EMERGENCY! ID Illness on Porcupine Puffer

mariegibson202

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Was quarantining my new porcupine puffer when I noticed she had ich so I started to treat her with metroplex. I then noticed the clownfish I had quarantined with her had signs of an internal parasite so I picked up some general cure and added a bubbler to their tank with the first dose of general cure. First dose everything went fine but after the second dose last night I woke up with her looking like this yet the clownfish is fine. I suspect it is cauliflower or fin rot however I'm unsure. Please help with identifying it and treatment options.

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Jay Hemdal

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Welcome to Reef2Reef!

One issue is that metroplex and General cure both have metronidazole in them, so there may be an overdose problem. The second issue is that metronidazole just isn’t very good at curing ich. What I think I see on the puffer is secondary bacterial infection from on-going ich. That is tough to deal with. Copper and antibiotics would be the way to go except that both of those meds take at least three days to work, and meanwhile the fish is going to get sicker....

Jay
 
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mariegibson202

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Ok so I did a water change asap to combat the overdosing. Do you think itd be too much on them to add the medications you recommend? The prazipro I ordered finally came in so I have that on hand as well as copper. Do you think a freshwater dip would be beneficial? Are there any other medications or treatments that you recommend to get this under control?
 
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Jay Hemdal

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I don't think a FW dip is warranted. Like I said, this is going to be tough because the fish is going to get sicker before it gets better, and it may not have that much time. I would get the copper level up to full dose in 12 hours (using a good test kit). I'd suggest using Coppersafe. Then, you'll need to dose the treatment tank with antibiotics - I'd use Neoplex if you can get it, Maracyn 2 if not.

Jay
 
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Jay Hemdal

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Would it be safe to use copper on a puffer, or at this point is copper damage the safer alternative?
I use Coppersafe on all manner of puffers with no issues. I have a one-eyed porcupine puffer that I use to keep the biofilter going on a 900 gallon quarantine system, and it goes through copper treatments over and over again with no problem. Much of the "copper toxicity" issues are caused by starting copper too late (due to fears about it), poor testing methods, ramping it up too slowly, using ammonia reducers or relying on "old wisdom" from back in the days where copper/citric acid was used, that had a lot more side effects. Losing fish during copper quarantine is going to happen, but it isn't due to "copper toxicity", people just assume it was due to copper since they were using it at the time. There are a few species that I think twice about using coppersafe on - mandarins, jawfish and some small wrasses. However, none of these fish do well in a bare QT, so that is a contributing, possibly only factor.

Jay
 
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