My struggle with Velvet, and Peroxide as a promising tool

Sashaka

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 7)

Day 4: Positives: No further losses since the Flame Hawk fish came up missing and no fish are using the powerheads to support respiration anymore. Setbacks: Ammonia is rising in the MD and the discoloration on the Yellow Coris Wrasse is still present. Nitrates are rising as well. A 60 gallon water change will be preformed as soon as another 33 gallon Brute can fills with RODI water in the water changing station.

  • Ammonia: It is unknown to me whether the Seachem Ammonia Badge or the API liquid ammonia test kit are acurate when used in saltwater with H202 dosing. The picture of the badge did not clearly show the level of ammonia in the tank. It was registering "Alert" or .05ppm. The API test kit showed a higher ammonia level at .25-.40 ppm. It is clear that at 75ppm H202 dosage, the biological filtration is disrupted. The question is whether it is because of die off of bacteria in the tank, missed CUC that are dying, and/or the missing Flame Hawkfish (presumed dead) rotting somewhere in the rocks.
    • A water change will be conducted tomorrow (I decided to do a larger water change and needed to make more saltwater
    • Microbacter7 was added at the higher dosage level on the label (1 cap per 50 gal)
  • Nitrates: While the pellet reactor is offline, the nitrates for a FOWLR are not at toxic levels at a little over 40 ppm. The water change should help control the nitrates.
  • All fish food is soaked in Selcon to help build up fish immune systems. This vitamin is a standard food additive.

API test kits.jpg BrandsBuffer.jpg Day4APIAmmoniaTest.jpg SeachemBadgePoint05.jpg D4Nitrates.jpg Microbacter7.jpg
 
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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 8)

Day 4: Positives: No further losses since the Flame Hawk fish came up missing and no fish are using the powerheads to support respiration anymore. Setbacks: Ammonia is rising in the MD and the discoloration on the Yellow Coris Wrasse is still present. Nitrates are rising as well. A 60 gallon water change will be preformed as soon as another 33 gallon Brute can fills with RODI water in the water changing station.
  • Yellow wrasse is not eating much. Ammonia spike could be the problem. Black spot on tip of dorsal fin is normal for the species. Darkish area on top of head has returned or was unnoticed in the lighting on Day 2
  • Regal tang is eating and swimming normally. No powerhead hovering observed
  • Yellow tang still not eating; extremely thin. I'm not sure it's going to bounce back to health. Seems interested but does not eat. Color looks good, but dorsal where the septicemia was located is held clamped close to body again. This may be a symptom of ammonia spike rather than original pathogen/disease. Does swim around a little and I did see it pick at Nori once, but still mostly hides under favorite ledge.
  • Hawkfish is no longer swimming to the surface to gulp air, very active today and eating well
  • Vagabond seems unaffected by dosing and did not display signs of illness before dosing

D4YWrasseDarkHeadPatch.jpg D4RegalTangEatingNoPowerhead.jpg D4YTangNotEatingThin.jpg D4YTang2NotEatingButInterested.jpg Day4HawknoseNoSurfaceHovering.jpg D4VagabondNoSymptoms.jpg
 

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 9)

Day 4 (continued): Evening - Dosed half (3-1/2 cups ) to try and protect what's left of the nitrifying bacteria until I can do the water change tomorrow.
  • Engineer Gobies did not come out of hiding after morning dose, nor did they come out to eat that I observed. Both come out for their evening swim after the other fish went to bed (common behaviors for these fish in my tank)
  • Moyer's Leopard Wrasse is still eating and not symptomatic of illness, though it seems stressed at the highest dose of 75ppm H202. All wrasses were in nighttime abodes during evening dosing, so no further observations were noted
  • Leopard wrasse is more shy and does not like it's picture taken. Weight seems to be holding, though it did flash once today
  • Pintail is very active and swimming all levels of the tank. It does not seem to be too stressed with the higher dosage of H202. It does not seem to hover at the surface water anymore and is eating well.
  • Banner fish were hovering in the stream from the power heads predosing of H202. They are swimming actively, eating well, and are no longer symptomatic in terms of illness.
  • Copperband was never symptomatic and continues to eat and swim actively
  • Unidentified Goby was never symptomatic and continues to eat and hop around the sand actively
  • Diamond Watchman has chosen a home where it is hard to observe. I did see it out and eating after the morning feeding. No visible signs of illness and weight looks good

