The Velvet Revolver - Battling Velvet in 200 Gallons

[asonitez]

Argh.... This morning was pretty stressful. I lost the clowns this morning. They rapidly declined and I'm sure its the velvet. I tried telling myself that it wasn't velvet just alien ich.. but its velvet. I have traced the source of the infection from my tank logs.

A Few weeks ago I got all my fish from Bob and they were in excellent health, after a brief quarantine with quinine sulfate (2 weeks) they went into the tank without issue. Shortly thereafter I purchased a

Flame Angel
Potters Angel

From the hidden reef. They went into quarantine for 2 weeks under quinine sulfate as well.. They both lasted through the treatment (neither were showing symptoms of ich). Both were showing, a white haze and decreased coloration which I thought was due to the quinine sulfate. A call to the NFP confirmed my suspicions.

After 2 weeks they went into the tank. Almost immediately within 72 hours I started seeing both of them looking stressed. The Flame angel went pale and I woke up to find the potters dead. Immediately thereafter I started seeing (What i thought) were ich spots on the other fish. That very night I pulled all my macro algae and inverts into my setup frag tank and dosed a 2X the dosage of Quinine Sulfate to the Main display tank. I left 1 sacrifical Zip snail in a shot glass. When it stopped moving it was at the right dosage. This halted the bleeding immediately. I started to see marked improvements however the slime was growing just not killing as fast.

I waited 1 week hoping for marked improvement and during that time towards the last day or 2 I lost a few more fish that never really "came out." TBH I was breaking down inside watching my buddies die. I upped the dosage of quinine and still no change after 3 days. (In Quarantine.. Ich drops off the fish COMPLETELY after 5 days using Quinine.) The fish still seemed stressed so I figured maybe I overdid it with the quinine and did a 30 gallon water change. For 1 day the fish looked fantastic! Then like a brick truck.. they started breaking bad.

I still thought it was ich until I started heavily researching fish diseases and treatments. I captured one of the clowns and under a bright desk lamp in a glass container during a FW dip I confirmed my fear. You guys did too. Velvet. I Broke down the whole tank last night. Everyone is now in copper.


Over the next 4 Days I plan to:


1. Drain the tank to within 1/2" of the Sand Bed.
2. Dose Hydrogen Peroxide And Leave it for 6 hours in the Sand bed.
3. Dose Hydrogen Perodixe in each of my Live Rock Holding Containers.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-07/sp/feature/

4. I will Drain and Refill the tank rendering the Hydrogen Peroxide inert and then Refill the Big Tank and add Salt.
5. Re-aquascape with the live rock thats been dosed with Hydrogen Peroxide
6. Transfer the macroalgae and some sand and live rock from my frag tank
7. Dose some Bio-Spira/Dr.Tim's and cycle the big tank



Things I learned during this process.

1. Ich is not the worst that can happen.

2. While it won't cure velvet... Quinine Sulfate is an impressive suppressant which extends the period in which you have to act when dosed at 1/4tsp per 10Gallon (Ignore Rock or Sand - it is not absorbed)

3.While suppressing the effects of Velvet... reducing the concentration of quinine sulfate in the water will cause a RAPID (within 24hrs) onset of Marine velvet infestation..

4. When quarantining....copper is the way to go... for velvet. Quinine is very safe and effective against ich.


I did everything right... Just didn't take into account something i've never dealt with before. I will never again stock my tank with Corals until I have stocked my tank with Fish. I feel that I can control the environment with fish before I add coral. I purposely did not pickup my coral yet from BOB who has been an awesome friend and ally during my Move and tank setup BECAUSE of my fish woes.

 

[jgraz]

5) Never, ever buy fish from Hidden Reef. That place has gone so far downhill it's a shame.

 

[Mark...]

Reading the article, it seems time of quarantine might help in the future:

Because of its lifecycle, a general recommendation has been to quarantine new acquisitions for 20 days to avoid introducing the disease (Noga, 2000 and Trevor-Jones, 2004), but I would urge most hobbyists to isolate them for a full month, with six weeks being optimal, for a number of reasons. The first reason is for uniformity. Because it will take at least a month to known if your new acquisition is free of Cryptocaryon irritans, it is better to simply get used to a long period of quarantine. Second, the signs of this infection are not obvious and, in my opinion, most aquarists can easily miss them. A full month or more of quarantine should give you enough time to notice the infestation, or, if you don't pick up on the signs, the fish will likely be dead by the end of the quarantine period.

 

[asonitez]

5) Never, ever buy fish from Hidden Reef. That place has gone so far downhill it's a shame.

How they talk about themselves it dosen't seem so. They seem to Bash Fish Factory and a few other places but they don't seem to be so good themselves!


One thing can be said for Central Jersey. I have been completely spoiled by North Jersey. Ocean Gallery II is leaps and bounds above hidden reef in terms of fish quality and coral quality.

Hidden Reef stomps a lot of places with dry goods though. They have a LOT of stuff.

 

[jgraz]

Dry goods is the end of HIdden reefs "pro's". When they were primarily a fish store they were very good. Since adding reptiles and now other household pets they have gone way down. I was there the other day and they had exactly 8 buckets of salt. All were royal nature. No thank you.

Fish factory for me every time.