Yeah I'm not too sure what happened that day. When I redid my reading on the 30th copper was back to normal. I assume it's safe to say copper was absorbed and leached back. I never had that big of a swing when testing copper.
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I'm surprised the cuprisorb has not been more effective. Has it changed color to dark blue/black yet?
The key are the large WCs with the products helping to clean up. May work but you'll use alot of product and time in doing so.
You're on a 40B. Maybe drain half out before doing WCs on the remaining half. Do that a couple times and then fill it back up to the top with fresh salt water. That helps me do large WCs if you're not already doing that.Yeah replying purely on water changes I'll need about 6 more water changes to bring me under 0.009 ppm, assuming nothing is leaching out of the rocks.
You can do what ever you want but see below...Hello everyone!
So I'm done with ich in my display. I did everything right, I thought, to keep ich and parasites out of my tank. All fish went through 2.5ppm copper for over 30 days. All inverts went in to coral QT and fallow for 75 days. Still got ich. At first I didn't care. All my fish are healthy and FAT. But man my tangs where showing it last month. Normally I practice ich management since I never had the space for enough QT tanks for ich eradication. I've always wondered if you can actually dose copper to the tank and not have leaching long term. If this doesn't work out and I can't have coral I'm fine with that. I deploy next year and would need to switch to FOWLR anyways and I'm buying a Waterbox 320 post deployment. I'm going to log my copper levels at least every 2 days and run 2.5ppm for 75 days. After that I'll perform a 100% water change and run cuprisorb. Once copper is undetectable I'll add hardy corals and continue with my wonky experiment.
Copper dosing began March 10th. Reached 2.5ppm as of March 17th, took it slow for the wrasses and anthias.
Tank details,
120g Standard tank drilled with a 40b Sump.
Skimmer, filter socks, and refugium (24 hour light cycle, AI Fuge light) for filtration.
I run ROX carbon 24/7 (does not from my experience remove copper power).
55w UV running 24/7.
Lighting is 2x AI Prime 16 and 4x T5HO, 2 Blue+ Bulb and 2 Coral+ Bulbs.
Livestock, (Yes its a lot, sue me.)
4" Blonde Naso
4" Sargassum Trigger
3.5" Hippo Tang
2.75" Purple Tang
3.5" Yellow Tang
3.5" Desjardini Sailfin
2" Clown Pair
3" Pintail Fairy Wrasse
3" Midas Blenny
2" Ruby Longfin Fairy Wrasse
3" Half male Lyretail Anthias
2.5" Female Lyretail Anthis
4x Peppermint Shrimp that I could not remove
Current Parameters
Ph 8.35/8.5 (Night/Day)
Salinity 35ppt
Alk 8.5
Mag 1320
Cal 460
NO3 10ppm (Daily dose)
PO4 0.03ppm (Daily dose)
Cu 2.5ppm
IMHO - this post seems weird (or to use your term - wonky) to me - maybe I'm just not understanding. You ask a question about using copper in the display, then you post you're already doing it and then - and with almost every response, you have a reason why the responses you're getting are 'wrong'.Today's reading. Still no noticeable reduction due to being absorbed by rock or sand. I'm surprised it hasn't gone down due to my chaeto either. Have about a 5 gallon bucket full of chaeto in my sump. Shrimp are still alive after a week of copper. Still can't catch them.
Remember the Hanna HR has the +/-0.05 ppm tolerance and there's been multiple posting here about the inaccuracy at very low range. Number of people, myself included, have tested fresh RODI at 0.07.
You can do what ever you want but see below...
IMHO - this post seems weird (or to use your term - wonky) to me - maybe I'm just not understanding. You ask a question about using copper in the display, then you post you're already doing it and then - and with almost every response, you have a reason why the responses you're getting are 'wrong'.
But, since you asked.
1. If your shrimp are still alive despite copper, your test would seem to be incorrect or wrong. Have you verified your test?
2. IMHO stocking density has a huge impact on CI (Ich). You have a lot of fish (as you yourself stated).
3. You have 'live rock' - what is the living part - does it contain invertebrates? They should, will be killed by the copper.
4. Copper can be removed in part by carbon - I believe you are incorrect
5. Certain types of rock will adsorb copper more than others. I do not believe that you can use the test the way you are to 'prove' that copper is not being adsorbed onto your rock. Its my experience that you don't want to dose copper by levels per se (i.e. you don't 're-dose' when it gets below 2.5) - you never want it to go below 2.5. If you are needing to redose at all, that copper is going into the rock.
6. I do not think its the right thing to do to 'experiment' with live coral, especially if you're planning to be shipped overseas soon. If you want to have a FOWLR great.
7. I do not think its the right thing to do to purposely overdose copper (for 75 days). There are long-term effects of copper on fish that you might not see right away. IMHO your wonky experiment has already been done by hundreds of thousands of people (or more) - who have killed, damaged, etc livestock by 'not following the directions'
PS - it sounds like you have a nice selection of fish. My guess is your tank - with those would look great with or without coral.