D4EngGobyPacing.jpg D4MoyersLeopardEatingNoSymptoms.jpg D4Pintail1.jpg D4CBandBannerNoSymptoms.jpg D4UnknownGobyOrLizardFish1.jpg DiamondGoby.jpg
 
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Sashaka

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 10)

Day 4 (continued): Blue Spot puffer in the sick tank is worse; it is now covered in dark patches and did not eat breakfast well. As this fish has already been through 30 days of Copper Power and 3 rounds of Prazipro, I made the decision to try medicating the sick tank with H202 at the same 75ppm dosage I used in the 180 gallon to see what might happen. The puffer did not seem to notice at all. It may be too sick to care, though it does swim around a little during the day, it is progressively getting worse.

Day1: Sick tank
Any idea what this is? It does not really look like black spot to me but the patches seem to be growing. Maybe bacterial in nature? #reefsquad ? The growth I surgically removed near the base of the tail below the anus that I thought was a type of worm parasite is growing back. :( It is the black ball like appendage between the anus and tail.

D4BPPufferBkSpots2.jpg D4BPPufferBkSpots.jpg
 
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Sashaka

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Still looking for direction to a couple of questions posted earlier if anyone can help out.. #reefsquad ?

1) Will an ammonia badge and/or API liquid ammonia test kit work with H202 in the water? Is one over the other more likely to give erroneous readings when used in H202 in the water?

2) I'm not sure how many days to keep dosing the tank. I was thinking 10 days at this strength. Any thoughts about this?

Thanks!
 

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 10)

Day 5: A 60 gallon water change was performed early this morning. Fish were not up yet when I started. Dosage of H202 was kept lower (5 cups vs the maximum amount of 7.2 cups for both the morning and the evening doses) to try to prevent a complete tank crash due to the detected ammonia in the tank. It was added directly to the replacement RODI saltwater mix and pumped into the tank. Frozen fish food mix (normal morning food preparation) was thawed while tank refilled. No fish loss since starting the H202 dosing to date. PH tested low again and was adjusted by adding more Ph Buffer.
Positives: The Yellow Tang is eating! It's eating heartily, actively hunting for the frozen food mix (my own blend) that is broadcast administered into the tank. It continues to hunt and eat for the full 20 minutes of observation. I'm psyched! All fish (that I can see) are eating. Respiration appears to be back to normal as well (I have video documentation of improved respiration in the yellow tang available if anyone is interested. I struggle to post videos on the R2R site, so I will not be adding videos to this H202 dosing picture diary)
Negatives: The yellow tang did scratch the sides of its nose several times on rocks, though not aggressively such as observed when fish were flashing before starting the H202 dosing. The water change helped lower ammonia level, but there is still ammonia registering on both the Seachem badge (about the same as before the water change and with the API Ammonia liquid test kit. I am not too concerned that the badge does not show a reduced ammonia level as it takes some time for the badges to register changes. (EDIT: After several hours, the badge reads between .2 and .4 to the naked eye. The API test kit suggests the water change did reduce ammonia levels, but not enough. I am unable to do a complete 180 gallon water change, but I am making more saltwater mix to reduce levels more. I still don't know if it is safe to administer Prime into the tank with H202 in the water. I didn't get an answer to this question when posted in a different thread started in this forum, so I will be calling the company that makes Prime to see if they can enlighten me any.
Notes: While I am waiting for an answer to the Prime question, I dosed 8-1/2 oz of 3% H202 (second dose) into the 29 gallon puffer sick tank. I administered 3/4 capfull of Prime immediately following the H202 dosing. The puffer will be my test subject to determine if Prime can safely be dosed into the 180 gallon at the same time as H202. I realize that if this is a toxic cocktail, the puffer may not die right away. The mixture could possibly damage organs that could take some time to kill the fish. I am observing carefully, though if the fish does die, I cannot be sure if it died from adding Prime to the H202 water or if the pathogen was the cause of its death. As sick as the puffer is right now, I don't think adding Prime to the puffer's tank water could hurt it much more than the damage the pathogen attacking it is doing. It looks simply awful. It did eat after dosing both the Prime and the H202, though it did hover at the bottom of the tank for a bit after dosing. No adverse reactions apparent by the end of the day after dosing Prime and H202 at the same time.

