Persistent parasitic infestation that won't go away

[tidal_flow]

I've been dealing with a marine velvet outbreak in my '72 Marine display tank since mid-October. I let the tank run fallow, keeping everyone's hands out of it. There's a 20-gallon quarantine tank in the same room, about 6 feet away. I figured parasites aren't airborne, so that's not the issue, right?

I've been keeping a close eye on my fish, especially the new ones in quarantine. They seemed fine for a month, but then I noticed tiny specs on my coflake beauty angelfish. We treated him, and the spots went away. Recently, I saw white spots on some fish, and little specs too. I didn't think much of it since they seemed okay.

But this morning, I woke up to find my orchid Dottie back had passed away, and my bicolor angel is lethargic. He's only a few inches long and looked healthy when I got him from the LFS last week. I'm at a loss with parasitic diseases. I need help and guidance. I have 10 drops per gallon of methylene blue concentrate in the quarantine tank. If I treat, what do I do about the methylene blue?

I've used formaldehyde 37% solution, API geneflake cure, parasite clear, and copper safe. I might have a few others. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. I'd post pictures, but my fish won't stay still, and I'm a quadriplegic, so it's tough. Thanks for your help, generous fish community. I look forward to hearing from you. Happy reefing.

I'm really concerned about the methylene blue in the water. Should I remove the filter when treating with copper safe, or is that not necessary? I'm also worried about the quarantine process. What do you do when it goes wrong?

[tidal_flow]

I'd really appreciate it if someone could chime in here.

[rockyfox]

I'm not much help with saltwater tanks myself, but I know some folks here have experience with them - @onyzza's one of them, she might be able to lend a hand. Hopefully someone with the right knowledge will chime in, sorry I'm not more help.

[onyzza]

I've been dealing with a marine velvet outbreak in my '72 Marine display tank since mid-October. I let the tank run fallow, keeping everyone's hands out of it. There's a 20-gallon quarantine tank in the same room, about 6 feet away. I figured parasites aren't airborne, so that's not the issue, right?

I've been keeping a close eye on my fish, especially the new ones in quarantine. They seemed fine for a month, but then I noticed tiny specs on my coflake beauty angelfish. We treated him, and the spots went away. Recently, I saw white spots on some fish, and little specs too. I didn't think much of it since they seemed okay.

But this morning, I woke up to find my orchid Dottie back had passed away, and my bicolor angel is lethargic. He's only a few inches long and looked healthy when I got him from the LFS last week. I'm at a loss with parasitic diseases. I need help and guidance. I have 10 drops per gallon of methylene blue concentrate in the quarantine tank. If I treat, what do I do about the methylene blue?

I've used formaldehyde 37% solution, API geneflake cure, parasite clear, and copper safe. I might have a few others. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. I'd post pictures, but my fish won't stay still, and I'm a quadriplegic, so it's tough. Thanks for your help, generous fish community. I look forward to hearing from you. Happy reefing.

I'm really concerned about the methylene blue in the water. Should I remove the filter when treating with copper safe, or is that not necessary? I'm also worried about the quarantine process. What do you do when it goes wrong?

So I'm assuming the disease is still active in the methylene blue water, which means it's probably best to get rid of it before using another med. To remove it, do a huge water change - like 90% - and then run some activated carbon. I think that'll pretty well remove it. The chemical media bags will need to be removed and thrown out to be replaced with fresh media after treatment. But carbon won't affect copper levels in the water, so it can be left in for copper-based treatments. What you gotta watch out for is using activated carbon or other absorbent media with other meds, 'cause it can render 'em useless. And sometimes you gotta turn off the protein skimmers too, 'cause they can remove the meds from the water.

[tidal_flow]

I don't have a whole lot of fish in the 20 gallon quarantine, just a handful really. There's a valentini puffer, a huma huma trigger, a coflake beauty angelfish, a gold blotch rabbitfish, a clownfish, and a purple firefish goby - all small, between two and three inches except the rabbit and the beauty, they're three to four. Filtration-wise, I've got a pretty basic HOB filter, AquaTech I think is the company, 5 to 15 gallon model.

Yeah, I've read that copper's the go-to treatment for parasitic diseases, but it's a problem for me since I want to have some inverts in the tank for cleanup. Copper's not invert-friendly, it'll seep into the rock and substrate and then leach back out into the water, making it impossible to get rid of and killing any inverts I try to introduce.

I got another shipment of fish this morning, and since I still had the parasite issue, I set up a new tank for quarantine and transferred the old fish to it for treatment. I sterilized the old tank and set it back up for the new fish. As of 5:00 p.m., all the fish are in the new tank with copper safe - 13ml of it, which should be around 2.0 PPM. No fish have died yet since the transfer, so that's a relief. I'll be treating with copper in the quarantine tank and hoping for the best.

[tidal_flow]

Also, I forgot to mention - I've got an API saltwater test kit that I use to test my water pretty frequently, at least every other day. I'm also adding beneficial bacteria to the water to counteract excessive ammonia and nitrites, as well as even nitrates. I do water changes every 2 to 3 days too, just to prevent any excessive buildup of any kind.

[LacieB]

I've been dealing with a marine velvet outbreak in my '72 Marine display tank since mid-October. I let the tank run fallow, keeping everyone's hands out of it. There's a 20-gallon quarantine tank in the same room, about 6 feet away. I figured parasites aren't airborne, so that's not the issue, right?

I've been keeping a close eye on my fish, especially the new ones in quarantine. They seemed fine for a month, but then I noticed tiny specs on my coflake beauty angelfish. We treated him, and the spots went away. Recently, I saw white spots on some fish, and little specs too. I didn't think much of it since they seemed okay.

But this morning, I woke up to find my orchid Dottie back had passed away, and my bicolor angel is lethargic. He's only a few inches long and looked healthy when I got him from the LFS last week. I'm at a loss with parasitic diseases. I need help and guidance. I have 10 drops per gallon of methylene blue concentrate in the quarantine tank. If I treat, what do I do about the methylene blue?

I've used formaldehyde 37% solution, API geneflake cure, parasite clear, and copper safe. I might have a few others. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. I'd post pictures, but my fish won't stay still, and I'm a quadriplegic, so it's tough. Thanks for your help, generous fish community. I look forward to hearing from you. Happy reefing.

I'm really concerned about the methylene blue in the water. Should I remove the filter when treating with copper safe, or is that not necessary? I'm also worried about the quarantine process. What do you do when it goes wrong?

I've got some experience with saltwater, though some LFS folks might say I did things the wrong way. I read this book that suggested dipping marine fish in dechlorinated tap water - pH around 8, temperature between 78 to 80, similar to the tank - for 2 to 10 minutes. I did this for years, even before quarantine. I'd dip my marine angelfish for about 2-3 minutes, and white, potato-chip-like things would start falling off their scales and settling at the bottom of the measuring cup. I'm pretty sure I've got a picture of it somewhere - I stopped keeping saltwater tanks in 2012 and quit running quarantines and doing marine aquarium service in 2006, since all that heavy lifting was taking a toll on my body. I also had a regal tang that got ich from a fish I didn't dip - she spent three months in a 20-gallon long tank with a UV light to clear up the issue. I had that regal for nine years before giving the tank away in 2012; sadly, my daughter managed to kill the tang in just three weeks.