Copper or Hyposalinity?

[diGeE]

I'm at a loss right now. Since all my fish have ich and I've been treating them with copper, I'm scared that the level is way too high. I keep testing my water and it reads at 1.0. I've done water changes to lower the copper, but doesn't seem to work.

I'm now looking into doing hyposalinity, but I'm woried that this will be too much for my fish (the transition from copper to hypo). Has anyone treated ich successfully? What did you use?

If you would lend me your expertise on the matter, it would be greatly appreciated.

[Casey]

Hyposalinity would have been your best bet copper can kill if to high and really stresses the fish out,You might want to run a poly filter to pull the copper out and work on water quality try to get the tank stable on temp etc etc. With good water quality alot of fish will kick the ich I wouldnt stress them out more right yet with hyposalinity.

[Spanky]

digee

Quick run down.
What size tank?
Got live rock and sand?
Fish list?
Inverts??
What filter?

[Kevin1000]

Don't try hyposalinity without a refractometer and don't try hypo and copper at the same time.

If your copper levels are not dropping with water changes then you should consider whether you have a bad copper test kit - if possible take a water sample to your LFS and have them verify copper level.

[diGeE]

Thank you all for your responses.

Casey - Thank you, I'm gonna go buy a poly filter tomorrow and work on the water quality.


Spanky - Right now the fish are divided into QT's, two 10 gallons. Both are running penguin mini's. Fish include:

- clown trigger
- dog face puffer
- sweetlips
- flame angel
- yellow tang
- chromis

They came out of a 120 gallon FOWLR.


Kevin1000 - I'm using Salifert to test my copper. I'm told that its good. But I decided to get all the copper out of the tank, then let the fish rest for a little bit. After that I will treat them with hyposalinity. Seems that is the best for the fish and what I should have tried first.


How long do you think I should wait before treating the fish with hypo?



Again, thank you all so much for your input. Much appreciated!!

[Kevin1000]

I would start hypo as soon as your sure the copper is out of the system. I usually spend about 24 hours to slowly lower the salinity of the water. If you think your fish is stressed by the copper you might do it over48 hrs. On the reverse end I take about 3 days to raise the salinity back to normal.

I think you will find hypo much easier on the fish and its easier to administer. If you mark the water level of the tank you can have a good benchmark for topoff level to keep salinity at 1.009. I would also keep some premixed hypo water available for water changes if required. An ammonia alert badge may come in handy as well.

Hope this helps.

[salt creepette]

i am fighting the same battle but decided not to do copper because of toxicity and other issues presented in this (first of two part) article. read up, its great for us ichy reef keepers

(be sure to check out the link to part two at the bottom of the article)

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.htm

[diGeE]

Well I woke up today to find my sweetlips has died.

I think my clown trigger is the next to go. He is in really bad condition. I hope some of my fish make it through this.

Kevin1000 - I got the ammonia badge as you advised. Thank you for your advice and I will be following it!

Salt Creepette - Sorry to hear that you have the same problem. Thanks for the link, very helpful. Are you using hypo to treat your problem? If so, is it working?

Thank you all for your help!!

[diGeE]

Hey Salt Creepette,

I just saw in your other post that your doing hypo treatment. how is that going? How long have you been doing the treatment?

thanks.

[diGeE]

Hey Salt Creepette,

I just saw in your other post that your doing hypo treatment. how is that going? How long have you been doing the treatment?

thanks.

[salt creepette]

digee, ive used hypo successfully once in the past. my skunk clowns have been undergoing it for the last two weeks or so. I just moved the fish out of my reef (as of 15 mins ago!) and havent started bringing the salinity down yet. I will start that tomorrow. you gotta do it slow; but when treatment's over, you have to bring it up even slower, about .001 per day. follow the other thread and I will keep y'all posted

[diGeE]

Thank you.....good luck with your quest. I look foward to seeing your progress.

[Andrew3]

If you have a refractometer, lowering salinity (for crypto) gradually over several days to SG 1.010 works great, but: (1) this level must be maintained, if higher it won't work & ick may come back, if lower, you will probably lose livestock, and (2) this level must be maintained for a week minimum, obviously this excludes the majority of marine invertebrates and must be done in a separate quarantine tank (though some hermit crabs seem to tolerate). Most marine fish can tolerate this level (1.010) for weeks or longer.

And, to prevent ick from reinfesting the fish, I would recommend not placing them (or any new fish) back in the tank they came from for six weeks (to allow the cysts/free swimmers to die off in the tank of origin).

This has been the most effective treatment of crypto IME.
HTH
Andrew

[diGeE]

Andrew3, I'm gonna invest in a good refractometer tomorrow. I'm kinda nervous about doing hypo, but I want my fish to get better. Luckily I'm only doing fish, no inverts. As of now there are no fish in the display tank. So I'm gonna wait it out. Poor fish have to live in a little QT for a long time. But what can ya do.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

[salt creepette]

yeah digee isnt it great. How is your ammonia in your QT's? mine has raised a bit to around .50 ppm and I have been using amquel plus and doing water changes. I am very slowly bringing down the salinity by replacing tank water with fresh water.