D5AmmoniaAfter60GalWaterChange.jpg D5Ph-low.jpg D560GalWaterChange.jpg
 
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Sashaka

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 11)

Day 5 (Continued): Look who's out with the gang and looking to be fed! Yellow tang is eating like a pig this morning. Respiration is back to normal. :)

D5YtangEating.jpg
 
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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 12)

Day 5 (Continued)
  • Wrasses still group together or hover near the sand after dosing, but all came out to eat. All seem hungrier than usual.
  • Banners no longer hover in power heads at all, eating and doing well
  • Yellow Coris Wrasse still has the dark patch on the top of its head
  • Puffer (in the sick tank) is eating and seems to be handling the H202 dosing well

D5BannerNoSymptoms.jpg D5PintailHoveringAtSand.jpg D5McCoskersFlasherHoveringNearSand.jpg D5UnknownGobyBkBottomFins.jpg D5YwrasseDarkPatchHead.jpg D2Puffer.jpg
 
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Sashaka

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Glad you are documenting this at this strength peroxide. You might be pioneer at these levels. Hopefully something good happens for all of our sakes. Thank-you for this update and lets get rid if the little buggers.

So many here have helped me over the years, I'm happy to share the good, the bad, and the ugly if it can be useful to further understanding about using H202 as a parasite remedy.

Just to clarify, to date, my H202 schedule has not remained at the highest level. It has been adjusted to follow what I perceived as the best course of action to protect my livestock, and it was administered as follows:
Day 1: Evening 6-1/2 cups, a slightly weaker dosage to see how fish react.
Day 2: Highest dosage or 7.2 cups (75ppm H202) dosage added both morning and evening
Day 3: Highest dosage or 7.2 cups added both morning and evening
Day 4: Lowered the dosage to just under a half dose or 3.5 cups for evening dose to protect the cycle
Day 5: Raised the dose to 5 cups, still not the highest dose, but the fish are all active and eating at this dose and they are continuing to improve. I don't want whatever bug to get a foothold on the fish again, but I also don't want to dose at the highest level if it's not necessary. These fish are my babies after all. LOL Plus, I am trying to save whatever cycle I have left in the tank
Day 6: Kept dosage at 5 cups. Fish are doing well, eating heartily, and swimming actively. The ammonia did not raise any higher today. I did remove a couple of dead snails that I missed when I removed the CUC. Actually, for the first three days I would find a snail or two on the sand bed or stuck to a rock and they were still alive. I pulled them as I saw them. On day 4, I found three snails but two were dead. Day 5 and 6, any snails found were dead.
 
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CuzzA

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FWIW, just to close out my saga, I got the final barnacle blenny out of the DT a few moments ago, which was a blessing since I started CP in the QT this afternoon and didn't want to pull the rock again for a second time to try and catch him, nor did I want to qt him separately. I dosed 80mg figuring I had a decent bio filter. Cut lights and will follow protocol with daily dosing.

