yup hard to say what it is if theres no real id who knows if qt would have seen any results, i think your doing the right thing by treating anyways and being cautious:) when adding your fish back im sure you know but add them 1 every few days or a week so as not to over work your bacteria:)

glad to hear things never got any worse man:)cheers:):)

you've never met me obviously :) I'm sure they'll ll just go back at once...

sounds like a familiar style lol :P

You can prevent it by doing proper quarantine. Many people quarantine their fish for 2+ months. During this period, many people also do prophylactic treatment. One of my favorite is hypo for 4+ weeks, prazi-pro for a couple weeks, and then a couple weeks of observation.
Fish can live for years. I don't know why we can't wait a couple months before we put them in DT.

Ya, 2 months of quarantine means yet another tank in the kitchen, which reduces the likelihood of me living many years...

Fish can live for years, and I've had some 10yrs + without quarantine. I "quarantine" anything new, but anything new will be while I have the current treatment tank up. After that, nothing new goes in.

I now always quarantine for 2 - 3 months. My last 2 times, lasted 3 months in total each. It takes that long just to go through the hypo salinity routine (which I now do whether or not the fish looks sick). Plus that time is well spent getting your new fish feeding well, and being strong before having to face their new tank mates in the display tank.

I have a QT ready to go all the time now, with a canister filter that is fully cycled. I change water using my used display tank water, so no extra salt costs.

It can also be connected directly to my DT and used as a refugium. At the moment, actually, I am using it to cure/cook some new rock. So always handy to have a spare tank ready to go when you need it.

I learned my lesson a year and half ago, and don't want to have to go through that again. I can't afford to risk my display tank, and have to tear it apart to catch fish that are sick.

That's not usual and surely not any excuse for not doing a proper quarantine. Usually it is quite obvious if there is a disease after 3 to 4 weeks. Of course to be safer is to leave the fish for 6 to 8 weeks, but if there is a disease it is a lot more common to come out after a week to 3 weeks.

Hey Brad i have a FX4 here, it's since cleaned out and has been in the closet for 3 years, maybe with established ruble you mentioned earlier. Either way your welcome to it.
Cheers Ronnie

Thanks Ronnie. The filter from Shelley is enough, I just don't have enough rubble. I've added some dry rock, so in time it should come around...
All fish look great, the 2 stuck in the tank to face their doom are fine, so not sure what the real cause is...

Unfortunately that didn't apply to me, haven't had a new fish in about a year. After losing the first two and starting to feed metro/focus/garlic combo it's been stable, going to run the full course and hopefully that's the extent of it.

[edit] Checked on the tank today, no new deaths and the damsel has probably 80% colour back after being almost white. Foxface seems less bothered and the spots are easing up. I'm cautiously optimistic. The skimmer went nuts though, haha.

That's probably because you had ick in your tank and never treated it and it was just in a state of low infection so not visible, so when the fish are stressed it all come out, even if it takes a year.

Once you got ick in your tank and if you don't treat for it, it won't go away on its own and will eventually return, as you noticed.

Obviously parasites don't come out of nowhere, but they can also come on corals and frags..this is why I desinfect all my corals.

Apparently a study showed that if no fish are added for 11 months the ich goes thru enough cycles that it diminishes and dies out so this isn't entirely true.

Yes I have heard about this, that after 10 generations it just exhaust itself. Dunno if it is true, but one thing is for sure, if that person got ich without introducing anything new for that long, then ick can surely survive that long as it does not pop out of thin air.

Maybe also the fish develop such strong resistance to the parasite that after a year or so it cannot survive. Not sure what it is. I know some people have ich in their tank and are seing cycle of it coming back even after a very long time.

Got a link to an article on this study Brett? I'd be interested to read it..

It's mentioned in this article.
http://www.reefsanctuary.com/forums/...ths-facts.html

Yeah that's the one.

That's assuming it's actually even 'ich'. Unless you take a sample it's guesswork at best.

As I mentioned in my other thread, I lost the queen angel last night. This morning the hippo, xmas wrasse and mandarin are gone. Naso won't likely make it by the time I get the meds needed. The clown looks like it's next. I haven't seen the leopard wrasse, but it looked reasonable last night. A yellow tang seems to be holding up.
I still have a couple of fish in the display, not sure what to do about them, although they seem unaffected.

Lessons learned:

Do not buy impulse fish. I didn't even want the one that caused this, it was the wrong fish.
You cannot successfully setup a new treatment tank to deal with this after the fact, unless you're willing and able to do a 100% water change every day for 4 or 4 weeks. I caused more harm with NH3 than the disease did.

I still cannot have a q tank setup full time for those occasions where you think you want a fish. I will be building a fish list once I can add back to the display, and buy all at the same time and treat in quarantine before adding to the main tank. Once that's done, no additional fish will be added. That's the theory anyway.

