Treating Velvet in Display?

dopey · Feb 12, 2020

Hi,

I have a barebottom display tank. At the moment I only have coral on one of the rocks in the Display tank.

I briefly read some about the downsides of copper in your display tank, but it seems to be a bad idea due to copper being abosrbed in substrate and having swings later in your DT.

Given this is a bare bottom, would it be feasible to instead remove the rocks/inverts out then treat the fish in the DT? I was thinking to stop the return pump and not have the sump connected, and use the sump as a holding container for the rock (Own pump/heater down there) without coral and the DT for the fish QT? I can place the 'coral covered rock' into a much much smaller tank I have and mount the light.

After finishing QT I hope(???) it be much easier to eradicate copper from the tank? It literally be a box of water with a couple power heads and a heater?

Unfortunately have no copper at home tonight, so trying to strategize a plan to execute tomorrow :( I know I can freshwater dip tonight, but that's my only tool this evening.

It's always the last fish you add..

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

Seems feasible. After treatment, I’d do 2-3 100$ water changes and run cuprisorb and polyfilter for a week or two. If you do this you should be fine.

Crabs McJones · Feb 12, 2020

You can freshwater dip to relieve symptoms and give you more time. But I would in on way shape or form put copper anywhere near the tank. You want to set up a quarantine tank minimum of 10 feet away to prevent cross contamination of both the copper, and the velvet. Running them so close together you risk the parasite living on in the sump, only to come back when you turn the system back on.
A quarantine tank doesn't have to be complex. Depended on how many fish a 20 gallon long or a 40 gallon breeder work great. A simple hang on back power filter with filter floss and a bottle of biospira. some pvc pipe and couplers for places for your fish to hide.
You want to run 30 days of copper (preferably copper power) at 2.0PPM and let the display tank run without fish for minimum of 76 days to starve out all parasites.

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

Crabs McJones said:
You can freshwater dip to relieve symptoms and give you more time. But I would in on way shape or form put copper anywhere near the tank. You want to set up a quarantine tank minimum of 10 feet away to prevent cross contamination of both the copper, and the velvet. Running them so close together you risk the parasite living on in the sump, only to come back when you turn the system back on.
A quarantine tank doesn't have to be complex. Depended on how many fish a 20 gallon long or a 40 gallon breeder work great. A simple hang on back power filter with filter floss and a bottle of biospira. some pvc pipe and couplers for places for your fish to hide.
You want to run 30 days of copper (preferably copper power) at 2.0PPM and let the display tank run without fish for minimum of 76 days to starve out all parasites.

This is 100% the better route. My answer was based on the possibility and plausibility of doing it in a must do situation

Halal Hotdog · Feb 12, 2020

With copper it seems you have read up on the drawbacks of treating your display tank. 20 years ago when we got 'white spot' we just threw some copper in our DTs. I agree a QT tank is a better way to treat fish, however it can absolutely be done safely in a display tank.

dopey · Feb 12, 2020

I don't see me getting a 40 breeder tomorrow, it's not like US that you just go into a petsmart :) Atleast never seen the standard sizes on shelves like that around here. -- it's more the AIO kits or speciality tank sizes. So could get one of those but then a place to keep it, etc.

I could easily get multiple 30L black buckets. One option be to split the fish into these, but that feels a bit brutal to do for 6 weeks?

The only 'tank' I have at my disposal is a 10gallon tank. I think housing a spotted surgeonfish, clownfish and couple cardinals be a bit much in that tank for 6 weeks?

Reason I was thinking keeping them in the display be better :( If not using the sump for rocks I could use buckets for the non-coral rock and setup the corals in the small 10gallon tank.

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

dopey said:
I don't see me getting a 40 breeder tomorrow, it's not like US that you just go into a petsmart :) Atleast never seen the standard sizes on shelves like that around here. -- it's more the AIO kits or speciality tank sizes. So could get one of those but then a place to keep it, etc.

I could easily get multiple 30L black buckets. One option be to split the fish into these, but that feels a bit brutal to do for 6 weeks?

The only 'tank' I have at my disposal is a 10gallon tank. I think housing a spotted surgeonfish, clownfish and couple cardinals be a bit much in that tank for 6 weeks?

Reason I was thinking keeping them in the display be better :( If not using the sump for rocks I could use buckets for the non-coral rock and setup the corals in the small 10gallon tank.