Anyway, back to the sole barnacle blenny, a short story only a reefer can appreciate. The blenny is about 1 inch long and maybe 3/16" wide, obviously difficult to catch in a maze of rock work. After the initial breakdown for pulling fish he disappeared for a couple days. Today he reappeared and he just so happen to slide into a small one way hole about a half inch wide and an inch deep. I placed a 1" clear rigid tube over the hole and spent and hour holding it hoping it would swim up. I put some brine shrimp in, nope, not coming out, so I walked away figuring this ain't gonna work, especially since he could slip through the uneven surface of where the rock and tube meet. A few hours pass, my eyes are closing on the couch and I'm dozing off when my better half jumps up and says, "let's have a snack." Okay, I'm up again, watching TV, eating some crackers, ham, cheese and pickles and out of the corner of my eye I see it swimming up in the tube. Man I jumped up so fast, hopped over the coffee table and food, snatched the tube and pushed the bottom into the sand bed. Success! Now to get rid of this velvet once and for all. Also, the firefish is fine. Of course none of them are very happy in this glass box. I'm sure they'll be happy to get home once the time comes.

Home:
20191223_180034.jpg
 

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 12)

Day 6: Christmas vacation is over. I had to go back to work today. Observation was limited to 5 minutes in the morning after dosing. Dosage remained at 5 cups for both morning and evening. I observed about 20 minutes after the evening dose, but many of the fish were already in nighttime abodes when it was distributed, so I added some flakes to encourage activity. I wanted to observe any adverse behaviors after dosing because I'm on day 6 of the dosing schedule and I'm still trying to figure out how long to keep adding the H202 to the tank. If any fish seem stressed, I'll want to discontinue. The OP stopped after day 6. I was thinking of going to day 10, but with the ammonia building, I may stop if the fish seem good to go. The fish became very active after the dose was added to the return, but they settled down quickly and became more interested in finding the food I broadcast fed into the tank. Some of the more active fish such as the Regal tang didn't come out, but this is not out of character for this fish. Once it goes to bed at night, it might peek out a bit if the lights in the room are turned on, but it usually just peeks out and then retreats.

  • Yellow tang continues to eat heartily, swim actively, and its color looks great. The picture today shows it collecting and eating pellets from the sand. I did catch it rubbing its nose again (this time on the sand bed). I don't know if the H202 is causing a tickle or irritation like carbonated soda would if it got up into our nose or if an infection may be starting. I will continue to watch closely and assess.
  • Banner fish swim and hunt for food together. Still no hovering in the power heads while observing the tank.
  • Flame angel still eating, fat, and alert. Non symptomatic.
  • Majestic angel had HLLE before dosing with H202. It developed about two years ago when I was running a lot of carbon in the tank. I read that carbon could be a cause of HLLE, so I pulled the carbon and now only run it once in a while for water clarity. The HLLE did not go away, but it did not get worse after pulling the carbon. I've been watching to see if H202 had any effects on HLLE. Unfortunately, I don't see any changes to date. The angel did not show symptoms or exhibit behaviors of a fish suffering from velvet before starting the H202 dosing

D6YtangEating.jpg D6BannersEating.jpg FlameAngelFatAlert.jpg D6MajesticAngel.jpg
 
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Sashaka

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FWIW, just to close out my saga, I got the final barnacle blenny out of the DT a few moments ago, which was a blessing since I started CP in the QT this afternoon and didn't want to pull the rock again for a second time to try and catch him, nor did I want to qt him separately. I dosed 80mg figuring I had a decent bio filter. Cut lights and will follow protocol with daily dosing.

Anyway, back to the sole barnacle blenny, a short story only a reefer can appreciate. The blenny is about 1 inch long and maybe 3/16" wide, obviously difficult to catch in a maze of rock work. After the initial breakdown for pulling fish he disappeared for a couple days. Today he reappeared and he just so happen to slide into a small one way hole about a half inch wide and an inch deep. I placed a 1" clear rigid tube over the hole and spent and hour holding it hoping it would swim up. I put some brine shrimp in, nope, not coming out, so I walked away figuring this ain't gonna work, especially since he could slip through the uneven surface of where the rock and tube meet. A few hours pass, my eyes are closing on the couch and I'm dozing off when my better half jumps up and says, "let's have a snack." Okay, I'm up again, watching TV, eating some crackers, ham, cheese and pickles and out of the corner of my eye I see it swimming up in the tube. Man I jumped up so fast, hopped over the coffee table and food, snatched the tube and pushed the bottom into the sand bed. Success! Now to get rid of this velvet once and for all. Also, the firefish is fine. Of course none of them are very happy in this glass box. I'm sure they'll be happy to get home once the time comes.

