Signs of copper intolerance?

[Shilpan Patel]

Hey guys,
Is it true that copper intolerance means the fish will stop eating first, and then if really bad start breathing heavy and becoming lethargic?

And is it also true that it’s very unlikely for them to just suddenly die due to copper toxicity? And they would stop eating etc and show all those signs first?

I ask because I have a scooter blenny in quarantine in therapeutic copper for almost 8 days now (I do up to 10 days and then transfer to a sterile bucket for observation). He’s eating fine (pellets 3-4x a day) and is showing none of those intolerance signs. I have already been told that dragonets don’t tolerate copper and I’m willing to accept that risk as I only realized this a few days ago. My question is would my fish show signs of copper intolerance first if there was a problem? Or do they usually just die very quickly?

 

[HotRocks]

IME, prior to the discovery of the Hanna checker a fish that was intolerant would stop eating one day. Then be gone within 48hours of not eating. I also suspect the levels were much higher than necessary when I experienced this.

 

[RichtheReefer21]

Did you ramp the copper levels slowly or were you forced to bring them up fast (i.e. if velvet was suspected)

Was the tank cycled? possibly an ammonia spike/sickness?

 

[Shilpan Patel]

Hello thank you for your input that’s reassuring then as the dragonnet is still eating and no signs of distress. I will continue with copper and let you guys know how it goes.

The ammonia went up over 4 days. I meant to do over 7, but my ceramic noodles leached copper from a previous quarantine and that’s why it only took 4 days.

Yup fully cycled tank! No ammonia or nitrite I check that and copper daily. I keep my copper at 0.35-0.40. It hasn’t dropped below 0.35 but I am having to add a bit of copper every few days to keep it stable. The small amount of sand for the bullet goby and the ceramic noodles cause trouble. I’m switching to sponge in my canister filter for the next quarantine.

To be honest the bullet goby and scooter blenny had been in the fish shop with other tangs for weeks with no signs of ich, they probably don’t have ich but after going fallow once I don’t skip QT anymore. The cupramine is prophylactic, there hasn’t been any signs of disease.

 

[Shilpan Patel]

Also can I just say thank you for all the advice? I’m new here and I’ve found the advice so helpful, I really appreciate it. It’s great to have a place to go to to ask questions. Two out of three of the LFSs in my city still say that Ich is everywhere and you can’t get rid of it!!

 

[RichtheReefer21]

Also can I just say thank you for all the advice? I’m new here and I’ve found the advice so helpful, I really appreciate it. It’s great to have a place to go to to ask questions. Two out of three of the LFSs in my city still say that Ich is everywhere and you can’t get rid of it!!

Stick with the 3rd lfs. Lol

 

[Shilpan Patel]

Haha yes I totally agree with you! They’re the smaller one but I stick with them when possible.

The other two stores I always see ich on their tangs.

By the way my scooter dragonnet started eating brine shrimp today. Just randomly. I was feeding the bullet goby which gets a mix of everything, and then the dragonnet randomly swam over, stared at it for a good minute, then went to town and started eating heaps of brine shrimps.
I’m going to try mix brine shrimp with other meaty foods like seafood mix and mysis, to see if I can coax it to eat even more variety.