Fish Dying quickly

[Marine Iguana]

Hello all, over the past 24 hours I have lost 4 fish- it started yesterday evening when I lost 2 lyre tail anthias. This morning everything seemed fine, then in 4 hours my flame hawkfish went from normal and eating to dead. Within an hour of losing the hawk, my cleaner wrasse developed the same symptoms and was gone within an hour- all of these fish have been with me for the past 6 months. All the other fish appear normal, with the exception of the foxface- every several minutes, the fox face starts swimming frantically, but then returns to normal and continues grazing around the tank.

Symptoms are this: fish out of nowhere would start bolting around the tank (no other fish would). After this, fish would have heavy breathing and lay on the bottom of the tank and seal refuge in the rocks. They would twitch and tense up often (reminding me of a seizure). I treated the tank for flukes with prazipro about 2 hours ago, no response in any of the fish.

Tank details:
-150g display, 30g sump
-Bare bottom tank
-All params tested and normal
-No inverts/corals affected, including softies, lps and acropora

Remaining fish stock includes:
-Scopas Tang
-Mimic tang (juvenile currently transitioning to adult)
-Talbot damsel
-Azure Damsel
-Green Chrome's
-Magnificent Foxface
-Eightline Flasher Wrasse
-Bruneus Wrasse
-Solar Wrasse
-1x pair percula clownfish
-Flametail Blenny

I'm stumped. Could this be velvet? I've dealt with it before, but it presented very differently (fish had visual symptoms), and I quarantined to prevent it. I also would think if it's stray voltage that all fish would be affected. Thanks for any help- I care so much about these fish and it hurts to see them suffering.

 

[brandon429]

awaiting diagnostics from the crew coming up soon I bet when they see your alert. can I ask how long this tank has been running? I track that data to help owners of new tanks/if applicable

 

[Marine Iguana]

awaiting diagnostics from the crew coming up soon I bet when they see your alert. can I ask how long this tank has been running? I track that data to help owners of new tanks/if applicable

Thank you- tank has been running a year now

 

[Brandont21]

I know you say params tested and normal, but the medics are still going to want the values you got. Wish you the best of luck though.!

 

[Marine Iguana]

Calc- 440

Alk- 8dkh

Mag- 1200

Nitrate- 10pm

Phosphate- 0.02ppm

Temp- 78

Salinity- 1.025

 

[Marine Iguana]

Bruneus wrasse just went down, moved him to the sump because he was being blown around the tank and damsels started picking on him

 

[Brandont21]

Did you test for ammonia?

 

[Marine Iguana]

My ammo alert badge say 0- I replace it every 6 months. I don’t have a test kit for ammonia

 

[brandon429]

it is not possible to have an ammonia problem in a year old reef tank when the losses are focused on fish, and disease preps may not have been applied

even the fish dying cannot drive up ammonia until you leave them in the tank days to rot, and even then in a tank this size it would take all of them at once to die/left in/to overcome the natural processing abilities of all reef tanks especially at this size.

rule out any cycling issues whatsoever, rule in disease.

do you fallow and quarantine each item added to the tank, this includes corals, rocks cuc etc>

 

[Brandont21]

Any aerosols being used in the room? Recently clean with windex or anything?

 

[Marine Iguana]

I do for the fish, I don’t for corals. Haven’t added any other inverts for months.

 

[Marine Iguana]

Any aerosols being used in the room? Recently clean with windex or anything?

Nope, we avoid them in the room

 

[brandon429]

Biosecurity

A short introduction to aquarium biosecurity

www.reef2reef.com

that shows how inverts can vector in disease and delays a while until expression hits

hey can you post a full tank shot

**good job at least on the fish preps that puts you in the rare range for new tankers, it's a good effort.

because the rates of disease expression are so insanely high compared to 2005, when 0 preps would be ok about 80% of the time not even the fish, that article now applies and it covers anything wet introduced from a pet store: everything. these fish, corals and inverts and live rock transfers are dirtier than the bathroom stall floor of studio 54 in 1973. they're more infective than that actual setting

 

[Marine Iguana]

Here’s the tank as we speak

 

[brandon429]

very nice, very clean too for such a new tank. that's really maturing nicely live rock, anem is happy, strong system. you can rule out oxygen issues (look at the surface boil from powerhead aims) ammonia (because no year old reef, no three month old reef can have ammonia noncontrol issues delayed after the cycle) nitrite, any measurable reef param in my opinion my own personal assessment risk % likelihood cause is 95% disease latent expression most likely, 5% TBD such as contaminants unaccounted for, odd behavior issues from a bully unapparent etc.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

did anything unusual happen 2-3 days ago? Any visitors? Water changes (maybe forgot to plug something)? Power failure? Have you started dosing anything new? Fish food is not expired?

 

[brandon429]

One contaminant issue to add may not apply but target killed all my fish once

For 25 years I'd taken common 1950s sprayway glass cleaner and cleaned the glass on various systems, sometimes even spraying onto the front glass and wiping

Decades, no problem. Then in 2018 I bought some at wal mart, sprayed only down low on the front panel of a six foot tall column tank, no incursion over the top, and 100% of fish were floating in 5 mins, about 30 fish no joke

Looked at the label it said new improved formula... ouch

Was this tank

 

[Marine Iguana]

very nice, very clean too for such a new tank. that's really maturing nicely live rock, anem is happy, strong system. you can rule out oxygen issues (look at the surface boil from powerhead aims) ammonia (because no year old reef, no three month old reef can have ammonia noncontrol issues delayed after the cycle) nitrite, any measurable reef param in my opinion my own personal assessment risk % likelihood cause is 95% disease latent expression most likely, 5% TBD such as contaminants unaccounted for, odd behavior issues from a bully unapparent etc.

Thank you- I’m your opinion, what disease do you think would be most likely? Velvet? I don’t have a QT large enough to handle all the fish at once, but I do have 2 sponge filters cycled in the sump.

did anything unusual happen 2-3 days ago? Any visitors? Water changes (maybe forgot to plug something)? Power failure? Have you started dosing anything new? Fish food is not expired?

Nothing that is standing out in my memory- no water changes in past week, no power failures, food not expired, not dosing anything other than my normal 2 part.

 

[Marine Iguana]

One contaminant issue to add may not apply but target killed all by fish once

For 25 years I'd taken common 1950s sprayway glass cleaner and cleaned the glass, sometimes even spraying onto the front glass and wiping

Decades, no problem. Then in 2018 I bought some at wal mart, sprayed only down low on the front panel of a six foot tall column tank, no incursion over the top, and 100% of fish were floating in 5 mins, about 30 fish no joke

Looked at the label it said new improved formula... ouch

That’s a massive bummer- when I clean the glass I spray the product in a sepperate room and wipe. Haven’t wiped the glass in the past few weeks though.

 

[Lavey29]

Your first post states you encountered velvet previously. Was it with this tank? Did you fallow 76 days? Do you do observation QT or medicinal treatment QT?