Home:
20191223_180034.jpg

Hahaha, I can visualize the mad dash to get to the tank in time. It's amazing that your lunge toward the tank didn't send the little guy back down the tube into the rock for safety from the giant human lunging toward. LOL Oh, wait. That's my luck. LOL It's amazing what tiny holes these fish can fit into to hide from our nets. I'm glad you found success and didn't break you neck getting to the tank. :)

PS. I've had a few fish that didn't take to full strength CP right away. Since then, I always ramp up to help them adjust more easily.
 

CuzzA

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I am curious having never used CP, when should I expect to see the fish to improve? No scratching, etcetera?
 

Sashaka

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I am curious having never used CP, when should I expect to see the fish to improve? No scratching, etcetera?

Good question. I think the amount of time for the fish to stop being irritated by the pathogen depends on a variety of factors such as how sick the fish is, how many parasites it's fighting off, what is the life cycle of the parasites, what species of fish is being treated, how strong is the fish's immune system, and even the strength of the CP (CP loses its punch when exposed to light and temperature changes, etc. I wish I had a better answer. I really think it varies. I've had fish that seem to have some relief within days and other that needed weeks to show improvement. Keep us posted on their progress. :) Remember that @Humblefish warns that "CP is heat & light sensitive – so store in a cool, dark place...and it is also susceptible to biodegradation." I actually think this was a warning on the packet of CP that came with my order.
 
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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 13)

Day 7: Observation was limited to 5 minutes in the morning after dosing. It's a work day (Friday). I expect to be able to gain a better insight on fish behaviors tomorrow after feeding/dosing as I'll be home for the day. Dosage remained at 5 cups for both morning and evening. I observed about 20 minutes after the evening dose, but again, many of the fish were already in nighttime abodes when it was distributed, so I added some flakes to encourage activity. I've contacted Seachem looking for an answer about the safety of adding Prime to H202 treated water. I had to leave a message, but I'm hoping to receive and answer soon.
  • Yellow tang came out to eat, though did not seem as ravenously hungry as yesterday morning when fed. I did not see it itch its nose during observations today; however, the nose does look to be slightly discolored. Maybe I'm just being paranoid and seeing more than what is actually there.
  • Engineer Gobies continue to seem stressed when H202 is dispensed into the tank but settle down quickly. H202 does not appear to cause any physical adverse signs on body of fish.
  • Ornate Wrasse is eating and active; All wrasses seem to hover around the sand more than before. I did not observe any flashing today. Ornate seems hungrier. My guess is the pod population took a huge hit . Luckily it does eat frozen foods when I broadcast feed.
  • Regal tang ate well and is still actively swimming. It does not seem to be symptomatic of disease.
  • Banner fish, Majestic Angel, Unknown Goby, Foxface, and Vagabond do not seem to be symptomatic of disease.
  • Did not see the Diamond Goby or Yellow tail this evening. They hide often, so I'm not too concerned.
  • Did not see the flame tail blenny. This fish usually comes out to eat as soon as food hits the water. If it does not come out in the morning, I'll start hunting for it.
  • Fish all gather together where I broadcast frozen foods and is normal behavior in the morning.
  • Majestic Angel: No change in HLLE that I can tell

D7OrnateWrasseEatingActive.jpg D7OrnateWrasseSeemsHungrier.jpg D7Pintail.jpg D7MajesticAngelHLLENoChange.jpg D7YTangEveningDoesNotEatMuch.jpg D7FishWaitingForBreakfast.jpg
 
