The Reefpocalypse: Have you experienced a disease outbreak in your tank?

[AlyciaMarie]

A reefer's worst nightmare: disease outbreak. In a saltwater world where we buy, trade, and acquire animals from all over the world, I'm sure many of us experience some worry when adding new additions to the tank. I sure do! Unfortunately, we take the good with the bad in this hobby. We can do all we can to try to reduce the risk of disease outbreaks in our aquariums, but sometimes, those little trouble-causing monstrosities still sneak their way in somehow.

Have you experienced a disease outbreak in your tank? What was it, how did you fight it, and what was the outcome?

 

[Dread Pirate Dave]

I QT all fish and inverts in hopes of not introducing something to my display tank. So far I have been lucky I think.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

So far, I have not experienced one and hope never to experience one.

 

[revhtree]

This should be a really interesting poll and thread!

I've had a few fish but never a full on disease disaster.

 

[EliMelly]

I had ich and velvet. Half the fish made it.

 

[exnisstech]

Velvet here. I was going to let everything die and tear the tank down but my family convinced me to set up a stock tank and start copper treatment. I'm glad I did. I managed to save some of my oldest fish but also lost a lot.
Two of the survivors. The fish had been with me for 6 years when I introduced velvet.

Lesson learned? Never buy fish kept in low salinity. The velvet came in on a fish that was housed in 1.015 salinity. The stores will tell you they do it to prevent disease but in reality it suppresses disease which then becomes active when the fish are added to water with normal salinity, 1.025 here. I keep a Hanna salinity tester on me and test water of any fish I am interested in at the lfs unless it is housed with coral and/or inverts which are the tanks I prefer to buy from as the others could contain copper and not all lfs will reveal that.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Velvet here. I was going to let everything die and tear the tank down but my family convinced me to set up a stock tank and start copper treatment. I'm glad I did. I managed to save some of my oldest fish but also lost a lot.
Two of the survivors. The fish had been with me for 6 years when I introduced velvet.

Lesson learned? Never buy fish kept in low salinity. The velvet came in on a fish that was housed in 1.015 salinity. The stores will tell you they do it to prevent disease but in reality it suppresses disease which then becomes active when the fish are added to water with normal salinity, 1.025 here. I keep a Hanna salinity tester on me and test water of any fish I am interested in at the lfs unless it is housed with coral and/or inverts which are the tanks I prefer to buy from as the others could contain copper and not all lfs will reveal that.

Glad you still have some fish from that outbreak!

 

[Reefer Matt]

My fowlr has had ich multiple times and velvet once. This was before I treated the whole tank when adding new livestock, as they are large fish and don’t fit in my qt tank. The ich was manageable each time with cupramine, but I lost three fish to the velvet within a few days. The tank also got flukes from my Emperor angelfish, but Prazipro and freshwater dips quickly took care of it.

Puffy is tough as nails though, and is the only original fish (out of six) in the tank after 6 years. My reef tank fishes are always qt’d before adding to the tank and I haven’t had an outbreak in those yet. (Knock on wood)

 

[vabben]

Take it from me, QT that "QT'd" fish you bought online.... Lost all my fish except for a white tail tang. Went fallow couldn't keep nutrients up and Dinos wiped out all the coral. Amazing I didn't quit after that.

 

[Rappa]

Yup. Learned the hard way here too. I used to think that quarantining wasn't necessary and it seemed like way too much work. "Just buy a fish that looks healthy"... Did that for 15+ years without much issue in a 50G tank. I really didn't buy that many fish, now that I think about it with my old tank. Then I upgraded to my current 220G. Started stocking it up with wish-list fish I had always wanted. Was doing really well, then I decided to buy 3 Firefish. FIREFISH!!! basically the cheapest fish you can get, brought Ich into my system and within mere days almost all fish were showing spots and Firefish were dead. Tangs were in rough shape. Luckily I got good advice from a friend, and right here on R2R. I ended up setting up my old 50G display in the basement as a QT/Hospital tank. Tried catching all my fish, but ended up having to remove all of the rocks and structures to get to them all. What a giant pain this was. Even with rocks out, it was still tough! It took an entire day to get them all out, then get the rock back into the display. Was able to save most of my fish with Copper Power and General Cure. Try catching a fish in a 6'ft tank with the rock and coral frags in place. Not happening! Ran the tank for almost 90 DAYS FALLOW to kill the Ich or Velvet. Was so boring and hated it so much. Corals did poorly and died off with no fish nutrients, and the display became a Copepod/Amphipod farm. They were like ants running around everywhere.

I will NEVER introduce another fish without 30 day QT'ing it with a Copper Power and a "General Cure"/or Prazipro treatment. So far so good since changing my ways. I was able to get a baby Purple Tang for free, because he and his entire stock tank had Ich/Velvet at the LFS... few of them were already dead. Took him home and nursed him back to health pretty easily. He's now runs with my Tang Gang 5" long and beautifully fat and happy.

 

[AlyciaMarie]

Velvet here. I was going to let everything die and tear the tank down but my family convinced me to set up a stock tank and start copper treatment. I'm glad I did. I managed to save some of my oldest fish but also lost a lot.
Two of the survivors. The fish had been with me for 6 years when I introduced velvet.

Lesson learned? Never buy fish kept in low salinity. The velvet came in on a fish that was housed in 1.015 salinity. The stores will tell you they do it to prevent disease but in reality it suppresses disease which then becomes active when the fish are added to water with normal salinity, 1.025 here. I keep a Hanna salinity tester on me and test water of any fish I am interested in at the lfs unless it is housed with coral and/or inverts which are the tanks I prefer to buy from as the others could contain copper and not all lfs will reveal that.

I've never heard of this, but I will definitely be considering it when buying fish in the future!

 

[exnisstech]

I've never heard of this, but I will definitely be considering it when buying fish in the future!

Some folks will dispute it but Jay H confirmed it as being true.

 

[Chris Spaulding]

When I restarted years ago things were going smoothly tank looked great all fish were doing good. Had about 12 fish. Came across a baby purple tang at a LFS for $50 that I had never purchased a fish from before. Fish looked great eating he said he has had it foe about 4 weeks and it had gone through QT. I brought this fish home and did not QT as I was told that had been done. Well about a week later Velvet broke out and I lost everything but the Purple Tang and my female Blood Clown. Ever since then I Qt everything at least a separate tank and observe, Medicate and copper only if needed.
I still have that Purple Tang and Clown to this day 6+ years later.

 

[SueAubu]

Rescued some fish from someone who was moving: harlequin tusk, snowflake blenny, blue, hippo and scopius tangs, 3 pairs of clowns. After about a week they started acting funny and then going missing.... Finally got on here in a TOTAL PANIC and you, my friends, told me how much trouble I was in....

Listened to everyone. Read all the sticky threads. Ran around and set up a hospital tank. Got ALL the treatments.

They were all lost within 24 hours, after.

Killed me. I'm not a fish gir, per se. These guys came with the corals in the tank I rescued. Still I failed them and I was devastated. I lost any interest in the build project and even my little (100g) reef tank next to my bed.

I'm back, though, mostly. The tank is laying fallow for another month, but the corals I have waiting in there LOVE the space.

(I'm debating using my ***hole damsels as the coal mine canaries next month before I add any fish...)