This Is What Velvet Looks Like

[Marco S]

I have had the absolute worst luck with Tangs. I have bought 7 and every single one of them came with ICH and or Marine Velvet. 4 of them made it through QT and have been in my main display now for over 2 years. I just got a new Naso Tang last week and it has been in QT with no signs of anything so I was focusing on getting it to eat and healthy before starting copper. This morning I noticed it had black spots on its face and body right after I dosed API General Cure. I figured it was tubellarian worms, (Black ICH) but many hours later I noticed some white spots on one of my Triggers and within an hour my Tang was covered in white powdered sugar all over. I was already at 1.07 CopperPower so I quickly got over 2.1 in a few hours. I did a freshwater dip because it looked like it was dying and now it is swimming around and looks much better. Hopefully it makes it because it is now in copper at therapeutic levels, so it just needs to make it through the current lifecycle and it should be okay.

I was about 2 minutes into the freshwater dip when I figured I would get some pics and a quick video since I have seen so many people confusing ICH and Velvet. One thing to note is that Velvet spreads EXTREMELY QUICK. It was about an hour from noticing the first signs to being fully covered. A lot of them have already fallen off in the freshwater, but there is enough still on it to see the difference between this and ICH.




I will update this in a few days to let everyone know if it makes it or not.

 

[Zakery Murray]

Poor little guy, hope this one pulls through for ya!

 

[Zionas]

What other Tangs have you tried?

 

[Squidward]

IMO observing is a big waste of time. I'd treat it immediately next time. But personally I prefer TTM. I've done TTM with all of my fish(30) since 2019. (11 Tangs) And all that have passed TTM have lived and thrived. Only had a potters that died from a inner parasite and a yellow coris wrasse that got killed by my Cuban Hogfish.

 

[Marco S]

What other Tangs have you tried?

I have a Powder Blue, an Achilles, a Blue Hippo, and a Purple Tang.

Edit: The ones that have died in QT were, a Blue Hippo, a Bristletooth and now this Naso. The Hippo died of ICH and a bad bacterial infection, the Bristletooth of Velvet and HLLE and this Naso of Velvet. I am done with Tangs. The four I have will have to do.

 

[Marco S]

IMO observing is a big waste of time. I'd treat it immediately next time. But personally I prefer TTM. I've done TTM with all of my fish(30) since 2019. (11 Tangs) And all that have passed TTM have lived and thrived. Only had a potters that died from a inner parasite and a yellow coris wrasse that got killed by my Cuban Hogfish.

This is the first time I have done a QT that I did not start with copper right off the bat and I am regretting that decision. :mad:

I've done the TTM once before with good results, but with smaller tanks. I don't have enough larger tanks to do TTM with larger fish and this Tang was around 6" and I have 2 Bluethroat Triggers that are around 5", a pair of Clownfish and a pair of Filefish all in the same QT so I needed to use a 55 gallon.

On a side note: unfortunately the Naso Tang has died. It took an hour from the time I noticed the Velvet for it to fully cover the fish and another few hours for it to die even though I already had it in copper. Hopefully the other fish make it. I really thought this Tang would pull through because it was healthy and eating both frozen food and Nori just yesterday. I really hate Velvet!

 

[Marco S]

It's weird that the Clownfish are the only ones that look unaffected. they really are bullet proof fish. My two Triggers are covered, but only one of them looks like it is struggling. Hopefully they both make it. The filefish are not looking too bad, but they are breathing heavy.

 

[Marco S]

So I have a question...I did not take the Naso out last night because the lights were off and I could not tell 100% that it was dead. I was going to wait until the lights came on to make the final diagnosis and remove it. However, this morning it looks like the flesh all over it's body and head have been chewed up pretty bad. Anyone know if this is from the velvet or were my Triggers trying to eat it? They do not seem to have much energy or appetite this morning so they are either tired and full from chewing on my Naso all night or they are just adjusting to the huge dose of copper I gave them last night.

 

[Marco S]

My Triggers are looking much better tonight so the copper is definitely working it's magic!

I do have a question for @Jay Hemdal and or @Humblefish though. I know that my Naso died of Velvet and I believe I also have flukes, but please look very close at my Trigger and tell me if it has anything else. I read that velvet is perfectly round and it looks like some of these are either long and skinny or the skin is coming off, (like mild Brook). I do not want to add any other meds because I currently have API GC and CopperPower in the tank, but if you tell me otherwise I will listen.

Thank you in advance!

 

[Thaxxx]

Do you get all your fish at your LFS, or online?

 

[Marco S]

Do you get all your fish at your LFS, or online?

I've gotten most of them from 3 different LFS's and some online from Divers Den and I have always had some disease to deal with EVERY time.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

My Triggers are looking much better tonight so the copper is definitely working it's magic!

I do have a question for @Jay Hemdal and or @Humblefish though. I know that my Naso died of Velvet and I believe I also have flukes, but please look very close at my Trigger and tell me if it has anything else. I read that velvet is perfectly round and it looks like some of these are either long and skinny or the skin is coming off, (like mild Brook). I do not want to add any other meds because I currently have API GC and CopperPower in the tank, but if you tell me otherwise I will listen.

Thank you in advance!

Visually identifying diseases is really almost impossible except under certain circumstances. I've looked at the sticky notes here and there are pictures of fish "with velvet" that very clearly have advanced cases of ich. Most people misidentify advanced cases of ich for something else. Velvet is very rare - and often, the only symptom you see is rapid breathing, not eating and swimming into the water flow. Ich starts as discrete spots, but soon progresses to a more uniform mucus coating. The fish will likely still feed right up to that point. Flukes often have no visible symptoms, but watch for rapid breathing, cloudy eyes and tattered fins.

I cannot rule out ich in this case. The response to the copper tends to rule out flukes being the cause.

Jay

 

[Marco S]

Just to update this...all the fish except for one Clownfish died. Ironically I believe this was actually Brook and not Velvet, so all the fish except for a Clownfish died from the Clownfish disease.