Purple tang, Ick or something else?

Dburr1014 · Jul 15, 2018

No flashing, eating well. Seems to be swimming fine. Just noticed last night the spots. Don't see any on other fish yet.
2 clowns, Wrasse, pj cardinal, royal gramma and 2 molly millers.
Millers added 10 days ago no quarantine. My bad. Lesson learned.
I have a 20 gallon to be set up if need be.

Christopher Davis · Jul 15, 2018

@Humblefish

Humblefish · Jul 15, 2018

It does look like ich starting up. However, I would FW dip the fish just to rule out flukes as a possibility: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/freshwater-dip.248898/

(Flukes are a lot easier to treat in a DT than ich.)

Dburr1014 · Jul 16, 2018

When I get home from work I'll try to fish him out. Wish me luck, tangs are fast.

Dburr1014 · Jul 16, 2018

This is today before the fw dip.
So he came out Pretty easily and went in the dip for about 4.5 minutes. He looked like he was starting to get stressed.
I didn't see anything fall off nor was there anything in the bucket. (black bucket)
I will keep an eye out the next few days and see if there are any changes.

Dburr1014 · Jul 23, 2018

So, tang was fine for 4 days, then I went on a mini vacation. Got back today to find this.
No other fish seem to have any spots.
Questions are
Is it Ick?
Do I take out all the fish off it is ick?
Do I see how long the parasite cycle is first before removing fish?

4FordFamily · Jul 23, 2018

At a minimum that’s ich but the size of some of the spots make me think velvet may also be at play. Your description of time ich went away and returned indicates ich, however.

They need to be removed and treated and the tank run fallow (no fish) for 76 days. Copper or CP is best. Dr Tim’s or BioSpira is best to get the nitrogen cycle rolling in QT. Monitor ammonia with the ammonia alert badge by Seachem.

Dburr1014 · Jul 24, 2018

Okay, making water now. I have to be out of town tonight so it will have to wait until Wednesday. I know if it is velvet time is of the essence. Fingers crossed.
My plan is to pull water from the display and use that for the qt tank. Treat with copper, bring it up over 4 days. Do a 2 gallon water change every day or 2 with nsw.
Sound good? And how long to treat? 4 to 6 weeks?

Humblefish · Jul 24, 2018

Dburr1014 said:
Okay, making water now. I have to be out of town tonight so it will have to wait until Wednesday. I know if it is velvet time is of the essence. Fingers crossed.
My plan is to pull water from the display and use that for the qt tank. Treat with copper, bring it up over 4 days. Do a 2 gallon water change every day or 2 with nsw.
Sound good? And how long to treat? 4 to 6 weeks?

Being this is possibly velvet, I would get the copper up to therapeutic within 48 hours and leave it there for 30 days. Good luck!

Dburr1014 · Jul 24, 2018

[emoji106] Thanks for the help, I'll keep you updated

Dburr1014 · Jul 25, 2018

Got all the fish out and into my 20 gallon. Started to dose copper safe tonight at 1 tsp for the tank. I'm going to do 1 more tsp before bed. Total dosing should be 8 tsp for 20 gallons so I'm splitting that up into 4 days.
Lfs didn't have a ammonia badge so I'm going to test everyday. And do 1 gallon change everyday.

Dburr1014 · Jul 29, 2018

Copper safe is up to about 1.8/2 ppm since Friday. My problem is I think I'm losing to the ammonia battle. I've been doing 1 gallon change in the morning and 1 at night. That is 2 gallons a day. When I test the ammonia it's been going up .25 ppm daily. I tested just now and it is at 1 ppm. Did a 2 gallon change and it barely even lowered it. Tomorrow I'm going to do a big water change. Fish a fine and swimming and all are eating. I'm removing any uneaten food and any poop I see. I've been feeding to a minimum. I see no spots on any fish. Because of my ammonia problem I'm thinking of maybe dumping the copper and going to hypo treatment so I can get some live rock in the tank.
Anyone have thoughts on this?

4FordFamily · Jul 29, 2018

Dburr1014 said:
Copper safe is up to about 1.8/2 ppm since Friday. My problem is I think I'm losing to the ammonia battle. I've been doing 1 gallon change in the morning and 1 at night. That is 2 gallons a day. When I test the ammonia it's been going up .25 ppm daily. I tested just now and it is at 1 ppm. Did a 2 gallon change and it barely even lowered it. Tomorrow I'm going to do a big water change. Fish a fine and swimming and all are eating. I'm removing any uneaten food and any poop I see. I've been feeding to a minimum. I see no spots on any fish. Because of my ammonia problem I'm thinking of maybe dumping the copper and going to hypo treatment so I can get some live rock in the tank.
Anyone have thoughts on this?

You need Biospira or Dr Tim’s ammonia in a bottle and some sort of faux sponge material (something that won’t absorb meds).

You need to do 90% water changes if ammonia is present. I did it every day for a couple weeks before I discovered BioSpira and Dr Tim’s.

Dburr1014 · Jul 31, 2018

I went to the lfs and got amguard and stability by seachem. And a sponge. Hopefully this stuff works. Still doing waterchanges daily.
Fish are still eating and swimming normally.

Dburr1014 · Aug 9, 2018

I'm happy to report that I'm half way in my copper treatment and still have all 6 fish living peacefully in the 20 gallon. I have not seen the ich but 2 days saw white blotches on the purple tang. They are gone now. He did have the shakes for 1 day. I'm waiting to see if they return and if they do I will snap some pics. Fingers crossed that they don't come back.

Dburr1014 · Sep 11, 2018

Things didn't go as planned.
So the tang still had ich after the 30 days. I was having a hard time with reading the api tests. Guess I was low. So I took a fresh gallon of salt water and dosed it and sampled it with the api test.
Now I'm good... Sunday will end my 2nd round of 30 copper dose and this time I see no signs of sick fish.
October 11th can't come soon enough. That will be 76 days since the fish have been out of the system. What a horrible experience this has been.