Hyposalinity

[ReefWithCare]

I wouldn’t raise more than .002 per day. And I would spread that out - morning & evening. You can safely lower salinity on fish more rapidly than you can raise it.

Oh wow that isn't that much. What's the big way to do this? It's only a 29G QT and I know you can't just drop salt in there...or can I get there by just replace a little bit of water everyday?

 

[Humblefish]

Oh wow that isn't that much. What's the big way to do this? It's only a 29G QT and I know you can't just drop salt in there...or can I get there by just replace a little bit of water everyday?

I would siphon out a little water everyday and replace with high salinity seawater.

 

[lewis.maryann08]

If I lower my salt will it hurt my corals?

 

[HotRocks]

This Sticky (Original Post) has been edited with new info. Reflecting up to date procedures and currently available products etc.

 

[Brock0019]

If OP would have drained his tank, would the free air have killed the eggs? Can the eggs survive on dry sand?
Obviously the free swimmers would be down the drain and dead but if draining the tank completely and letting it sit for a week would have killed all the ich eggs, wouldn’t that have been a much easier solution?

Currently have ich, no corals and contemplating draining the tank and just staring over to avoid the months of low salinity, and fear of it resurrecting. Bought some CP and it should be here sometime
Next week, just looking for the easiest solution since I have no corals.

 

[Uncledazza]

I have been running my DT at 1.009 (checked with a Milwaukee and auto topped with Apex 12ppt) for the last 2 weeks and just lost a flame angel to flukes. I check the fish every day with a pair of Surgical Binocular Loupes 3.5x 420mm while feeding. I noticed cloudy eyes on Monday but could not see the flukes. I started treating the tank with Melaflex. I did not think that Flukes could live in hypo, so I thought it was a bacterial infection. On Friday I could see that it was flukes and started treating the tank with Prazipro. Yesterday I noticed that the eyes were worse (pretty bad actually) maybe it was because of the prazi killing the flukes I could now see the flukes more readily, the fish was hiding and looking in a bad way. I removed it for a freshwater dip in Malachite Green for 5 minutes and a 10 second dip in methylene blue before moving it to the QT tank running copper power at 2.5ppm (hanna checker) and the fish did not make it.

All fish (except a white tail tang, the flame angel and a yellow tang, which came from Marine Collectors) have been through quarantine 1.026 Sal, Copper power at 2+ ppm 30 days 2 rounds of prazipro. The DT has no inverts or coral (they are in another QT tank 76 days + by now). I dropped to hypo when I saw the white tail tang flashing, I could not see anything wrong with it. I was going away for a week, so I dropped the Salinity before I left as I did not want an outbreak while I was away.

Now the potters angel may have a slight eye going cloudy. All the fish have always had really bright eyes.

Has anyone else had issues with hypo resistant flukes?

My tank is a Refer 350, 91 Gal with Caribsea Life rock & marinepure block
2 x Ai Twentysix
Clarisea 3000
Veovit with 1kg media 70 gal/per hour
Ph 8.1-7-9
KH 5.9
NO3 10
PH4 0
ORP 300
Temp 78

 

[Lionfish hunter]

for those interested . here is a post I did reflecting back and making some notes and warnings on my DT HYPO..

ok so let me do a quick post so who ever reads this does not make the same mistake I have..

here is the background.. the Display tank is about 600 gallons was ten years up and running. 40 fish and plently of large 40 lbs pieces of rock.. in other words not really movable. I had a lot of corals sps and problems with bubble and turf algea., more about algea later. ick arrived in the spring as usual. I usually just let it run it course but this time got a little worried. more than usual so I did the hypo treatment. I was aggressive and did it in the DT. here are the rules I found on that. Note I had three types of algea growing in the tank. bubble, turf the hard to remove impossible turf.. and a third that was almost like fluffly . hard to describe but could be brushed off.. had a lot of it and caused problems during the hypo as described below. it covered my rock.

NOTE. I REMOVED ALL CORALS AND INHABITANTS EXCEPT THE FISH AND ROCK AND SAND. CALIBRATE YOUR REFRACTOMETER WITH 35PPT SOLUTION. NOTE RODI

1. You can hypo a DT. but certain cautions must be met.
2. expect ammonia spikes if you do not remove the rock if covered in algea.
3. I had ammonia spikes and found it was the die off of the algea.
4. After ammonia spike I decided to do the heavy lifting and I removed half the rock with the help of fellow reefer. put rock outside and let dry to get rid of turf bubble and fluffy algae. Should have done this in the beginning. Note I had biological bed in my sump to handle the tank.
5. I lost fish because I should have removed the rock first that was coated in fluffy algae. the fluffy algae dies right away. bubble takes a few days.. and turf that is anther story. I think if the rock is not covered in fluffy algae you are ok.. but watch for ammonia spikes
6. you can control ammonia spikes but only for 24 hours with use of prime or similar product.. but
7. Ammonia spikes I controlled with seacheme product called prime and MUST do and did large water changes to control the ammonia spikes.. talking 250 gallons.
8. I think again,, could have avoided the ammonia spikes if I had taken the rock covered in algae out first. NOTE, I have a large sump that has live rock and sand that was NOT covered in algae so that could maintain the biological .
9. The spikes in the ammonia ended when I removed half of the live rock with algae from the tank.
10. the ick cleared up in days of dropping the tank to 1.009. IT did not work at anything above 1.010. Some have said 1.014 is workable to kill ick. that is not correct in my opinion.
11. Bubble algae does not live through hypo, hypo kills bubble algae. Good news there.
12. Turf algae is weakened and Hypo does appear to kill it but it takes much longer. Two weeks in hypo and the turf is still living. But appears to be vanishing.. but then again.. tank is not fully lighted anymore.
13. Finally,, make sure all your refractometers are calibrated properly. Mine was not. I actually had the hypo at 1.006 and lost a fish or two because of it.
My Milwaukee was showing 1.009 dead on. Then I purchased two BRS handheld with calibration solution of 35ppt. Discovered the issue and am correcting it.
14. Display tank at two weeks looks good, actually really good. no bubble algae, and the fish look good. My fox face I never use to see the iris in his eyes due to them being cloudy ..

