confused

T

terbear425

Registered Member
Nov 3, 2006
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new to this, so I need some help. I have a 55gal SW tank that has been running for 8 months now. Had several fish in it but got a bad case of ick and lost all the fish except a blue surgeon tang and a domino damsel. The fish store guided me thru the cooper treatment and both fish are still alive. The tank was treated for 21 days. I don't see anymore ick and they are eating very good. But the tang sometimes shakes her head like she did when she had this. She is not scratching on anything and like i said eating and swimming around just fine. Is there any reason for alarm? My readings on my tank are;
salt .016
PH 8.1
I use bottled water because our town water is full of iron. If I'm missing anything please let me know
 
First welcome to AC!
I wish you had found us before you treated your tank. The copper you used will most certainly kill ich it unfortunantly will preclude you from EVER having any inverts in your tank . The copper will stick around in your substrate and rocks forever and it is highly toxic to our spineless friends.
You might also consider raising your salintiy to .021-.026 that's the strenght of sea water and your fish will do much better under those conditions. Often times lfs will keep salinity low to fight of parasites ,"they would be better served if they would qt but, that's another thread", and to save them some money.
You'd propbably save a lot of money in the long term if you bought a ro-di unit. Again you are most welcome here at ac. If you have any more questions or if you recieve or have recieved any advice that's ....... questionable please feel free to ask.
Again welcome to AC.
Max
 
Max, thankyou for welcomming me to ac. in my first note, i'm still wondering if i should worry about the ick the way the tang in acting. also i was wondering what a ro-di unit is. like i said i'm new to this. it has been 2 weeks since the last treatment of copper, how long do i have to wait to introduce a new fish? I really miss not sitting here watching them after along night of work.
 
Well, the copper has most certainly killed off all the invertabrates in your tank so ich isn't going to be an issue. I'd do a major water change ,"don't raise your s.g. too fast not more than about a point per water change!" I'd say that they might be suffering from copper poisoning that's probably what killed the rest of your fish off.

ro-di Is reverse osmosis it's a membrane filter all that will come out of it is pure water so you'll have to buffer appropriatly. I wouldn't add any new fish until you are sure that copper levels have fallen off in your tank.

Fwiw, that's not how I would have treated but, what's done is done.
hth
Max.
 
if this should ever happen again[ i sure hope not] what do you suggest for me to do instead of using copper
 
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=51213 Sorry, I wasn't trying to be snooty it's just that you were the victim of some pretty bad advice. Your tank won't ever be able to support any invertabrates at all clean up crew included. You'll have some efforts ahead of you to keep algae etc. in check since you won't be able to keep snails or shrimp. I feel bad for you . The above link is to set up a hospital/q.t. tank if you use it for new introductions you shouldn't ever have another disease issue.
Hope this helps
Max
 
thanks

thankyou for all your info and i didn't feel like you were being snooty. its just a shame that you can't trust a very well known fish store. well i learned the hard way!! thanks again for you help!
 
lol, they want you $ and they have staffing issues to if they are like any other lfs I've ever been into. We just want your company.
 
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