Copper in quarantine?

[mandyplo]

Hi I've been battling Marine Ich for over a month and a half and well after losing 4 fish I have definitely learned my lesson.

I have set up a 30 gallon quarantine tank with glass barebottom, PVC pipes and only sponge/ammonia filtration. It has been running for about a month and I'd like to re-stock my display tank with fish at some point in the future, so I'm wondering what do you guys use for copper medications in your quarantine tanks?

Cupramine by Seachem is available to me locally, does anyone use this one and have success with it?

Any tips / pointers would be great this is my first time quarantining marine fish and I want to make sure I do it correct right from the beginning. Thanks.

[howdy20012002]

I use cupramine and it is the only one I would use
Make sure you follow the instructions and test for the levels every day until it levels out and then every week or so after that
Use API or seachem tests kits
If the reading isn't close to what it should be buy another test kit as they can be unreliable especially the seachem
Don't waste your money on the API test it is junk

[mandyplo]

I use cupramine and it is the only one I would use
Make sure you follow the instructions and test for the levels every day until it levels out and then every week or so after that
Use API or seachem tests kits
If the reading isn't close to what it should be buy another test kit as they can be unreliable especially the seachem
Don't waste your money on the API test it is junk

I'm confused you said use api or seachem then you said seachem is unreliable and not to use api cause it is junk....So what test kit should I pick up for testing copper?...

[Skimmerking]

I'm confused you said use api or seachem then you said seachem is unreliable and not to use api cause it is junk....So what test kit should I pick up for testing copper?... +1 Neal im confused

[howdy20012002]

hey there
sorry about that..I answered in a hurry and on my Iphone
what I meant to say is....
I personally like the salifert Copper test and I find it to be the most accurate
I have gone through 3 API testkits and I have yet to get any reading that even looks close to what the reference cards shows.
I have used seachem and still do, but have had issues with a couple where they weren't showing what they were supposed to show.
I can't really comment on the others because I haven't used them.
so, salifert would be my first choice
seachem second
however, with any of them, if you do get a reading is not enough close enough to what you think, definitely retest.
I would personally buy 2 tests kits and test with both just to make sure.
copper, although very effective at killing parasites, can be just as effective killing your fish if the dose is too high.
let me know if you have any more questions.

[asylumdown]

hey there
sorry about that..I answered in a hurry and on my Iphone
what I meant to say is....
I personally like the salifert Copper test and I find it to be the most accurate
I have gone through 3 API testkits and I have yet to get any reading that even looks close to what the reference cards shows.
I have used seachem and still do, but have had issues with a couple where they weren't showing what they were supposed to show.
I can't really comment on the others because I haven't used them.
so, salifert would be my first choice
seachem second
however, with any of them, if you do get a reading is not enough close enough to what you think, definitely retest.
I would personally buy 2 tests kits and test with both just to make sure.
copper, although very effective at killing parasites, can be just as effective killing your fish if the dose is too high.
let me know if you have any more questions.

I think the reason API kits are such garbage when testing cupramine is because the copper in them isn't really either 'free' or chelated. The copper is bound up in an organic amine complex, which makes it invisible to some tests, like API. It's also why you need to be really careful about dosing reducing agents like Prime or anything designed to make ammonia non-toxic, because they also reduce the copper in cupramine which can make Seachem's recommended copper level of 0.5ppm lethally toxic. For that reason, I wouldn't use cupramine in a system that wasn't 100% cycled, because it's so dangerous to dose water conditioners with it, and the most commonly available test kits for ammonia are salycilate tests (like APIs), which can break apart the amine complex and give a false reading of ammonia.

Also, I wouldn't necessarily agree that copper is that great at killing the parasite. It's totally ineffective against 2 out of the 4 main stages of the parasites life cycle, and one of those stages, the encysted tomont, is perfectly capable of staying in it's bulletproof little cyst for way longer than any fish could tolerate exposure to copper. In some instances, a two week course of cupramine (as recommended by Seachem) will be enough to clear a QT system of the parasite completely, but there are going to be just as many cases in which a tomont sits patiently in the QT system for 3 or 4 weeks, hatches after the aquarist has halted the copper treatment, and re-infects the whole system, leaving the aquarist to scratch their head and wonder what the hell is going on.

