Coppersafe poisoning possibly

[Richards Aquarium]

I bought 2 Ocellaris clownfish 2 weeks ago the lfs treats with copper they had them for 2 weeks prior to me purchasing them. I orginally was testing with a test that was not working i purchased a hanna tester to find out my copper level was over 3.0 ppm probable for about 2 to 3 days. I lowered 2.25. I was not paying attention to the evaporation and it went up to 2.77 that was this morning. I lowered down to 2.55. My one clown is not eating I have not witnessed him eat anything for 2 weeks. The other clown is eating like a pig. Please suggest what I need to do this is a qt. The clown that is staying above fake rock is there all day then sleeps on the bottom. He does not move from there and most the time is head down he's the one not eating.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I assume you did not test the level as you added. Or had false reading until you got Hanna test
Overdose is very s possible and you can do a major water change and add to level in 24 hours and see if butterfly rebounds

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I don't think this is from coppersafe over-dose: if it were, most likely BOTH fish would be affected, since they are in the same water. Also, coppersafe is safe for clowns for sure up to 2.75 ppm, and probably higher than that.

From the video - the one clown is indeed breathing fast. The water looks a bit murky, sometimes that's an artifact from the video, but how is the ammonia testing? Does the tank have good aeration? However, same thing - if the water was bad, or if there was not enough aeration, most likely BOTH clowns would be showing symptoms.

There are some internal diseases common to clownfish that cause rapid breathing, not eating, and sometimes white stringy feces - things like coccidia and some viruses. These are not always contagious to all fish in the tank.

 

[Richards Aquarium]

Ammonia is at 0 I think the murkyness you are seeing is. it is a plastic tub and there is no light to that tank just the light it gets from the window and the light from my display tank. I did a 3 gallon water change. Which I know brings me down past therapeutic level. I am gonna leave it like that until tomorrow and see if there is a change in him. This did not happen to him until I added the coppersafe. So I'm at a loss. If it could be a virus what should I do ?
Thank you for your help.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Ammonia is at 0 I think the murkyness you are seeing is. it is a plastic tub and there is no light to that tank just the light it gets from the window and the light from my display tank. I did a 3 gallon water change. Which I know brings me down past therapeutic level. I am gonna leave it like that until tomorrow and see if there is a change in him. This did not happen to him until I added the coppersafe. So I'm at a loss. If it could be a virus what should I do ?
Thank you for your help.

Sorry, there is no effective treatment against viral fish diseases, and the coccidia doesn't have any real treatment either. We see a number of clownfish show up here with rapid breathing, not eating and usually stringy white feces. The survival rate for these is small/none, we just have not found a true cause or effective treatment.....

 

[Duane family]

I agree with what Jay Hemdal is saying. Basically you received 1 fish in good health but the other one is in very poor health. The only thing you can do is give it time and hope for the best. Its a tough one though but these issues happen very very often where a fish in poor health is passed to the customer.