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CuzzA

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Good question. I think the amount of time for the fish to stop being irritated by the pathogen depends on a variety of factors such as how sick the fish is, how many parasites it's fighting off, what is the life cycle of the parasites, what species of fish is being treated, how strong is the fish's immune system, and even the strength of the CP (CP loses its punch when exposed to light and temperature changes, etc. I wish I had a better answer. I really think it varies. I've had fish that seem to have some relief within days and other that needed weeks to show improvement. Keep us posted on their progress. :) Remember that @Humblefish warns that "CP is heat & light sensitive – so store in a cool, dark place...and it is also susceptible to biodegradation." I actually think this was a warning on the packet of CP that came with my order.
Yes, I've been storing the CP in the dark colored bag it came in in a drawer. I also cut lights and pulled the carbon filter cartridge. The fish are only getting ambient light. It kind of sucks because I know the fish are not happy. I felt bad and bought them some fake coral decorations and a reef background for when I do the sterile tank transfer for observation. Which reminds me I need to start acclimating a black Molly.

I'd really like to know how it got in my system. I started trying to figure it out and the only thing I can note is one of my LFS had clowns and anemones in their invert system. Seems like a great way to introduce velvet (or any parasite) to a system that should be fishless. The anemones also pose a big threat I hadn't considered since many people trade in their plethora of split bubble tips and since those nems hold a lot of water I could see the introduction into the system happening very easily and clownfish being less likely to show signs of the parasite.
 

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Yes, I've been storing the CP in the dark colored bag it came in in a drawer. I also cut lights and pulled the carbon filter cartridge. The fish are only getting ambient light. It kind of sucks because I know the fish are not happy. I felt bad and bought them some fake coral decorations for when I do the sterile tank transfer for observation. Which reminds me I need to start acclimating a black Molly.

I'd really like to know how it got in my system. I started trying to figure it out and the only thing I can note is one of my LFS had clowns and anemones in their invert system. Seems like a great way to introduce velvet (or any parasite) to a system that should be fishless. The anemones also pose a big threat I hadn't considered since many people trade in their plethora of split bubble tips and since those nems hold a lot of water I could see the introduction into the system happening very easily and clownfish being less likely to show signs of the parasite.

Wow! Makes a lot of sense that since anemones hold water, they could potentially deflate in our tanks some nasties. I've been keeping multiple saltwater tanks for over 10 years. Why hadn't I thought of this myself! That's why I love this place. I'm continuously learning! Thank you for sharing your thoughts. By sharing we all become better caretakers for our fish. I know quarantine of inverts in a fishless system is the only sure way to avoid introducing ich or velvet in our tanks. Maybe we can add royally ticking off the anemone so it deflate before we put it into quarantine might be a good idea too! :D
 

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Visual Diary of H202 Dosing in 180 Gallon Saltwater FOWLR Tank (page 14)

Day 8: Dosage remained at 5 cups but was only administered once in the afternoon. Fish are doing well. I think whatever pathogen (suspected velvet) is dead. All seems well. Ammonia is still detected, but it's testing low. I was going to stop dosing H202 today completely, but then worried that some free swimming stage of the pathogen survived and decided to dosed once more at 4: pm. After today, I may stop dosing H202 and just observe. I am hopeful that if this was velvet, it has been eradicated, but only time will tell. If this was black ich (a slight possibility because of the unknown black patches that showed up on the blue spot puffer), than I should probably keep dosing for at least until 11 to 12 days. Still, I'm concerned about over doing H202, so my plan is to just observe after today. All fish for several days now are eating and are not showing symptoms of illness. If any experts here feel this is a bad course of action, please chime in and let me know. #reefsquad @Humblefish Thank you!

NOTE: As Prime added to the puffer's sick tank did not seem to cause any issues, I added Prime to the 180 gallon tank before I went to bed to keep ammonia under control until I can get to a water change tomorrow.

I'll update on the 180 gallon tank monthly after today to track progress or possible long term effects of dosing H202 that could show up later.

NOTE: I will continue high dosage of H202 in the puffer sick tank but will only update on progress or setbacks at the end of the puffer's treatment.


