Emergency ich attack

SOARnTACO

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My 3 tangs are in qt. Rookie mistake used ich x. Got better now a week later as of today. My blue hippo looks like a goner I put ich x in last night. Got someone grabbing me cupramine right now as we speak.

Can I add that on top of the ich x?

Until I get home to change the water. And then I’ll just be treating with the cupramine for the rest of qt
 

LAReefer4Life

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Sorry to hear this. Always best practice not to combine medications. I would do at least 50-60% water change and then split your doses am/pm bringing your cupramine to .50ppm therapeutic levels over 2-3 days. You could conduct a second large water change on day 2 and make sure you add the cupramine to the new water before adding it the QT, this will ensure your levels keep increasing to the appropriate goal. I've used cupramine with great success but you'll need a good test kit. Hanna checkers are the best for this. Seachems sells their own copper test but it is hard to read in my opinion, but better than nothing. API test kits don't work with Cupramine so stay away from those.
 
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aqua_code

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You could also run a poly filter and carbon to remove any copper or malachite green from the ich X.

The downside of switching medications is that the fish won't be getting treated as you return the levels to normal.

You could also setup up another tank for TTM and/or use Cupramine in there. It's hard to say if the remaining 40% of medication in the water will react negatively to the Cupramine.
 

Darth.Daddy12

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I wouldn’t focus on the hippo tang.. they have great immunity to ick naturally. They are prone to it but at same time have a natural immune system that can handle it most times.. do some water changes add some carbon to suck everything out and go hyposalinity for couple weeks..

You didn’t mention the other two tangs.. so idk how they deal with ick or hypo.. but hippos are very sensitive but very durable at same time.. unless you have two tanks to put the hippo into a hypo system and Medicare the others then I’d do as I said above.. thing is blue tangs have such a good immune system to ick that they will carry it for their life so any time they get stressed it will appear and threaten any tank it’s in.

This is one of the little not so mentioned secrets about Dory..
 

LAReefer4Life

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Also stay away from additives such as PRIME with copper. Its a good idea to add an additional power head to agitate the surface more aggressively in QT.
 

Darth.Daddy12

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Also stay away from additives such as PRIME with copper. Its a good idea to add an additional power head to agitate the surface more aggressively in QT.
I don’t understand this? Copper is part of the ick treatment. That’s why you can’t medicate in a tank with inverts? To my understanding it’s one of the key ingredients?

Also don’t know who is using prime in a reef tank considering most are using rodi so no reason to declorinate the water?
 

LAReefer4Life

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I don’t understand this? Copper is part of the ick treatment. That’s why you can’t medicate in a tank with inverts? To my understanding it’s one of the key ingredients?

Also don’t know who is using prime in a reef tank considering most are using rodi so no reason to declorinate the water?

This is not for reef tank. He is using cupramine in QT. In QT ammonia rises quick sometimes so I was advising not to use ammonia reducer, prime as an example.
 

Darth.Daddy12

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This is not for reef tank. He is using cupramine in QT. In QT ammonia rises quick sometimes so I was advising not to use ammonia reducer, prime as an example.
Still makes no sense cause a QT tank should still be cycled and ready to go at any time.. sounds like a bad way to QT IMO. Fish already stressed from new environment and small tank at that.. (is tangs are bad at this they will super stress in anythjng smaller then 3’ Long) stress weakens immune response and then bad water conditions only add to this.. what’s the point to even doing a QT if the tank isn’t cycled and ready to handle the fish load? Best case you have fish with ammonia burned gills that live half their life.. worst case they never come out of QT cause of ammonia.. if this is what anyone is doing this is tick poor husbantry and you’re making your fish sicker and weaker by putting them into Qt ca directly into tank. Even more so tangs who need and want room to free swim, are easily stressed and susceptible to lots of diseases when stressed. If this is how you are QT fish and corals you’re either going to spend a lot replacing fish and corals or have lots of DT issues. Likely both..

Your QT should be fully cycled and running ready for fish 24/7.

All that said.. if one were to be running this kind of QT spur of the moment setup I would advise to be using prime at the 4x dose to nutrize ammonia as that will have way worse effects in any specimens then some disease or oarisite they may or may not have.. best way to kill a sick fish is introduce ammonia even in small amounts.
 

LAReefer4Life

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Still makes no sense cause a QT tank should still be cycled and ready to go at any time.. sounds like a bad way to QT IMO. Fish already stressed from new environment and small tank at that.. (is tangs are bad at this they will super stress in anythjng smaller then 3’ Long) stress weakens immune response and then bad water conditions only add to this.. what’s the point to even doing a QT if the tank isn’t cycled and ready to handle the fish load? Best case you have fish with ammonia burned gills that live half their life.. worst case they never come out of QT cause of ammonia.. if this is what anyone is doing this is **** poor husbantry and you’re making your fish sicker and weaker by putting them into Qt ca directly into tank. Even more so tangs who need and want room to free swim, are easily stressed and susceptible to lots of diseases when stressed. If this is how you are QT fish and corals you’re either going to spend a lot replacing fish and corals or have lots of DT issues. Likely both..

Your QT should be fully cycled and running ready for fish 24/7.

All that said.. if one were to be running this kind of QT spur of the moment setup I would advise to be using prime at the 4x dose to nutrize ammonia as that will have way worse effects in any specimens then some disease or oarisite they may or may not have.. best way to kill a sick fish is introduce ammonia even in small amounts.

I think the initial question is centered around mixing medications by combining cupramine and ich x. I gave information I believe to be helpful in regards to the question.
 

SandJ

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Still makes no sense cause a QT tank should still be cycled and ready to go at any time.. sounds like a bad way to QT IMO. Fish already stressed from new environment and small tank at that.. (is tangs are bad at this they will super stress in anythjng smaller then 3’ Long) stress weakens immune response and then bad water conditions only add to this.. what’s the point to even doing a QT if the tank isn’t cycled and ready to handle the fish load? Best case you have fish with ammonia burned gills that live half their life.. worst case they never come out of QT cause of ammonia.. if this is what anyone is doing this is **** poor husbantry and you’re making your fish sicker and weaker by putting them into Qt ca directly into tank. Even more so tangs who need and want room to free swim, are easily stressed and susceptible to lots of diseases when stressed. If this is how you are QT fish and corals you’re either going to spend a lot replacing fish and corals or have lots of DT issues. Likely both..

Your QT should be fully cycled and running ready for fish 24/7.

All that said.. if one were to be running this kind of QT spur of the moment setup I would advise to be using prime at the 4x dose to nutrize ammonia as that will have way worse effects in any specimens then some disease or oarisite they may or may not have.. best way to kill a sick fish is introduce ammonia even in small amounts.

Someone can correct me if this info is wrong...copper treatment (as well as other medications) can kill off the beneficial bacteria in your quarantine tank, even one that is cycled and running. This is where the need for Prime could come into play, when the bacteria is killed off and can not process the ammonia. But I believe prime is only effective temporarily (I was thinking 24 hours), and the ammonia will be released back into its toxic form if not removed from the tank in a water change.

Except Prime converts copper into a deadly form that will kill the fish. So it can not be used in conjunction with copper. Then you rely on water changes.
 
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SOARnTACO

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Just to put out there my qt is a year old tank with live rock no sand bed. 55gallon 4’ long.
All my tangs have died 3 total.
Wrasse still holding on strong
 

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