Thanks Jon. Japarto at Safari loaned me about 160g worth of barrels, which made the task much easier. We were able to drain the tank in about 7 minutes, catch most of the fish, extract the hippo from the rock work, and only lost a few corals to crashes (don't have 3 pound "frags" mounted on magnets!).
Setting up the fish trap now to see if I can get the remaining mandarin and orange spot goby.

This is horrible! I hope your fish pull through!! Wow, I can't imagine how you must be feeling! Hang in there!

yeah and it is velvet, ich and brook safe as well.

Very sad to hear that. Best option and only option that is half decent is to catch all the fish and treat fast. Problem is..what is it? if it is velvet then Cupramine is the way to go, if it is brook then formaline is the way to go. I think Paraguard also work as I have seen some clownfish being successfully curer from brook with Paraguard. Not sure how effective Paraguard is for velvet.

Greg, this is truly tragic! Your fish were awesome, what a loss as I know you've had some of them a long time.

Paraguard is like formalin, it can burn off some velvet on the skin but will not cure it. Becareful with paraguard though, it can be overdose without knowing and it cannot be tested. Usually by the time you see velvet on the fish's body, it's already terminal stage and very hard to cure (even with cupramine).

I have been going pretty generous with Paraguard and never had a problem with it. Once I dosed one full cap over by mistake in a 20 gallons (3 caps instead of 2) without any bad effect. Paraguard totaly decompose in the water after 24 hours unlike copper or cupramine which remain active and in the water forever.

I never had to treat velvet but I am treating 2 clownfish now with Paraguard for Brooklynella. They have been in quarantine for a month with 3 weeks of Paraguard and I will keep the treatment another week or so. The fish stopped scratching after a few days in Paraguard. I started treatment as soon as I saw the clownfish scratching on everything. Glad they were in quarantine so treatment was quick and easy.

Now that I read you guys having parasites show up after months..I will keep the clown in quarantine in observation at least another 4 weeks after treatment. I really don't want this stuff in my main tank so if it takes 4 months so be it.

sorry to read about this brad.
glad you got some help dealing with this over there.
crap like this is always easier to get through with helping hands.
hope things work out!

Yikes, this is a sad thing to read. Good luck with everything..

Wow Greg that is brutal. Velvet scares the living beejezus out of me!

Brad have you seen the goby or mandarin since I left? Hows everyone doing in QT? What was the name of the drug you got? I didn't see anything like it at BlueWorld when I was there, thought I'd pick some up in case my fish came in this week.

Ya, both of them are having a great ol time, whole tank to themselves. Just rigging the trap now.
I'm using something called uni marin. Not sure what's in it.

Thanks again, sure appreciate the help!