Need confirmation: is this velvet?

[ReefGoose]

I've had what I think is velvet going through my tank. All fish are currently is copper in a hospital tank, but two days into copper the two clownfish look worse than before going in. Just checking to make sure it isn't brook or something that needs a different treatment. Lost 2 before getting the hospital setup, then 2 in the last 2 days in the hospital tank.

Ammonia alert badge says tank is safe.

If it helps:
First loss: Royal Gramma
Then in order: kole tang, Midas Blenny, flame angel.

Hanging on: 2 pictured clowns and a wrasse.

Seem to not notice: engineer goby, 3x Fiji blue chromis, bangaii cardinal.

Thanks in advance.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I've had what I think is velvet going through my tank. All fish are currently is copper in a hospital tank, but two days into copper the two clownfish look worse than before going in. Just checking to make sure it isn't brook or something that needs a different treatment. Lost 2 before getting the hospital setup, then 2 in the last 2 days in the hospital tank.

Ammonia alert badge says tank is safe.

If it helps:
First loss: Royal Gramma
Then in order: kole tang, Midas Blenny, flame angel.

Hanging on: 2 pictured clowns and a wrasse.

Seem to not notice: engineer goby, 3x Fiji blue chromis, bangaii cardinal.

Thanks in advance.

yes, this appears to be velvet and may have second issue with brook. Would also support rapid fish loss.
I see you mentioned copper- Is it coppersafe or cupramine and at what copper level and how are you testing copper level?
Copper products take a couple of days to start taking effect and recommended treatment time is 30 FULL days at 80 degrees with velvet. Also monitor Ammonia levels while in quarantine with a reliable test kit and add aeration during treatment using an air stone.
I do not trust ammonia badge which is also for freshwater after 2 weeks f use especially when in with copper and other medications

 

[ReefGoose]

yes, this appears to be velvet and may have second issue with brook. Would also support rapid fish loss.
I see you mentioned copper- Is it coppersafe or cupramine and at what copper level and how are you testing copper level?
Copper products take a couple of days to start taking effect and recommended treatment time is 30 FULL days at 80 degrees with velvet. Also monitor Ammonia levels while in quarantine with a reliable test kit and add aeration during treatment using an air stone.
I do not trust ammonia badge which is also for freshwater after 2 weeks f use especially when in with copper and other medications

I'm using copper power. I bought a Hanna checker, and just measured at 2.38ppm.

I have a salifert tester but had assumed the ammonia alert badge would give me an idea of when WC was needed. I did use cycled sponge in a hob filter (no other media) so I have a little bit of nitrogen cycle. I've been changing 1 gallon of the 10 gallon a day.

Tank is running 78 degrees but I'm gonna bump it up to 80.

I'm running an aquaclear 30hob, sponge media and floss, also a sponge air bubble filter for extra aeration.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I'm using copper power. I bought a Hanna checker, and just measured at 2.38ppm.

I have a salifert tester but had assumed the ammonia alert badge would give me an idea of when WC was needed. I did use cycled sponge in a hob filter (no other media) so I have a little bit of nitrogen cycle. I've been changing 1 gallon of the 10 gallon a day.

Tank is running 78 degrees but I'm gonna bump it up to 80.

I'm running an aquaclear 30hob, sponge media and floss, also a sponge air bubble filter for extra aeration.

Looks like oyu have everything in order and should beat this however Velvet moves quickly

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I've had what I think is velvet going through my tank. All fish are currently is copper in a hospital tank, but two days into copper the two clownfish look worse than before going in. Just checking to make sure it isn't brook or something that needs a different treatment. Lost 2 before getting the hospital setup, then 2 in the last 2 days in the hospital tank.

Ammonia alert badge says tank is safe.

If it helps:
First loss: Royal Gramma
Then in order: kole tang, Midas Blenny, flame angel.

Hanging on: 2 pictured clowns and a wrasse.

Seem to not notice: engineer goby, 3x Fiji blue chromis, bangaii cardinal.

Thanks in advance.

Can you post a video of the fish? Super fast breathing is the hallmark of velvet. This looks like Brook to me.

 

[ReefGoose]

Can you post a video of the fish? Super fast breathing is the hallmark of velvet. This looks like Brook to me.

Here is a video.

Don't see panicked breathing. Clown hasn't been eating much, but to be honest he was always fat but didn't visibility go nuts at feeding time with the others. This guy's has hung on with symptoms now for a little over a week.

Unfortunately I lost the black clown overnight. The orange fish who is still alive has had symptoms for like 4 days longer.

Other fish in treatment look alright. Lubbock Wrasse had symptoms days ago, but none now. Lubbock wrasse seemingly got better on his own before going into treatment. He was sick for maybe 3 days?

Engineer goby still has the same appearance as clownfish, but hasn't really changed behavior besides not having as much of an appetite.

Bangaii and 3 blue Fiji chromis have not ever presented infection.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Here is a video.

Don't see panicked breathing. Clown hasn't been eating much, but to be honest he was always fat but didn't visibility go nuts at feeding time with the others. This guy's has hung on with symptoms now for a little over a week.