Just my observations..

why do huge water changes to get rid of ammonia when you can simply add prime ever 24 hours? Several people have been doing massive water changes in this forum where a little bit of prime every 24 hours would accomplish the same thing with less stress on the fish. It absolutely works.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

why do huge water changes to get rid of ammonia when you can simply add prime ever 24 hours? Several people have been doing massive water changes in this forum where a little bit of prime every 24 hours would accomplish the same thing with less stress on the fish. It absolutely works.

Prime can't be used with Cupramine, and it may have issues with CP and Coppersafe (still testing that). Another issue; ammonia detoxifiers work really well for the first few doses, but as time goes on, they don't work as well. I don't know the chemistry involved, but you don't want to rely on them for ammonia control for more than a few days to perhaps a week. If you do water changes, alternating with Prime, that works better. Better still is to always work things out so that you have an operating biofilter. Keeping sponge filters running in a sump is a good idea.

Jay

 

[chicago]

Prime .. at least my understanding , is an emergency use. Not a cure to removing. If I recall it eventually will release back?

 

[chicago]

Uncledazza ---- please get yourself a hand held salinity checker.. BRS or other vendors.. I actually have two of them.. get the calibration solution also... I was using a Milwaukee.. green unit and it was off... I have an apex and I only use that to watch the trends up or down to make sure that I am not overskimming and freshwater replacement is causing drops in Salinity... I lost some fish during hypo because of not checking with Handheld.​

 

[Lionfish hunter]

Prime .. at least my understanding , is an emergency use. Not a cure to removing. If I recall it eventually will release back?

Prime .. at least my understanding , is an emergency use. Not a cure to removing. If I recall it eventually will release back?

It can be an emergency use, it can also be used in new tap water you add to the tank. No need to only be an emergency product, there are no negative side effects. It will continue to detoxify ammonia as long as you add it every day in the right dose for the amount of ammonia you have. I do this in my quarantine tanks and never had an issue. Daily water changes are not necessary. The ammonia that prime binds is still available to be used by nitrifying bacteria. It is actually better to not do the daily water changes as more ammonia in the water will help build up the biofilter as long as there is prime in the water in the correct dose. If you do constant water changes and keep the ammonia low, it will take forever for your biofilter to build up enough bacteria.

 

[chicago]

hmm... interesting read... I was using Amguard which seachem says will degrade after 72 hours.. binds fast..

Overview​

AmGuard™ safely, rapidly and efficiently detoxifies toxic free ammonia. It is safe to use during tank cycling and is ideal for treating emergency situations. AmGuard™ is the strongest liquid ammonia binder on the market. It works within minutes to detoxify free ammonia, and it doesn’t degrade for nearly 72 hours. That’s at least twice as long as our competitors’ products. Unlike competing products, AmGuard™ converts it into a safe, non-toxic form that is readily removed by the tank’s biofilter. It does not alter pH.
Ammonia can exist in two forms: free and ionized. It is only the free form that is toxic. Traditional ammonia test kits convert all ammonia to free ammonia by raising pH to 12–14; at this pH AmGuard™ cannot function and thus a false positive reading will result. For long term ammonia control, use Seachem Stability® and Matrix™. Use Ammonia Alert® or MultiTest™ Free & Total Ammonia to directly monitor levels of free ammonia. AmGuard™ also removes chlorine and chloramines.

When I did hypo, i failed to get all rock out.. not that you have to.. unless like mine it is covered in a lot of algea. The algae dies off quickly with hypo..creating some issues of ammonia spikes ect.. thus why I resorted to Amguard.

 

[Muffin87]

Both the Milwaukee and the Hanna Digital Refractometers have a Salinity Accuracy of ±2 PSU; ±2 ppt.
Basically, a 1.009 sg sample can give a reading between 1.007 sg and 1.010 sg.

Does that make them unsuitable for hyposalinity, or is a confidence interval of 1.0075 to 1.0105 sg within the acceptable range?

Thanks a lot.

Here in Italy, chelated copper treatments are unavailable, and ionic copper treatments must be imported from abroad, so it seems hyposalinity is the only option for me
(chloroquine phosphate also not an option).

 

[crazyfishmom]

I am considering using hypo as my sole quarantine method for new fish. I realize that it doesn’t treat everything but with ich being the most common parasite around I am hoping it would be sufficient.

Would treatment for 30 days (once 1.009 hypo is reached) and having copper available in the event that velvet rears its ugly head a feasible option?

Any thoughts?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I am considering using hypo as my sole quarantine method for new fish. I realize that it doesn’t treat everything but with ich being the most common parasite around I am hoping it would be sufficient.

Would treatment for 30 days (once 1.009 hypo is reached) and having copper available in the event that velvet rears its ugly head a feasible option?

Any thoughts?

Yes - some people do this. Hypo also controls flukes very well, only velvet is uncontrolled. F the fish go off feed and begin breathing fast, suspect velvet and use coppersafe.

Jay

 

[crazyfishmom]

Yes - some people do this. Hypo also controls flukes very well, only velvet is uncontrolled. F the fish go off feed and begin breathing fast, suspect velvet and use coppersafe.

Jay

Thank you!