What to do with immune fish

CSail · Feb 7, 2024

I had a tank crash a few weeks ago which appeared to be velvet. I pulled all fish from display tank and tried treating in copper but I was too late and most fish either died before treatment or while in hospital tank with copper safe. However 2 fish remained a pink spotted watchman goby and a Pygmy red rooster waspfish. Neither showed signs of sickness before treatment, but both started to become lethargic, wouldn’t eat and had rapid breathing while being treated in coppersafe and I know copper is bad for waspfish and they appeared that they were going to die. So I put both back into my display tank figuring if they were going to die either way then at least they would be better off in the display tank I guess. Turns out as soon as I put them back in the display tank they got better and now have been completely free of any symptoms, eat great and appear healthy for weeks. I thought my diagnosis was wrong and maybe it was some sort of viral thing that made my fish sick so I added a neon damsel and after 2 days it was covered in velvet but the goby and waspfish are still completely happy and symptom free. What am I supposed to do with the goby and the wasp fish if they won’t tolerate the copper, but also appear immune to the velvet. Are the velvet parasites still attacking these fish even though I can’t see it and keeping the velvet alive in the tank? How do I treat them safely? I already have 3 display tanks and don’t want to start another just for these 2 to live out the rest of there days.

Jay Hemdal · Feb 8, 2024

CSail said:
I had a tank crash a few weeks ago which appeared to be velvet. I pulled all fish from display tank and tried treating in copper but I was too late and most fish either died before treatment or while in hospital tank with copper safe. However 2 fish remained a pink spotted watchman goby and a Pygmy red rooster waspfish. Neither showed signs of sickness before treatment, but both started to become lethargic, wouldn’t eat and had rapid breathing while being treated in coppersafe and I know copper is bad for waspfish and they appeared that they were going to die. So I put both back into my display tank figuring if they were going to die either way then at least they would be better off in the display tank I guess. Turns out as soon as I put them back in the display tank they got better and now have been completely free of any symptoms, eat great and appear healthy for weeks. I thought my diagnosis was wrong and maybe it was some sort of viral thing that made my fish sick so I added a neon damsel and after 2 days it was covered in velvet but the goby and waspfish are still completely happy and symptom free. What am I supposed to do with the goby and the wasp fish if they won’t tolerate the copper, but also appear immune to the velvet. Are the velvet parasites still attacking these fish even though I can’t see it and keeping the velvet alive in the tank? How do I treat them safely? I already have 3 display tanks and don’t want to start another just for these 2 to live out the rest of there days.

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

Can you post video/pictures of the fish? I suspect this is ich, not velvet. With velvet, you will see rapid breathing and death, although sometimes at the very end of the infection, you can see some dust/cloudiness to their skin. If you can see distinct spots, then this is ich.

Gobies and waspfish are fine in coppersafe at 2.25 ppm. What was your dose and what were you testing with?

Jay

CSail · Feb 8, 2024

All the fish that died had rapid breathing looked like they had powdery skin hiding from light, my dotty back and purple tang had skin or slime coat falling off, and the purple tang had large colorless/ white patches on its body making the fish mostly colorless. The whole tank was fine no symptoms that I could see then overnight the ditty back became deathly sick and some other fish looked powdery. My clowns however had encrusted looking spots on them that went away over night then came back then became slimy and had different color patches and then find and tails looked like they were falling apart. I used a Hannah checker and started slowly raising coppersafe levels, never even made it to half dose because everything died within a few hours minus the goby and waspfish and the clowns, but the clowns were barely alive at that point

CSail · Feb 8, 2024

Oh and I forgot to get pictures of my other fish as I was frantically getting my QT tank up and running and catching my fish, but I found 2 pictures that are not mine that I got off the internet that look similar to how my tang looked if you combined the faded spots from the one picture and the white specs from the other pic but with maybe a bit more spots. The picture of the clowns however is a picture I took of my clowns before they got slimy and fins started to fall apart. Also everything I read online including on this forum people say the Pygmy red rooster waspfish is sensitive to medication and especially copper, that is why after just the goby and waspfish were left alive and they looked symptom free but appeared to be getting worse from the copper i ended up putting them back in the main tank where within an few hours they were back to there old selves again with no more rapid breathing, eating again and have still remained spot free and healthy. I’m no expert and I’m open to all and any opinions on diagnosis and what to do with the fish and main display tank.

Jay Hemdal · Feb 8, 2024

CSail said:
Oh and I forgot to get pictures of my other fish as I was frantically getting my QT tank up and running and catching my fish, but I found 2 pictures that are not mine that I got off the internet that look similar to how my tang looked if you combined the faded spots from the one picture and the white specs from the other pic but with maybe a bit more spots. The picture of the clowns however is a picture I took of my clowns before they got slimy and fins started to fall apart. Also everything I read online including on this forum people say the Pygmy red rooster waspfish is sensitive to medication and especially copper, that is why after just the goby and waspfish were left alive and they looked symptom free but appeared to be getting worse from the copper i ended up putting them back in the main tank where within an few hours they were back to there old selves again with no more rapid breathing, eating again and have still remained spot free and healthy. I’m no expert and I’m open to all and any opinions on diagnosis and what to do with the fish and main display tank.

The purple tang has ich, that's how they look towards the end of the infection. The clowns probably have ich, but it could also be Brooklynella.

Jay