Unfortunately I lost the black clown overnight. The orange fish who is still alive has had symptoms for like 4 days longer.

Other fish in treatment look alright. Lubbock Wrasse had symptoms days ago, but none now. Lubbock wrasse seemingly got better on his own before going into treatment. He was sick for maybe 3 days?

Engineer goby still has the same appearance as clownfish, but hasn't really changed behavior besides not having as much of an appetite.

Bangaii and 3 blue Fiji chromis have not ever presented infection.

That does look like brooklynella.

Treatment is difficult. Formalin works best, but isn’t safe for humans or invertebrates.

Ruby Reef Rally Pro can work, but it needs to be started at the first signs of infection.

 

[ReefGoose]

That does look like brooklynella.

Treatment is difficult. Formalin works best, but isn’t safe for humans or invertebrates.

Ruby Reef Rally Pro can work, but it needs to be started at the first signs of infection.

So should I WC to get rid of copper and formalin bath the survivers, or start RRR? I don't have either so I will need to try and order some ASAP. Not sure if either LFS would keep that on hand for a local faster run.

When you say formalin isn't safe, are you saying it shouldn't used it at all, or that I should use it and be careful? It seems like I would need care to handle correctly with just a few minutes of looking into right now.

AP chemistry teacher here so I know how to work with dangerous chemicals, but also don't want to be over confident and end up harming myself. I would happily defer to someone who has experience with formalin (it's a home aquarium, not a school one)

 

[ReefGoose]

So should I WC to get rid of copper and formalin bath the survivers, or start RRR? I don't have either so I will need to try and order some ASAP. Not sure if either LFS would keep that on hand for a local faster run.

When you say formalin isn't safe, are you saying it shouldn't used it at all, or that I should use it and be careful? It seems like I would need care to handle correctly with just a few minutes of looking into right now.

AP chemistry teacher here so I know how to work with dangerous chemicals, but also don't want to be over confident and end up harming myself. I would happily defer to someone who has experience with formalin (it's a home aquarium, not a school one)

Probably not practical to do Formalin in the house.

I just purchased some RRR and I'll try to treat with that as soon as I can get it. Clownfish looks like he's in bad shape, so we will see if he's around to start treatment.

Would a FW bath give temporary relief to buy time until RRR arrives?

Additionally, can I treat both RRR and copper power at the same time since everyone is already in copper? otherwise I can treat for Brook and restart copper to just protect against anything else as long as display will be fallow for a good while now.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

So should I WC to get rid of copper and formalin bath the survivers, or start RRR? I don't have either so I will need to try and order some ASAP. Not sure if either LFS would keep that on hand for a local faster run.

When you say formalin isn't safe, are you saying it shouldn't used it at all, or that I should use it and be careful? It seems like I would need care to handle correctly with just a few minutes of looking into right now.

AP chemistry teacher here so I know how to work with dangerous chemicals, but also don't want to be over confident and end up harming myself. I would happily defer to someone who has experience with formalin (it's a home aquarium, not a school one)

I would use RRRP. Both as a 24 hour in tank treatment and a daily higher dose aerated and heated bath (3x dose for 3 hours). This product may have a small amount of formalin in it. I guess I’d remove the copper first.

Formalin de-gasses from water, so when you dose a home aquarium, you end up breathing it. I used to use it daily at work, and I’m still above ground at 66, but in good conscience, I can’t suggest other people use it in their homes. Schools have stopped using it as a preservative for their bio specimens.

 

[Staghorn]

This is beautiful!

 

[ReefGoose]

Video 12/4/25
A quick update. I was disappointed at first RRRPro won't arrive until Saturday. But... Everyone (survivors) who are in copper currently are looking better.

Tuesday night the orange clown got a 5 min FW bath. Thought I killed him for a second because right when I dropped him in he looked like he stopped breathing. I used the bubbler to get him moving around and then he swam around and kept moving for the rest of the dip. Yesterday he still looked kinda bad, but actually ate with the other fish at feeding. Today he ate again and looks remarkably better. Still a little bit of dusty stuff but tons less than before. I literally think it is just that he finally started eating again and his immune system got to work.

All other fish in qt look pretty good and are eating. Engineer goby still a little dusty but bangaii and chromis have no spots or dust visible.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Video 12/4/25
A quick update. I was disappointed at first RRRPro won't arrive until Saturday. But... Everyone (survivors) who are in copper currently are looking better.

Tuesday night the orange clown got a 5 min FW bath. Thought I killed him for a second because right when I dropped him in he looked like he stopped breathing. I used the bubbler to get him moving around and then he swam around and kept moving for the rest of the dip. Yesterday he still looked kinda bad, but actually ate with the other fish at feeding. Today he ate again and looks remarkably better. Still a little bit of dusty stuff but tons less than before. I literally think it is just that he finally started eating again and his immune system got to work.

All other fish in qt look pretty good and are eating. Engineer goby still a little dusty but bangaii and chromis have no spots or dust visible.