The buckets for rock and the coral rock in the ten gallon would work GREAT! And yes if you only use JUST the DT and do what I listed above you should be fine. Don’t use an filtration you use now or power heads get some cheap Chinese stuff for treatment and then take out after you are done and use the good stuff for actual DT

dopey · Feb 12, 2020

Great.

I have leftover dry rock. I coud put it in tonight to start seeding, and use it during the QT then toss it out afterwards.

I'll switch to some disposable powerheads during the QT and use my 'good' powerheads for the buckets/coral tank.

Then it will only be a box of water. No overflow/sump enabled, and just some to-be-thrown-away powerheads/heater + to-be-thrown-away rock in the display tank.

Crabs McJones · Feb 12, 2020

You can quarantine in a bucket in an emergency. heater and a powerhead and bacteria suppliment and something for the bacteria to colonize in that doesn't absorb copper, you can wrap a piece of filter floss around the powerhead to have it act as a filter.

Thomashtom · Feb 12, 2020

Yes it can I have done it with rock in tank about year ago and it worked. Need to have a Hanna test kit and monitor daily. Use copper power that is at least worked for me. I don’t have corals but so keep that in mind. Thanks

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

dopey said:
Great.

I have leftover dry rock. I coud put it in tonight to start seeding, and use it during the QT then toss it out afterwards.

I'll switch to some disposable powerheads during the QT and use my 'good' powerheads for the buckets/coral tank.

Then it will only be a box of water. No overflow/sump enabled, and just some to-be-thrown-away powerheads/heater + to-be-thrown-away rock in the display tank.

no, please don’t use any rock as it will absorb the copper and mess up dosing, use PVC pipe for hiding places and sponge filter or the like for bio filtration

Thomashtom · Feb 12, 2020

Yes it would be easier without the rock

dopey · Feb 12, 2020

Malifry97 said:
no, please don’t use any rock as it will absorb the copper and mess up dosing, use PVC pipe for hiding places and sponge filter or the like for bio filtration

Ahh! Right. Duh. I was only thinking after treatment it would leach.. ofcourse it mess up dosing too. I will not use any rock during treatment. Thanks for pointing that out!

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

dopey said:
Ahh! Right. Duh. I was only thinking after treatment it would leach.. ofcourse it mess up dosing too. I will not use any rock during treatment. Thanks for pointing that out!

Yea! No problem! Anything I can do to help!

artieg1 · Feb 12, 2020

Seems like it could work in theory, but...

You're basically turning your DT into a treatment tank. Which means all media (live rock, coral, other bio media) has to come out of the DT and sump. And that means you are basically taking out your biological filter and putting it into buckets. Now, starting a QT has similar issues anyway, because you don't have one to begin with and have to seed somehow and watch ammonia.

Then the issue is residual copper after you reboot. Seems like you can sterilize heater and other filter and such, but I don't know about copper leaching from plastic.

Halal Hotdog · Feb 12, 2020

I disagree with live rock and sand absolutely needing to come out. After treatment you can add absorbent materials to help remove any residual copper.

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

artieg1 said:
Seems like it could work in theory, but...

You're basically turning your DT into a treatment tank. Which means all media (live rock, coral, other bio media) has to come out of the DT and sump. And that means you are basically taking out your biological filter and putting it into buckets. Now, starting a QT has similar issues anyway, because you don't have one to begin with and have to seed somehow and watch ammonia.

Then the issue is residual copper after you reboot. Seems like you can sterilize heater and other filter and such, but I don't know about copper leaching from plastic.

Hence why he will be using all junk/cheap powerheads and filters that he will just be throwing away and not using the sump

Malifry97 · Feb 12, 2020

Halal Hotdog said:
I disagree with live rock and sand absolutely needing to come out. After treatment you can add absorbent materials to help remove any residual copper.

Copper kills any inverts or coral. This means that you will ruin everything on your live rock. That’s not exactly ideal as this will cause additional ammonia. Also, rock and sand will absorb the copper which lowers copper levels and throws off concentration. This is also bad

dopey · Feb 13, 2020

Thanks all.

today I will start with medicating in a bucket(s) to start. If they seem to be improving then convert my DT into a QT for the 6+ week duration.

My god does this disease spread fast. Even one night sleep and one fish died and another looks like the other did last night.

I should of had such medications on hand.