In all my reading and communicating with people who have made careers out of studying marine parasites, the only treatment method that has been shown to be 100% effective in eradicating the parasite from fish completely is the tank transfer method, or a hybrid method that functionally does the same thing, which is remove tomonts from the system and destroy them. The only things that are known to kill C. irritans tomonts in-situ will also kill all your fish.

[howdy20012002]

if you are going to keep this system going after the fact, I would just leave the copper in it for your next purchase
if testing for ammonia, you will get a positive reading because some with bind with the copper - should typically show less some ammonia when tested but I found it to be less than lowest point on the API test - so it will test positve for ammonia but not by much.
as asylum mentions, don't use any other medications because they can bind with the ammonia and kill the fish and use the bare minimum of prime
Neal

[asylumdown]

if you are going to keep this system going after the fact, I would just leave the copper in it for your next purchase
if testing for ammonia, you will get a positive reading because some with bind with the copper - should typically show less some ammonia when tested but I found it to be less than lowest point on the API test - so it will test positve for ammonia but not by much.
as asylum mentions, don't use any other medications because they can bind with the ammonia and kill the fish and use the bare minimum of prime
Neal

If you do that, you'll be adding your new additions straight to full strength copper solution. Seachem recommends a 3 day acclimation process to get to 0.5ppm copper. The last time I used Cupramine I was using a Seachem test kit that was almost out of the powdered reagent so the test was underestimating the amount in solution. I accidentally brought the copper to 0.5-0.6ppm on the first day. 3 of 5 fish were dead the next morning. Even when the instructions are followed regarding acclimation, copper medications (including cupramine) still kill fish all the time, so IMO I would be even more conservative with how quickly you raise the copper levels than the instructions suggest. I can see running the system with copper when there's no fish in it so that the nitrogen cycle is totally adapted to it, but you should still bring the copper concentration down to 0 before you add any new fish, then acclimate those fish to therapeutic levels as recommended.

[Reef Pilot]

If it is just ich you're battling, why not use hyposalinity? Much simpler, and safer for your fish. Plus you won't have everything contaminated with Copper.

I have used hypo a few times now in QT with new fish, with 100% success.

[howdy20012002]

I totally agree with the use of hyposalinity
if you can wait the 6 weeks, that is by far the best and safest treatment of ich.
what I do, empty out just over half the tank and fill it back up with fresh water...this should put you at about 1.010 which is where you want to be.
I have done this numerous times and there is no reason to bring the fish down slowly..just back up slowly over a 2 or 3 day period.

asylumdown
I will respectfully have to disagree.
I plunk fish into copper systems every time I bring fish in with little effect on 200 fish in them..with very little deaths.
it is the bringing the copper level up to the therapeutic level that is the dangerous part which is why I think seachem says do it over 48 hours..that is so you don't poison the fish with too much copper.
I totally agree that copper will kill fish..but as long as you keep it within the guidelines of seachem you should have little problems.
and adding cupramine will not effect the bacteria to where it will affect their ability to do their job..it is any live critters dying off within the live rock that may cause a small ammonia spike.

[duncangweller]

I would second the hyposalinity route. I currently have my fish in QT tank because of ich and I am leaving my DT fallow for 10 weeks to make sure the little bastards are well and truly gone. The fish are doing really well, eating like its going out of style and in great condition. It's been really easy to maintain so far as well with water changes every second day with ro/di water made up to 1.009 salinity.

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Tapatalk 2

[Baldy]

I would second the hyposalinity route. I currently have my fish in QT tank because of ich and I am leaving my DT fallow for 10 weeks to make sure the little bastards are well and truly gone. The fish are doing really well, eating like its going out of style and in great condition. It's been really easy to maintain so far as well with water changes every second day with ro/di water made up to 1.009 salinity.

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Tapatalk 2

Im going through the exact same thing now due to negligence on my part with new additions. i lost a foxface to it but all 7 other fish are doing great right now at 1.009. Eating like pigs.

Why the water changes every 2nd day though? are you having nitrate or ammonia problems in the QT?

