Treating with copper

[Underwater Passion]

Hey everyone, so I have done extensive research on ich and velvet. I made the mistake of not QTing a Powder Blue Tang (yes, I learned my lesson) and him and my hippo tang got ick.
Long story short i set up two hospital tanks to treat all fish:
1. 55 gallon I’m using cupramine
2. A 29 gallon I’m using copper power at a level of
1.75ppm to treat my flame angel.

In the process of fallowing my tank for 7 weeks (one extra week to be safe) All copper tests performed with the reliable

My questions are:

1. I read wrasses don’t do well in cupramine and copper power is better after I already started them in the cupramine treatment. One is a carpenters flasher and the other is a 6 line. both seem fine and eating well. Copper level got to 0.77ppm so I added some carbon to reduce the level back to 0.5ppm. Can I just transfer the wrasses over to the tank with copper power or do I need to reduce the cupramine to 0 to transfer them over and restart my treatment for all other fish?

2. My hippo has white spots on her again even 4 days into treatment. Is it normal for the ick/velvet to resurface on their skin this far into treatment even after all white spots went away?

3. Will tangs be ok in cupramine? I’ve read mixed opinions.

4.AFTER all this work and fallowing the DT, once i treat all fish and then watch them in a QT for 4 weeks before adding back into DT. Is there anyway that ick can break out in my DT if it is not introduced by any new comers? So essentially are all the ick parasites dead at this point?

Thank you in advance!

 

[Lionsreef]

If your wrasses are doing fine in cupramine @ 0.77 ppm I see no need to move them to the tank with copper power. All my fish are actually in cupramine QT right now @ 0.55ppm due to a velvet outbreak in my QT. I've got 3 wrasses (mystery, melenurus and yellow) along with Purple tang, sand goby and maroon clown.

 

[Big G]

Cupramine, because of its small dose and thus even narrower therapeutic range was very difficult to use with the hobby grade color matching test kits. Because of that, I think, it got a bad reputation. The Hanna changes that big time. I'd leave your wrasses where they are as long as you are not seeing any "copper sensitivity" symptoms.

Yes, spots showing up several days into copper treatment is very common. Remember the spots are not the actual parasites. The spots are the mucous response to the parasites after they drop off the fish as the copper only kills during the "free swimming" stage of the parasites.

With the Hanna Copper Checker the tangs should be just fine but, as I stated above it's very comforting to have the wider therapeutic range of a chelated copper like Copper Power or Coppersafe.

Always a chance for a fallow period to fail. All it takes is just one parasite that squeaked through your eradication methods. That's why some go nuclear and start over with dry rock, dry sand, and then strict QT of "everything" that goes into the tank. It's all about your comfort level with all the choices to make about existing rock, sand, corals, inverts, etc.

 

[Underwater Passion]

Cupramine, because of its small dose and thus even narrower therapeutic range was very difficult to use with the hobby grade color matching test kits. Because of that, I think, it got a bad reputation. The Hanna changes that big time. I'd leave your wrasses where they are as long as you are not seeing any "copper sensitivity" symptoms.

Yes, spots showing up several days into copper treatment is very common. Remember the spots are not the actual parasites. The spots are the mucous response to the parasites after they drop off the fish as the copper only kills during the "free swimming" stage of the parasites.

With the Hanna Copper Checker the tangs should be just fine but, as I stated above it's very comforting to have the wider therapeutic range of a chelated copper like Copper Power or Coppersafe.

Always a chance for a fallow period to fail. All it takes is just one parasite that squeaked through your eradication methods. That's why some go nuclear and start over with dry rock, dry sand, and then strict QT of "everything" that goes into the tank. It's all about your comfort level with all the choices to make about existing rock, sand, corals, inverts, etc.

Thank you! I appreciate the input Just got a little worried after reading info on different forums. I will continue the treatment and monitoring. So far so good.

 

[Underwater Passion]

If your wrasses are doing fine in cupramine @ 0.77 ppm I see no need to move them to the tank with copper power. All my fish are actually in cupramine QT right now @ 0.55ppm due to a velvet outbreak in my QT. I've got 3 wrasses (mystery, melenurus and yellow) along with Purple tang, sand goby and maroon clown.

That’s comforting to know your wrasses are doing well. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Underwater Passion]

Cupramine, because of its small dose and thus even narrower therapeutic range was very difficult to use with the hobby grade color matching test kits. Because of that, I think, it got a bad reputation. The Hanna changes that big time. I'd leave your wrasses where they are as long as you are not seeing any "copper sensitivity" symptoms.

Yes, spots showing up several days into copper treatment is very common. Remember the spots are not the actual parasites. The spots are the mucous response to the parasites after they drop off the fish as the copper only kills during the "free swimming" stage of the parasites.

With the Hanna Copper Checker the tangs should be just fine but, as I stated above it's very comforting to have the wider therapeutic range of a chelated copper like Copper Power or Coppersafe.

Always a chance for a fallow period to fail. All it takes is just one parasite that squeaked through your eradication methods. That's why some go nuclear and start over with dry rock, dry sand, and then strict QT of "everything" that goes into the tank. It's all about your comfort level with all the choices to make about existing rock, sand, corals, inverts, etc.

Big G,

I was thinking about dosing with Kanaplex, metroplex, and focus just to cover all my basis. Is it possible to do this during copper treatment? I know cupramine says not to mix with other meds but I thought some meds were ok.

 

[Big G]

Dosing antibiotics while treating with copper is a close call. Some like to dose to prevent bacterial infections. But each time you add more meds you are increasing the stress on the fish. Dosing food + metro + focus to feed directly to the fish's gut is pretty common to treat internal pathogens. Kanaplex is best dosed into the water column to treat bacterial infection.