fungal infection.


I've learned that if a fish has signs of anything, it doesn't come out of QT.

You were using chloroquine phosphate... what were you using to confirm the CP was at therapeutic levels the entire time? I think you might have reintroduced a still infected fish back into your tank.

The clowns developed the fungal infection in areas of damage where they were bit by another fish. In fact one of the clowns lost a bit of his dorsal fin and still has a fluffy growth where the tissue is trying to regenerate.

I kind of messed up in moving the fish out of qt too soon as you say, I was more worried about deteriorating water quality (just ammonia control with no real bio filtration). That may have been my downfall.

CP was replaced at a marginally higher concentration every water change. CP doesn't fall out of solution. But it does biodegrade from bacterial consumption. I don't know, I just went with what I was accustomed to do decades back with CP. That could also have been another source for the problem. I think I ll stick to copper next time onwards. I'm done with CP as I stated.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hmm. Maybe the fallow period of 6 weeks was not enough? I dosed tablets intended for human consumption and because of the filler present I even dosed slightly extra to be safe. But the dosage I feel was sufficient if a bit extra. And yes I wasn't thinking straight about the resistance to chloroquine, just frustrated that I'm worse than when I started after having the poor fish go through a month and a half of being in medicated water of various kinds and then a further period to a total of two months.

To answer your final question, yes rapid breathing in the most affected fish. He is also exhibiting listless behaviour with head jerks, sudden irratic swimming, flashing and scratching, not yet reaching for the surface but staying behind the wave maker in a low flow area.

The primary reason I didn't use copper is I don't have the hannah test kits to measure copper and also I have practically no experience with the substance.

I can't remember, was yours the case where I calculated/checked the CP dose based on the weight of the excipients? That product was only about 2/3'd active ingredients IIRC. What dose di you use? Some people report that they need to use 20 mg/l active CP in order to cure velvet (but I've seen fish toxicity at that level).

Jay

 

[Salty87]

I can't remember, was yours the case where I calculated/checked the CP dose based on the weight of the excipients? That product was only about 2/3'd active ingredients IIRC. What dose di you use? Some people report that they need to use 20 mg/l active CP in order to cure velvet (but I've seen fish toxicity at that level).

Jay

No Jay I was not the one you calculated for. The tablets I used were 250 mg each with 155 mg of chloroquine. I dosed at 15mg/ltr. Maybe a tad more on subsequent water changes.

 

[Salty87]

Can be brooklynella and trying to determine

I think I owe you an apology. I've been googling images for velvet and Brook and this velvety dusting appears to be early Brook as far as I can tell. No spots or granules but a velvety dusting appearance on the face region.

The fish are in the middle of ttm with peroxide and usually symptom free for the first two days and then start flashing again but considerable improvement from before. Hopefully peroxide and ttm get rid of this headache of mine. Can you tell me the treatment of choice for Brook? As far as I read up, chloroquine, metro or formalin are the options.

Also, I will take a snap or two when transferring from one qt to another.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I think I owe you an apology. I've been googling images for velvet and Brook and this velvety dusting appears to be early Brook as far as I can tell. No spots or granules but a velvety dusting appearance on the face region.

The fish are in the middle of ttm with peroxide and usually symptom free for the first two days and then start flashing again but considerable improvement from before. Hopefully peroxide and ttm get rid of this headache of mine. Can you tell me the treatment of choice for Brook? As far as I read up, chloroquine, metro or formalin are the options.

Also, I will take a snap or two when transferring from one qt to another.

Typical treatment is a formalin solution is mixed with in a separate container with either fresh or saltwater. Start with a quick dip in the formalin at a higher concentration then performing treatment in a prolonged bath of formalin base at a lower concentration in a quarantine tank. The longer the fish are exposed to the formalin treatment the more effective it will be at eliminating this issue.
If a formalin solution is not available for immediate use, temporary relief can be achieved by giving the fish a FW bath or dip in water same temperature as display tank. Even though this treatment will not cure the disease, it can help to remove some of the parasites, as well as reduce the amount of mucus in the gills to assist with respiration problems.
Treatment is best done in a QT tank using either quick cure (more effective) or Ruby Rally Pro. Ruby takes a little longer and initial treatment generally takes 2-3 days to really start going to work.

 

[Salty87]

Typical treatment is a formalin solution is mixed with in a separate container with either fresh or saltwater. Start with a quick dip in the formalin at a higher concentration then performing treatment in a prolonged bath of formalin base at a lower concentration in a quarantine tank. The longer the fish are exposed to the formalin treatment the more effective it will be at eliminating this issue.
If a formalin solution is not available for immediate use, temporary relief can be achieved by giving the fish a FW bath or dip in water same temperature as display tank. Even though this treatment will not cure the disease, it can help to remove some of the parasites, as well as reduce the amount of mucus in the gills to assist with respiration problems.
Treatment is best done in a QT tank using either quick cure (more effective) or Ruby Rally Pro. Ruby takes a little longer and initial treatment generally takes 2-3 days to really start going to work.

I'm a bit leery on using formalin given its carcinogenic property and that the fish are all in my bedroom. I could manage a bath in a well ventilated space. Will metro or Chloroquine work? As I have more ready access to them.

 

[Salty87]

Typical treatment is a formalin solution is mixed with in a separate container with either fresh or saltwater. Start with a quick dip in the formalin at a higher concentration then performing treatment in a prolonged bath of formalin base at a lower concentration in a quarantine tank. The longer the fish are exposed to the formalin treatment the more effective it will be at eliminating this issue.
If a formalin solution is not available for immediate use, temporary relief can be achieved by giving the fish a FW bath or dip in water same temperature as display tank. Even though this treatment will not cure the disease, it can help to remove some of the parasites, as well as reduce the amount of mucus in the gills to assist with respiration problems.
Treatment is best done in a QT tank using either quick cure (more effective) or Ruby Rally Pro. Ruby takes a little longer and initial treatment generally takes 2-3 days to really start going to work.

Photos I managed to get while transferring. Other than the dark discoloration near the face and body that resolves when stress is removed,what I couldn't capture is a light velvety sheen over the face under the right light. Also note the cotton tuft on the dorsal tip (that's where it was bit by a blenny prior). That tuft was resolving as new tissue regenerated.

After the first peroxide bath, scratching has significantly decreased. No hurried respiration now. No mucus peeling off. They eat well. I might end the ttm with a mild formalin bath and methylene blue combo in safety stop just as insurance.

 

[Salty87]

Some more.

 

[Salty87]

@Jay Hemdal @vetteguy53081 pls refer to the attached pics. I now feel it is early Brook I'm dealing with and not velvet. Any further input is appreciated.

 

[vetteguy53081]

@Jay Hemdal @vetteguy53081 pls refer to the attached pics. I now feel it is early Brook I'm dealing with and not velvet. Any further input is appreciated.

Looking like brook yes and treatment will be in a quarantine setting using a formalin based medication such as quick cure or if not available ruby rally pro will also work but take longer
You can give fish a 5 minute freshwater dip the same temperature as display tank to offer temporary relief but ultimately treatment is needed