[duncangweller]

I started off doing water changes frequently in order to get the salinity down to 1.009 then once at the correct level I slowed down with the water changes. At the moment I do one about every 3/4 days. It isn't a very big tank and there are 5 fish in it so just want to be safe. I read an article saying that you should do a partial water change every couple of days so that was kind of the route I was following.

Either way it is working so.can't complain.

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[Reef Pilot]

Once I had my water down to 1.009 (the magic number), I never changed it again, until I was raising it back up. For that, I used display tank water (from water changes) to get it back up. The advantage was that the new fish were fully acclimated to my DT (their ultimate destination) water when they were ready to be moved.

Of course, I checked water params in the QT the whole time. And be sure to use an accurate refractometer. Those swing arm hydrometers are totally inadequate for this purpose.

[Baldy]

cool. I dosed with prodibio startup and put an ammonia badge in the 55g tank. along with small pieces of LR and ceramic rings filter media. im becoming more and more a believer in hyposalinity =)

[mandyplo]

I started off doing water changes frequently in order to get the salinity down to 1.009 then once at the correct level I slowed down with the water changes. At the moment I do one about every 3/4 days. It isn't a very big tank and there are 5 fish in it so just want to be safe. I read an article saying that you should do a partial water change every couple of days so that was kind of the route I was following.

Either way it is working so.can't complain.

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Tapatalk 2

I have nothing against hyposalinity, my only worry was when I read somewhere that the pH was hard to keep at a stable level when treating by hyposalinity method. What are you guys doing to maintain your pH levels? I don't mind the long 6-10 week waiting at all, only thing steering me away was how much work it would be to stay on top of pH levels

[Baldy]

I dose for calc/alk via two part dosing method so all I use the solution for alkalinity. Only takes about 5 ml to treat 20gal of rodi water. A little bit goes a long way. I use the brs powder but don't remember exactly which one. I have read that regular baking soda works as well but you might want another opinion on that

[Reef Pilot]

I have nothing against hyposalinity, my only worry was when I read somewhere that the pH was hard to keep at a stable level when treating by hyposalinity method. What are you guys doing to maintain your pH levels? I don't mind the long 6-10 week waiting at all, only thing steering me away was how much work it would be to stay on top of pH levels
Have never adjusted any of my water when doing hypo, and fish were always happy. My QT is running all the time (also use it for coral frag QT) using a canister filter, and water from my display tank after water changes. So it is always in a mature and stable state. I think people get into trouble with their QTs when they are hastily set up, and don't have stable params to start with.

[howdy20012002]

I have never had any problem maintaining the tank in hyposalinity.
like mentioned, the most important aspect is having a stable system to begin with.

[asylumdown]

I think the other main problem with hypo salinity is that it's not always a magic bullet cure. Whether it will work for you depends as much on what strain of C. irritans you're dealing with than the method itself. Red Sea variants of C. irritans are endemic to highly salty water, with the hypothesis being that because of that, they're easily damaged by reduced salinity environments. The early studies from the 70s and 80s on ich control where the idea of hypo as a treatment came from appear to have been done using variants that were innately susceptible to lowered salinity, likely due to where in the world they came from. Since then there's been several other strains of the parasite identified. The more people study it, the more plastic an resilient the parasite seems to be. Since the 90s there's been several other 'strains' of C. irritans identified - so far no one has gone far enough to classify them as different species - but the newer variants are showing up in places and conditions that people didn't previously think were possible. There's a strain from Australia that happily completes it's entire life cycle in brackish estuaries, and appears to have a genetic adaptation to an extremely broad range of salinities.

Later studies on ich have shown that reducing salinity to 'hypo' conditions was not sufficient to eradicate the parasite, and there's been a conversation in the literature that the conflicting results from one study to the next were possibly due to the specific strain the authors of the various studies were working with.

The problem for hobbyists, is that you have no idea what variant of ich you're dealing with, and considering how fish from the red sea, Australia, the South Pacific, and basically anywhere else in the world we get fish from end up in the same tanks in LFS, there's a good chance any one hobbyist's system is infected with different strains from all over the world.

I like the idea of hypo because it's the easiest and least labour intensive, and if you're concerned with pH, making a concentrated baking soda solution and adding small amounts of it can bump it up really easily, but it's another one of those treatments that might work, or it might not, and you've got no way of knowing going in whether it will work for you. It works for enough people that it persists in the forums and blogs as a method, but it fails for a lot of people as well, who are then left scratching their heads and getting told they must have done something wrong (which, in many cases I'm sure is true).