Regardless of having coral or not, I wanted the tank to run as if I had coral in it. This way all I have to do is acclimate the coral and all my processes, minus rechecking dosages to correspond to coral uptake, will be in place. I have my CO2 scrubber running also.PPS - you said - if I'm remembering correct, that you are dosing phosphate. WHY? Since you have no corals
I just re-read this thread. Are you seriously going to put that beautiful elegance coral (which in general (others can correct me) is not a 'hardy' coral into your tank any time soon? My comment would be that I wouldn't trust putting that coral into a tank unless you had several weeks/months of ICP tests documenting low levels.
Also - the fact that on at least a couple occasions the copper levels (if I'm reading your post correctly) were below 2.5 - meaning that you are probably still going to have CI in your tank.
Thanks for answering - and no it didnt seem 'defensive'. I'm curious - how are you going to measure copper to be sure its 'low enough'. I know you said 'ICP', biweekly or monthly. I was just wondering how long you think its going to take in months and expense to do that.Replying to the first part. All I've done is share my personal experience.
Now replying in order.
1) Copper was checked constantly to be above the 2ppm therapeutic levels of chelated copper. I doubled checked with my buddies hanna checker and also validated the readings with hannas standard.
2) I cannot disagree with that, the fish are confined to a small box with a rapidly reproducing monster.
3) The live rock is rock that was cycled for 6 months before being added to the tank which was about 11 months old at the start of this thread. The only inverts on it where various pods and sponges. The sponges are gone but the pods are still there. I firmly believe you need a nuke to kill pods. Even in my real dedicated QT tank with ionic copper at 2.5ppm I had pods on the glass and filters. I wouldn't doubt copper slowed down the growth.
4) You can test it yourself with chelated copper. Ill send you some carbon and copper power. It's basically useless for removing it. They're are dozens on posts reef2reef of carbon not touching chelated copper. it works okay for ionic based copper.
5) 100% agreed. The main thing I wanted to see with this "experiment" is how much will actually absorb/leach. Granted I have no way of validating how much actually goes in and comes out of the rocks. But I just wanted to document my success or failure with this.
6) To each their own, I see the moral issues with it as they are live creatures, but at the end of the day I've already made up my mind on it. Also by deployment next year was to Afghanistan so we'll have to see what really happens with the US pulling out.
7) At this point copper has not been over dosed and stayed close to or at the recommended levels by endich and above the recommended levels stated by humblefish. For chelated copper it's known to be safe at 2.5ppm and safe for the entire life cycle of ich.
Regardless of having coral or not, I wanted the tank to run as if I had coral in it. This way all I have to do is acclimate the coral and all my processes, minus rechecking dosages to correspond to coral uptake, will be in place. I have my CO2 scrubber running also.
100% going to add the elegance, sps, lps and many other to the tank. But like I said in the first post, I won't add them until I feel comfortable with their being undetectable levels of Cu in the tank. Copper safe recommends 2.5ppm but from what has been described by Randy Holmes and humble fish 1.5-2ppm is considered the therapeutic range for chelated. I can very easily be wrong and did this for nothing. But i'll take that as a first hand learning experience. I hope I didn't come out as defensive, I do appreciate the feed back.
Thanks for answering - and no it didnt seem 'defensive'. I'm curious - how are you going to measure copper to be sure its 'low enough'. I know you said 'ICP', biweekly or monthly. I was just wondering how long you think its going to take in months and expense to do that.
I mean - I think everyone here knows that 'eventually' - with or without ICP testing that Copper levels will drop in a tank with rock to undetectable levels (with water changes, etc).
IMHO, the reason most people don't use it in a display tank is the enormous (as compared to a QT tank with no rock) testing and dosing requirements - you dont know the 'actual tank water' volume, you dont know if your rock will adsorb more or less depending on the type, its very easy to have levels that are too low and then too high (if you overdose, or your tests arent completely accurate).
I know you decided you're going to 'do what you want to do' - and I'm not trying to be overly 'critical'. BUT - I think its not a matter of 'ethics', its a matter of (and its hard to say this about fish) cruelty to keep fish in copper for 75 days. The side effects are well known.
PS - I thought on a couple of your posts you mentioned that the copper level was 1.2 or at least below 2. Often it was 2.5 or above. The recommended dose for copper power is 1.5 - 2.0. So - either way - to me - you're overdosing on time and dose.
Thanks! That makes more sense - I didnt realize that you decided to drop down to 30 days.I've already began to drop the copper level after 30 days which is why the last readings are inder 2ppm. Currently copper is at 0.25ppm. Originally I wanted to do the full 75 days but as usual my patience never lasts.
One thing I can for sure say is from a cost stand point alone I would never do this again unless I had absolutely no option. I'm looking at 3 containers of salt $210, fritz to save money since and since I couldn't find TMPR. The removal media was another $75. Add in about 3 ICP tests just to verify readings and I'm well in to $400.