Uronema - Eradicate or Ignore?

[Nroddot]

So are you dosing metroplex in your DT for 14 days?

Does anyone know if you use Seachem Metroplex in your DT will it cause any issues down the road when you do add corals? It's not like copper where it would soak into the rocks or sand right?

I did see that feeding fish with Metroplex or GC with focus would work to make it reef safe but should you run carbon if I do that?

I dosed Seachem Metroplex into the display tank and I also used mixed it with frozen food and Seachem Focus to give to the fish. At the time I only had a green star polyp, xenia, and a couple mushrooms. Metroplex didn't seem to bother them, and I've added additional corals (only softies) down the road and haven't had any problems.

Nearly three months later, I still have three out of the six original chromises, my two clowns, and a couple other fish I've added since then. I lost three chromises in a span of about two weeks and ever since then, uronema hasn't troubled me. The three chromises I have left are doing great and none of my remaining fish have ever shown signs of uronema since I made my original post.

 

[Reeffragger]

I just ignore it. Ive been able to get dozens of green chromis that are immune or never get it. You just have to pick the ones that dont have the marks in the store. And it never seems to go on any other fish but the chromis

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

So long story short.. I have euronema in my new 600g DT. Total water volume 800 gallons about 400 lbs of live rock. There is currently nothing in the DT.. what can I dose to nuke the euronema? I have a bottle of formalin.. h2o2?

I can run carbon and do some big water changes, but I just want it OUT.

 

[piranhaman00]

How do you know its in DT without fish in the tank?

From my limited reading, you cant get it out without taking tank down and bleaching. Just dont worry about it and dont add chromis.

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

I know it is in there as I had a tang succumb to it. My favorite tang, an achilies that I have had for 3 years..
I was able to get all the fish out. Just thought that since that there is nothing in there except rocks I could nuke it.

I have read about the potential for h2o2. I mean, I could care less about my bacterial colony at this point

 

[piranhaman00]

I didn’t think tangs could even get it.

 

[jmoney7]

Uronema seems to impact more fish today than it ever did before. Uronema is particulalry troublesome for many reasons. It is particularly deadly, when it's identified it is often too late to treat, and it's an internal and external parasite. Most alarming for many, is that it does not have a fallow period like ich or velvet, so a fishless tank will not fix the issue. In other words, it can "live without a host".

The fish most commonly affected/associated are chromis. It is also common in butterflies (particularly copperband, pearlscale, etc.) and anthias as well. Recently, centropyge (dwarf angels) are seemingly more impacted by it, and I've even seen it in some wrasses. @Humblefish has looked at some assumed "spinal injuries" in wrasse and found that internal uronema was present on the spine itself upon autopsy, so it's hypothesized that it's a bigger issue than we thought. However...

I personally don't think it poses much of a threat to a display tank full of healthy, established inhabitants. It seems to run rampant through new additions, particularly of those groups of fish. When we (@HotRocks and I) quarantine, we treat it with metroplex up front (which also handles brooklynella).

So what do you do with this information?

"Ignore":
A healthy, established fish in a tank seems to be "immune" (resistant) to it. In practice, I've never seen uronema suddenly appear on healthy, established fish in the display tank. Even existing chromis seem unaffected, typically. I don't personally worry about uronema for anything other than new additions. I do run all coral, inverts, rock, etc. through a 72 day fallow period, but I certainly don't bleach it, which is a tried and true method for killing uronema. So for that, I probably introduce it in to my "clean" display tanks.

I treat all new fish as if they have it to be safe. I do this more to keep new fish and others sharing the quarantine with it safe from uronema. Don't misunderstand, uronema is a NASTY condition. It's very deadly, but again, for whatever reason I've not seen it harm well-established fish, even of typically vulnerable species, say 3-6 months after addition.

Eradicate:
I call this going nuclear... If you want to do so, bleach is a tried and true method of killing off uronema. Some people opt to bleach everything and start over. However, if you're not prepared to keep it out of the tank long-term and prophylactically treat fish for it before entering your tank properly going forward, I'd say it's a waste of effort. Perhaps more importantly, remember that you would have to bleach everything wet that entered your tank from now on, as well for 100% effectiveness. Perhaps it's an unlikely event that you could get uronema from inverts, rock, or coral -- but it's certainly possible. If you bleach these new additions, you'll likely kill whatever you're adding. I don't think this is necessary but this is my own arbitrary opinion and almost solely based on anecdote/experience and observation from monitoring the R2R disease forum.

Admittedly though, I've learned the hard way over the past 18 months how much more virulent it is these days. Whether that's because of the overall weakened/worsened condition of the fish we receive today or because the uronema itself is truly more virulent -- I do not know. Perhaps both.

My Choice:
I choose to quarantine and treat all new fish, run coral/inverts fallow (which doesn't impact uronema for the inverts or coral), but not worry about the impact it may have on my display tanks. I avoid bleaching anything, or starting over, to keep it out. We of course may choose our own paths!

For those wanting more info about Uronema, here is a link to an article: (edit by Jay Hemdal)

Uronema / Red Band Disease - Hemdal

Red Band Syndrome in Marine Fishes: Caused by the Protozoan; Uronema sp. Jay Hemdal Introduction: This moderately common disease of certain species of marine fish is so often misdiagnosed that most aquarists apply incorrect treatment methods...

www.reef2reef.com

I know this thread was a few years ago but I’m dealing with this now and I really do not wanna tear my tank apart to get rid of this but I’m pretty positive uronema is in my tank and I am wanting to add new fish to the tank. How should I go about that. Seeing that new fish are most susceptible.