The only thing I'd say about it is to take the X salinity for X weeks instructions that are out there with a grain of salt, as I don't think the global population of C. irritans necessarily got the memo that they were all supposed to have a self destruct sequence at a number that we find to be convenient and safe for our fish. If it doesn't work for you, know that there's as good a chance that your particular strain of ich was never going to be cured by hypo (or copper for that matter) as there is that you did something wrong.

The success or failure of each of the methods of treating ich depends on so many factors that have nothing to do with the treatment being applied, and everything to do with the specific strain and conditions of your tank during the outbreak, and that often gets overlooked when people are trying "eradicate ich". Two people can apply the exact same protocol and have different results, because their 'starting conditions' were also different.

[Baldy]

I think the other main problem with hypo salinity is that it's not always a magic bullet cure. Whether it will work for you depends as much on what strain of C. irritans you're dealing with than the method itself. Red Sea variants of C. irritans are endemic to highly salty water, with the hypothesis being that because of that, they're easily damaged by reduced salinity environments. The early studies from the 70s and 80s on ich control where the idea of hypo as a treatment came from appear to have been done using variants that were innately susceptible to lowered salinity, likely due to where in the world they came from. Since then there's been several other strains of the parasite identified. The more people study it, the more plastic an resilient the parasite seems to be. Since the 90s there's been several other 'strains' of C. irritans identified - so far no one has gone far enough to classify them as different species - but the newer variants are showing up in places and conditions that people didn't previously think were possible. There's a strain from Australia that happily completes it's entire life cycle in brackish estuaries, and appears to have a genetic adaptation to an extremely broad range of salinities.

Later studies on ich have shown that reducing salinity to 'hypo' conditions was not sufficient to eradicate the parasite, and there's been a conversation in the literature that the conflicting results from one study to the next were possibly due to the specific strain the authors of the various studies were working with.

The problem for hobbyists, is that you have no idea what variant of ich you're dealing with, and considering how fish from the red sea, Australia, the South Pacific, and basically anywhere else in the world we get fish from end up in the same tanks in LFS, there's a good chance any one hobbyist's system is infected with different strains from all over the world.

I like the idea of hypo because it's the easiest and least labour intensive, and if you're concerned with pH, making a concentrated baking soda solution and adding small amounts of it can bump it up really easily, but it's another one of those treatments that might work, or it might not, and you've got no way of knowing going in whether it will work for you. It works for enough people that it persists in the forums and blogs as a method, but it fails for a lot of people as well, who are then left scratching their heads and getting told they must have done something wrong (which, in many cases I'm sure is true).

The only thing I'd say about it is to take the X salinity for X weeks instructions that are out there with a grain of salt, as I don't think the global population of C. irritans necessarily got the memo that they were all supposed to have a self destruct sequence at a number that we find to be convenient and safe for our fish. If it doesn't work for you, know that there's as good a chance that your particular strain of ich was never going to be cured by hypo (or copper for that matter) as there is that you did something wrong.

The success or failure of each of the methods of treating ich depends on so many factors that have nothing to do with the treatment being applied, and everything to do with the specific strain and conditions of your tank during the outbreak, and that often gets overlooked when people are trying "eradicate ich". Two people can apply the exact same protocol and have different results, because their 'starting conditions' were also different.

in no way am I disagreeing with you as it seems you definately know what you are talking about. But how would you go about treating an ich outbreak?

[Baldy]

Sorry, just re-read some of your other posts. Seems the tank transfer method is what you might recommend?

[asylumdown]

asylumdown
I will respectfully have to disagree.
I plunk fish into copper systems every time I bring fish in with little effect on 200 fish in them..with very little deaths.
it is the bringing the copper level up to the therapeutic level that is the dangerous part which is why I think seachem says do it over 48 hours..that is so you don't poison the fish with too much copper.
I totally agree that copper will kill fish..but as long as you keep it within the guidelines of seachem you should have little problems.
and adding cupramine will not effect the bacteria to where it will affect their ability to do their job..it is any live critters dying off within the live rock that may cause a small ammonia spike.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean? Are you suggesting that dropping a fish from copper free water in to water with 0.5ppm copper is any different physiologically for the fish then adding enough copper to bring the water they are already in to 0.5ppm in one go?