Yes - FW dips can buy you a bit of time with Brook, but the extra handling causes a lot of stress on the fish.

Fingers crossed!

 

[ReefGoose]

Another update.
Qt Tank day 7 video

Clownfish still has a few spots, but they look bigger and less like the dusty/film stuff from before. Look more like spots with little white hairs sticking out. I tried to get closer pictures but they don't really show what I can see in person. Overall behavior the fish is behaving more normal and looks decently healthy. Big turnaround in just a couple days. Film and dust are gone on all fish, including clown.

Chromis and bangaii never looked sick.
Clownfish, engineer goby, and Lubbock wrasse at some point were definitely sick but now are eating again and look basically normal.

Casualties: Royal Gramma, blue eye kole tang, orange spot goby, Midas Blenny (my favorite ), flame angelfish, black ocellaris clownfish.

The clownfish was seemingly sick for a long time (about a week), which makes me think it wasn't velvet, because everyone says that disease kills quickly.

The fact that everyone is looking better also has me questioning if it is brook. Because so far the treatment was copper.

So there is evidence to support brook, but also evidence that says copper helped and maybe it was velvet?

I think a major factor in the disease outbreak was my pulling back on feeding schedule in the main tank to combat hair algae. I have an automatic feeder that drops a variety of pellets. That auto fed 3x daily, and I would feed frozen every other day on top of that. I had pulled back on the feeder to 2x daily and the frozen to like once a week. When sick none of the fish are well. Once they started eating again everyone looks great again. I've only been feeding 1x a day in qt, but they have been eating much more normally, accepted frozen yesterday and mixed pellets today. A lot to be said for a fish with a full belly.

Going forward:
If they continue looking healthy I'm going to complete 30 days in the copper. Today is day 7 of copper.

Once I get the RRRPro I will give all the fish a bath in RRRPro, but return to the copper to finish the copper treatment.

Once copper is complete, I will do another RRRPro bath and then do an in-tank RRRPro treatment. Hopefully there will be documentation on R2R on length and concentration.

Then I will treat with Prazipro.

Then we will just hold the fish in qt until tank has completed 80 days fallow.

Right now I have 6 survivors in qt, 1/2 the original population. Hopefully I get to return 6 to the tank... In February.

 

[ReefGoose]

Update:
Video 12/13

Fish have been in therapeutic copper 15 days now. Last measured 2.38.

We had one more loss, the engineer goby of all fish found the 1" gap where the back of the tank isn't covered near the aquaclear and jumped out in the middle of the night one night.

Clownfish and wrasse has a 90 min rally bath two days ago, I thought I saw some type of infection on the clownfish mouth (lips looked white) and a small part of the wrasse tail looked not right. Both tolerated well and look better. The clownfish mouth looks like he got one of his teeth knocked out, which is kinda funny.

Behavior is normal, but I got on video the "stress spots" my clown has gotten on his upper back every time something in the tank changes. I kinda figured I was managing ich since I got him 4+ years ago. These bumps are raised, primary end up on his upper back, look invisible when viewed from the side, but when he faces towards, they are visible. Sometimes I swear they have little hairs coming out of them.

Any ID on confirmation what this is? Video is attached up top.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Update:
Video 12/13

Fish have been in therapeutic copper 15 days now. Last measured 2.38.

We had one more loss, the engineer goby of all fish found the 1" gap where the back of the tank isn't covered near the aquaclear and jumped out in the middle of the night one night.

Clownfish and wrasse has a 90 min rally bath two days ago, I thought I saw some type of infection on the clownfish mouth (lips looked white) and a small part of the wrasse tail looked not right. Both tolerated well and look better. The clownfish mouth looks like he got one of his teeth knocked out, which is kinda funny.

Behavior is normal, but I got on video the "stress spots" my clown has gotten on his upper back every time something in the tank changes. I kinda figured I was managing ich since I got him 4+ years ago. These bumps are raised, primary end up on his upper back, look invisible when viewed from the side, but when he faces towards, they are visible. Sometimes I swear they have little hairs coming out of them.

Any ID on confirmation what this is? Video is attached up top.

Yes this is secondary bacterial lesions associated with brook. As it spreads across the body producing lesions as it progresses often confused with ich and can turn into secondary bacteria. Other symptoms will be lethargic behavior, refusing to eat and heavy breathing from the mucus.
Start with a prolonged 60 minute bath of ruby rally pro then at a lower concentration in a quarantine tank as you mentioned doing a bath but did not seem to be but a few minutes. The longer the fish are exposed to the treatment, the more effective it will be at eliminating this issue.
Since a formalin solution is often not available for use, temporary relief can be achieved by giving the fish a FW bath or dip in water same temperature as display tank. Even though this treatment will not cure the disease, it can help to remove some of the parasites, as well as reduce the amount of mucus in the gills to assist with respiration problems.
Treatment is best done in the QT tank using Ruby Rally Pro. Ruby takes a little longer and initial treatment generally takes 2-3 days to really start going to work.