Brittle Starfish is dead

[fire30b]

hello everyone
I had a brown brittle starfish. The brittle starfish and all my inverts (1 cleaner and 1 peppermint shrimp, and all my snails)were moved into my QT 2 days ago because my fish in my main tank were developing a parasite (ICH and black spot). I have started a copper treatment in my main tank. I came home from work today to find my Brittle SF missing 4 legs and a hole starting to develop in the head. What cause my brittle death? My water levels are as follows: PH 8.2, Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, and Nitrates 40. water temp is 81 degrees
This is my first time treating my fish with copper(SeaCure). Does this seem to work? It says to treat for 14 days, Should I treat for a month? Am I going to lose my fish?
Thanks

 

[yellowtail]

so you are treating in your main tank? what is in it as far as live rock,sand etc?you know that since you have used copper in the main tank that you will NEVER be able to put ANY inverts like snails in your tank ever again.the copper is not soaked in the silicone and inverts cant stand copper.how did you acclimate the inverts to the qt tank?
sorry to be so harsh but facts dont lie.

 

[fire30b]

thanks for the reply yellowtail.
My inverts were never acclimated in the QT because I took the water from my main tank. I then did a water change on my main tank. I have a 75 gal tank with about 50-60 lbs of live rock and I have a fine crush coral for my substrate. At my LFS I bought this product by Kent called regenrable toxic metal sponge which is suppose to remove my copper in my tank and make it safe for my inverts. My LFS said to use it for a month then my tank can have invert.

 

[yellowtail]

some people have had success with copper and inverts but sometimes it dosent work.my advice to you is to put only 1 sanil in after hey the lfs says it is ok and if he survives the try a few more.the copper treatment will not be as effective in your main tank because you substrtae and live rock will soak most of it up.that is why people have fish in the qt with nothing in it.now to the starfish scenario,normally expelling limbs is due to improper acclimation so there could have been many different facts in you water chemistry to cause this. such as water temp. i forget who said this exactley but when limbs fall of it is due to water inbetween the cells walls that just birst and eventually fall off.

 

[jtutton]

I have posted this before, but I'll post it here for your benefit.
Copper is highly toxic to aquatic invertebrates, hence why it kills anything like ich. I wish you luck in getting the copper out.
I found stop parasite. It's a liquid you should be able to get at LFS. It smells like hot sauce and is pepper based. You follow the directions and dose 2x per day for 5 days. Then 2x per week for a few weeks. It kills the dinoflagellate that creates the cysts you see on your fish. It is invert safe. I have crabs, snails nudibranchs, shrooms, zoos, etc. and they are all fine. The anemones don't like it much, but they survive.
This process will not kill anything other than the ich.
I am retreating my tank as I think there's some ich in it, although it doesn't appear to affect anyone other than clowns or relatives.
You will need to get a pH buffer if you use this as it tends to decrease the pH of the tank. Just make sure you test the pH first before adding the buffer and don't od on it.

 

[fire30b]

I wish I knew about the stop parasite liquid before I started to treat with copper. I started the treatment in my main tank only because lfs said the the Regenerable Tonix Metal Sponge by Kent would remove my copper for the tank. I taught it would be safer to treat fish in my 75 gal than in my 10 gal QT which would not be able to hold all my fish.
I have put my inverts in my QT. What should I feed them? I have no substrate in the tank. I have only a 4 lb live rock in there. How long will the inverts last in my QT?
How many people have used copper before? How long should I treat for? I still see spots on my fish. I started the treatment 3 days ago. Should I start seeing improvement in my fish?

 

[jtutton]

I'm not familiar with treating with copper. There are test kits you can get. Also, you should make the LFS test your water since they didn't ask if you had inverts. That's pretty bad.
You can also remove the rock from your tank and put it in a tub or trash can with a powerhead for circulation and keep recatching your fish, put them one by one in a bucket or small tank that is treated with copper and put them back.
I have been told by another LFS, that specializes in aquaculturing corals , that running copper can affect the immune systems of fish. That explains why sometimes fish look great in the store and you get them home, put them in a tank with no copper and the natural occurring parasites that the cleaner shrimp and normal fish immune system would fight off attack them.
Good luck, I always feel terrible when a fish dies or an invert. I've been pretty lucky with my 29. Only lost 2 fish so far and a few inverts. One fish I just never found, but it was wild caught and probably underwent a lot of stress in the process.