Some tentative conclusions:
  • Some fish seem to handle the highest dosage of 7.2 cups of H202 better than others. For example, my engineer gobiess and wrasses seem to be more stressed and/or more sensitive to the treatment. At the lower dosage of 5 cup they seemed to fair much better and continued eating.
  • PH and the biological filtration seems to be effected. PH can be controlled by adding more buffer to the tank and Prime appears to be a safe to control ammonia spikes; however, more research needs to be conducted before a true conclusion should be made as I never heard back from Seachem about the safety of adding their product Prime to a tank with H202 in the water, and I am not a chemist. All I can say for sure is adding Prime to the puffer's tank with H202 in it did not immediately kill the fish.
  • I can concur with the OP about the promise of using H202 as a treatment in a FOWLR tank; My yellow tang (on deaths door before starting treatment) was not eating, was super thin, and spent most of it's time in the flow from the power heads before starting treatment appears to have made a full recovery after treatment. The banner fish and Regal tang were still eating but spending half of their time in the flow of power heads have stopped this behavior as well. Other fish in the tank exhibiting symptoms of illness such as hovering at the bottom of the tank, top of the tank, gulping air from the top of the tank, listless behaviors, have stopped exhibiting these behaviors after treatment as well. Only time will tell if the symptoms return now that adding H202 to the tank has been discontinued. If symptoms return, my conclusions are that either the treatment was stopped too soon, or the treatment only 'controls' the pathogens making the fish more comfortable, but does not eradicate them completely. More research needs to be conducted in a scientific setting to positively determine overall effectiveness, exact dosages, lengths of treatments for different pathogens as well as different species of fish, and to determine what effects (if any) using H202 as a treatment for saltwater fish is likely to have on the long term health of the fish.
  • I do not advocate any one else try this experiment with their livestock! I entered into the treatment with full knowledge that using H202 as a treatment could cause losses to some or all of my livestock. I adjusted dosages based on observations of my fish and the needs of keeping my biological filtration going, so my dosing schedule cannot be used as a road map for others as everyone's tank and its needs are different. Keep in mind, I may have just been lucky! Still, pending further research, I would agree with the OP that using H202 is a promising alternative to common practices and allows for treating fish in a FOWLR display.
Pictures
  • Yellow tang eating well, active, no symptoms of illness. It appears that the yellow tang is already gaining some weight, though that may be just my wishful thinking as I can't actually weight the fish. It's belly area is expanding though from eating heartily over the last few days. Flame angel was never symptomatic and did not appear affected by the dosing of H202
  • Side view of tank=Fish gather together in this corner for breakfast (frozen mix)
  • Diamond Goby is out, but I worry it does not have enough food now since the sand is basically sterile now. It is eating frozen mix.
  • Regal tang and Majestic Angel are eating, active, and exhibit no symptoms of illness. HLLE on the MA does not appear to be better or worse after H202 dosing. I will continue to observe even though dosing may be discontinued after today.
  • Moyer's and Ornate Leopard wrasses as well as the other two wrasses (Pintail and McCosker's) did exhibit stressed type symptoms each dosing, but all seemed to tolerate the lower 5 cup dosage better than the 7.2 cup dosage. They continued to eat throughout the treatment period, though the Ornate wrasse did appear to lose some weight, but not significantly.
  • The only fish loss was the Flame Hawkfish before the H202 dosing was initiated. Other expected losses were some snails that I missed pulling before treating the tank.

D8YTangNosymptoms.jpg D8GatheringForBreakfastTankSide.jpg D7DiamondWatchmanNoSymptoms.jpg D8RTangANDMajesticAngelNoSymptoms.jpg D8MoyersWrasseNoSymptoms.jpg D8CBNosymptoms.jpg
 
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When to mix up fish meal: When was the last time you tried a different brand of food for your reef?

  • I regularly change the food that I feed to the tank.

    Votes: 33 26.8%
  • I occasionally change the food that I feed to the tank.

    Votes: 40 32.5%
  • I rarely change the food that I feed to the tank.

    Votes: 37 30.1%
  • I never change the food that I feed to the tank.

    Votes: 9 7.3%
  • Other.

    Votes: 4 3.3%
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