Have medication on hand BEFORE you run into this type of scenario. I'll be picking up chloroquine this morning.

Maintaining a spare filter hanging off the main tank isn't practical, as it would require effort to not build up NO3 in the tank.

I suspect that before this week is over, I'll have 2 chromis left....

:cry:

sounds like you could use a few laps around the lake..

What a terrible loss Brad, so sorry to hear this. I wish we had just left the fish as is, but hindsight is a great thing ain't it? How big is your QT tank? Do you think the number of fish/gallons contributed to it? Just a thought.

Where are you getting the chloroquinine? I'm wondering if I should be finding a source as well...

Ya, scheduled for later.

One of the yellow tangs gone....

What lousy news. I'm so sorry for your losses.

Where can you pick up chloroquine diphosphate? I've read that if it's terminal stage, it might not work fast enough (same as cupramine); you might want to carefully use copper salt directly (i.e. copper sulfate with proper test kit) - just make sure you don't use it in lower salinity tank

Do not use "hang-on" filter in the main tank to seed as most of those clog up and some have carbon. Use sponge filter in the sump to seed, you just wash it out everytime you change water.

Chloroquine phosphate can be found at any drug store and works the same as diphosphate. My vet is examining a fish right now and will give me a script for it.
Copper is not an option in my mind, I think it does more harm to the fish long term.
The hang on is fine, it only has carbon if you add carbon :) But yes, a foam block carefully maintained could work.

Chloroquine phosphate is "off the counter" drug without prescription?

Well copper might have negative long term effect, but if the fish does not even live, what does it matter if it has long term because it has no term if it dies ;-D

I wonder if chloroquine phosphate actually can cure brooklynella too - your vet know?

No, it's a prescription drug, which is why the vet is involved. And yes, it treats brooklynella as well.
I think copper, at this point, would simply kill the fish. And wreck the tank. And all the rock in it. This is my future frag tank, and I don't want to have to dismantle it to clean it.
From what I've read, the CP works really well and quickly. I should have it shortly.

Thanks, please update us when you apply it :)

Are you getting the actual chemical or the human version of the drug (I think it's Aralen) ?

(don't know that you are going to apply to a reef tank - hopefully no negative effects)

I'm getting the tabs (Arelen) but have a compounding pharmacy trying to source the diphosphate salt. The tabs are 155mg active ingredient.

And no, not in the display tank, it's highly toxic to algae, meaning it would kill all the corals. Inverts seem to do fine (shrimps/clams, etc).

it is amazing how these scaled covered things start to have meaning in one's life.
you aren't just losing a few fish, it is like you are losing a few friends.
sorry to hear it is going so badly.

I think half the bad was caused by the treatment tank having no mature filter :)

this place has it http://www.fishchemical.com/Products...2937.Item.html

But I think you have to have a business to order it in for you and not to sure if you can get it shipped to Canada (although it says they ship to 14 countries).

I won't feel so go shipping it to my friend in the States and trying to bring a 1 kilo bag of white power across the border. ;)

Cheers,
Vic

Thanks Vic, I'll look into that.

So sorry for your losses. I did the same thing a few months ago, set up an emerg qt, moved all my fish and treated with copper. No cycle, no cycled filter. Within hours I lost my clowns and slowly lost all but my chromis and cardinal, in total 6 fish. After 6 weeks the chromis developed lympho, at that point I decided enough. I couldn't get the ammonia to 0 even though I was changing the water everyday, cleaning the filters, vacuuming uneaten food and poop. I moved the fish back to the dt, the chromis dies within a week, still have the cardinal. I've only dealt with ich, nothing as serious as what you are dealing with, but I said I'd never qt another fish as it seemed what I was doing ended up being just cruel. I'll be switching tanks soon and hoping to keep my smaller tank running as a qt but have not yet decided.

I don't have any advise to offer you, I hope this all gets sorted out and you don't lose everything.

Like I mentioned, I'll keep this treatment tank going for a while, and buy all the future fish at once and qt/treat accordingly. Once they go in, no new fish.
My naso is white, on the bottom of the tank, almost lifeless. I just added the chloroquine and pumped water across the naso's gills. Some color has returned and she's breathing faster. Here's hoping she pulls through...

Naso is gone :(

Also, good idea #2 that isn't very good. Don't do water changes from one tank into another. SPS water got added to my daughter's tank, which I'm now dismantling to catch the infected fish....sigh

Aww Cowgirl...:sad:

Brad, really sorry to hear that you are experiencing more losses. I still have a 90 gallon sitting in my garage if you need another tank. :sad:

I spent an hour trying to move water through her gills, just kills me....