I'm pretty sure the reason the acclimation period is stressful for fish is because copper is a poison to them, and their kidneys and liver need time to adapt to the increased work they need to do to prevent the poison from killing them. You say you've had very little deaths with that method, which to me sounds like you have experienced fish mortality as a result of dropping fish directly in to full strength copper water. When the fish you're talking about can sometimes cost north of 200 bucks, I don't know if I would be willing to take that risk.

Also, it's not a good idea to have live rock, or any calcareous materials in a system where copper is being dosed. Copper reacts with it and falls out of solution.

[asylumdown]

Sorry, just re-read some of your other posts. Seems the tank transfer method is what you might recommend?

So far it's the only method that's 100% effective against the parasite. There's no question over whether it will work because it directly attacks the stage of the parasite that all the other treatments are so horrible at dealing with.

Once a pro-tomont encysts, it turns into this horrible little wild card. Nothing out there that we know of reliably kills it with 100% effectiveness that won't also kill your fish. The treatments for ich that are out there are designed to work on stages of the parasite that are more vulnerable, and they're pretty effective against those stages, but the tomonts - ugh. They're almost beautiful in how good they are at preserving the species.

Once a theront detaches from the fish, it becomes a 'pro-tomont' that spends on average 18 hours crawling around on the substrate. It sheds most of it's cilia, and changes shape. Then it encysts, and is basically bullet proof. The vast, overwhelming majority of tomonts will excyst and release their tomites within 10 days, which means that any system with ich in it that is either fishless, or undergoing treatment that can kill a free swimming tomite, the vast majority of the infestation will be cleared about 11-12 days after the last theront drops off the fish. The most current research has shown, however, that a certain percentage of tomonts can simply stop developing, for weeks or months. The longest recorded time encysted was 72 days, which is a crazy extreme, but considering that each study captures just a tiny fraction of the behaviour of an entire species, it indicates that as a whole, the bell curve of 'possible times encysted' for this parasite is huge. I can't remember if it was Colorni, or Colorni & Burgess who said it, but they stated that this extreme asynchrony seems so adaptive it can't be considered anything but a survival strategy.

So, you might have a system in which one or two tomonts are going to shut down for the long haul, or you might not. If you don't, then the chemical or salinity treatments will probably work as expected. If you do, you'll end up very confused when weeks after you thought you were clear and haven't added anything new to your tank, ich comes back.

The tank transfer method takes the wild card out of the equation. It directly and acutely destroys the tomonts as they drop off the fish. It only takes 12 days, and basically uses the life cycle of the parasite against it. THe main system still needs to be fallowed though.

It's way more labour intensive, and the timing is critical, but it's easier than it sounds.

Again, this is all opinion, but so far I've tried hypo (it failed, but I sucked at the protocol, so don't count that as diagnostic for the method), and I lost fish because of it. I've tried copper, and I lost heaps of fish to that. I now use tank transfer method, and I've so far not lost a fish, and it's been 100% effective.

[Baldy]

So do you think that the problems with hypo might be either not using it for a long enough period of time (either the fish in hypo or leaving the dt fallow), or perhaps not maintaining low enough salinity?

I've had ich come back in hypo because I was not diligent in maintaining top off and the salinity crept back up again. Could issues like these cause people to believe hypo isn't effective?

[Reef Pilot]

Again, this is all opinion, but so far I've tried hypo (it failed, but I sucked at the protocol, so don't count that as diagnostic for the method), and I lost fish because of it. I've tried copper, and I lost heaps of fish to that. I now use tank transfer method, and I've so far not lost a fish, and it's been 100% effective.
I have used hypo 3 times now, with 100% success rate. There are a couple critical success factors. One is that you have to go down to 1.009 (using a refractometer) and the other is keep it there for 6 weeks since the last time you saw any symptoms. There can be no compromise with those two.

I actually used nearly 3 months total time in QT with mine. I had some finicky fish and used the extra time to get them feeding well and strong before transferring them to my display tank, where they might not be treated well initially by their new tank mates (ie. my yellow tang).