Rusty angel and copper. Help

Phishguy3.0 · Feb 16, 2020

I dosed my 10 gal qt this morning with 8 drops of of cupermine. A little less then half the first dose. I have a rusty angel and a double saddle back. I noticed some increased breathing from my angel. He was swimming around the tank ok after the dose. 12 hours later and he’s been stuck swimming in the corner basically trying to push through the glass. I tried to persuade him to go to another part of the tank with my net and he didn’t even notice the net on top of him which is very unlike him. Is he dying? I did a partial water change. Hopefully in the morning things will be better. Any advice would be appreciated.

Big G · Feb 17, 2020

Most dwarf angels do better with a "chelated" copper like Copper Power or Coppersafe. The "ionic" coppers like Cupramine and Brightwells are a bit rougher on them. Coppers are after all are a poison.

Dosing for angels and other "sensitive" fish (wrasses, anthias, butterflies, etc.) can be a bit tricky. For example, Cupramine says to give the tank half the dose and then later do the other half. That's a lot of copper split into two huge doses. I've had much better luck with sensitive fish to take the total amount and break it down into very small doses in the AM, lunch, PM spread out over 4-5 days or so, as long as you are not treating a parasite infection and need to get to therapeutic levels asap. This gives you plenty of time to observe for sensitive fish.

Beautiful fish. Best of luck.

Phishguy3.0 · Feb 17, 2020

Phishguy3.0 said:
I dosed my 10 gal qt this morning with 8 drops of of cupermine. A little less then half the first dose. I have a rusty angel and a double saddle back. I noticed some increased breathing from my angel. He was swimming around the tank ok after the dose. 12 hours later and he’s been stuck swimming in the corner basically trying to push through the glass. I tried to persuade him to go to another part of the tank with my net and he didn’t even notice the net on top of him which is very unlike him. Is he dying? I did a partial water change. Hopefully in the morning things will be better. Any advice would be appreciated.

So last night a did a partial water change and this morning the angel is swimming around the tank, color looks good but he’s basically bouncing into everything. I just did another partial water change. Hopefully this is just side effects of the Cupramine. Have you had any experience with these side effects?