Long Tent. Anemone Shrinking

[bluestew]

My long tent anemone is slowly shrinking day by day. My buble tip, curly Que, & Condies are fine. My girlfried ( who got me into this hobby ) has had same problem w/ her long tent. anemonies.
All my corals are fine & look fantastic since I've been adding all my Kent products rec. by my LFS.
Also learning the hard way & also too late, I just set up a 20 gal QT & now all of my remaining fish are in it due to ich, velvet & scabbing. Have been reading these fourms for info & help. Today is the 1st time SWF let me post a thread. So please be patient with me as to I dont know all the abbrev. yet. Treeting QT w/ Quick Cure (Malachite Green, Formalin) Orig. the white spots were on a few fish in the morning & after a few hours seem to disapear. Now white & brown spots & some scabbing.
I would be grateful for a treatment procedure for my QT due to 3 different procedures given to me by 3 different LFS.
Thanks to all in this fourm I have gained greater knowledge for the caring of my mini reef.
75 gal reef tank / fluval 404 / 75 deg temp / sal. 1.023 / PH 8.2
Ammonia 0 / Nitrite 0 / Nitrate 10-20 ppm(allways) / calcium 350 (being raised since 3-8-030) 1 power head / 2 - 48" 10k Day lights / 2 - 48" atinic blue lights / 90 lbs LR / 20 lbs live gravel
Tank is 6 week old & been maintaining above water qualities for 2-3 of these weeks.
Fish load (1) Scopas Tang / 1 Mandarin / Damsels: 1 Fire, 1 orangetail blue, 1 blue velvet, 2 - 4 stripe / 1 Bluehead wrasse / 2 Percula clowns / 1 Clarki clown / 1 African red knob starfish / 1 Blue Spiny lobster / 1 Blue Bullseye Mushroom / 2 Dwarf colored feather dusters / Corals: 1 candy cane, 1 Red Lobo. Brain, 1 Green Lobo. Brain, 1 Devils hand leather, 1 trumpet, Zoanthid sea mat, 1 elegance & the anemonies mentioned above

 

[beth]

You already initiated 2 treatments. What do the spots look like?
Like salt sprinkled on fish, or like powder, either whitish or rust color? Are the fish breathing rapidly?? Have any copper and copper test kits on hand? [That does not mean put copper in your tank! I'm just asking at this point.] By the way, Do some water changes or use carbon filtration to get the meds you have been using out of your QT.
When was the last time you added fish?

 

[bluestew]

I only gave 1 treatment (Quick Cure - Malachite Green, Formalin) yesterday 3-10-03.
On Sat. 3-1-03 Bought 2 pecula clowns & 2 clarki clowns from LFS. As of this time all has been well in my reef tank. 1 of the clarki clows was clouded on skin. Others seemed fine. Sun. 3-2-03 bought Blue headed wrasse from another LFS. Girlfriend bought fish at same time from both stores. Mon. 3-3-03 received fish & inverts. from ***********.com & found the cloudy Clarki clown dead. From this point I started monitoring all livestock very carfully. I also have been reading these fourms & decided to set up a QT. Mon 3-3-03 Noticed a few white spots on Scopas Tang in the morn. when I turned on the lights, but they disapeared in a few hours. Asked LFS what to do & they sold me Organi-Cure (1.25% copper, 17% formaldehyde) & said OK to treat reef tank with this. I was sceptical so I asked a diff. LFS & they said DO NOT treat reef tank & sold me Quick Cure (as described above).
Called mrf. of both products & they said wait a few days & watch fish. Poss. ammune system would beat disease. Mean while spots increasing to other fish, but still disapearing after a few hours in the morn. Also fish seem to be OK other than white spots. Thurs 3-6-03 Brown spots starting to appear on tang & white spots on 2 damsels & mandarin. The white spots appear to be like salt. And the brown spots on the tang appear to be like flat dots under scales. Fri 3-7-03 set up a 20 gal QT w/ 50% reef water & 50% fresh sea mix & clean PVC fittings for hidding. Stableized QT for 1 day to match reef tanks water quality & temp.
Sun 3-9-03 White & brown spots bad on tang & almost all fish starting to breath rapidly, so I transfered all fish to QT but did not treat yet. Mean while my girlfriend has been having the exact same symtoms as I have with her Yellow Tang & other fish. We are fairly sure we got the same disease from 1 Of the LFS. So I started 1 treatment as described above on Mon 3-10-03.
Test kits on hand are; copper, alk., PH, Amon., trite, trate, calcium, salinity.
Meds on hand are; Quick Cure(Malachite Green, Formalin), Organi-Cure (Copper 1.25%, Formaldehyde 17%), Sea Cure (Deionized water, copper sulfate, and acid), Melafix (Melaleuca CAS#8008-98-8 001.0%, Inert Ingredients 099.0%) & as much TLC as I can provide.
I have not done a water change on the QT since it is only 3 days old, but I will if needed. I do a 10-15 gal. water change on my reef tank every 10-14 days normally.
Tues 3-11-03 7 AM This morning the tang is covered w/ both colored spots & blue head wrasse no spots but laying on bottom under power head with only gills moving. As of a few minutes ago 10:30 am the tang has only 6-10 spots now & is swimming about the QT. Before he was just hiding w/ mouth constantly open & gills flying.
I hope I have given you all the info needed & not bored anyone.
I have lost 5 fish over the past few days incl. fire damsel this morn. & my blue head looks to be next.
1 last thing. My reef tank as of today has hundreds of very small white lice looking creatures crawling all over my aquarium glass.
Are these the tomites of the tomonts & will they just dye or will my inverts & corals become hosts?
Thanks again in advance for any help with this matter.
Rob

 

[beth]

Basically, disaster laid on top of disaster. So many fish in a brand new setup. None of the fish were QTed prior to going into a reef tank, and now the fish are all in a hospital tank that is not cycled.
Perform hyposalinity on the fish in the hospital tank. If you do a Search here, using our Search Feature, listing my name and Hyposalinity, you will find the procedure. Can’t say that this is a viable situation at this point, with all the fish in an uncycled QT. Have you read the FAQ section at the top of this forum? Have you read any good hobby books before starting up in the Hobby? I can recommend some if you want.
Do these brown spots also look like salt, only dark?

 

[gatorcsm]

Due to your large fish load, you might want to consider moving all of your inverts to a 50-70 gallon rubbermaid container with a powerhead (or two), a heater, and your aquarium lights. This would be everything from your main tank except for the fish. The live rock should prevent the new setup from cycling, and the 75 gallon tank will tolerate the large bioload better than a 20. Not to mention the decrease in stress (somewhat). You might also want to consider using a little bit of bactervital or something of the sort to try to maintain levels in check, once the rock/corals/inverts are removed. Try to position your canopy over this rubbermaid to provide enough light for your corals. Put a bunch of PVC in the main tank. I just got done with recovering from a somewhat similar problem, but not with quite as many fish. It worked out, and now all of my fish/inverts/rock are living together again in the main tank. No signs of ich or any other problems after the first week now.
Hope this helps. The first hypo I tried was in a 20g with all of my fish, and the task of maintaining ammonia/nitrites was an impossible task. I was doing around 60% water changes and still wasn't getting levels even close to healthy levels. That is when I did the above.
Obviously, this will only help if you are to perform hypo. Don't perform this measure and then use chemicals/antiobiotics/copper in the main tank.

 

[bluestew]

Yes I have read the FAQ's in this fourm. Also many books since starting this hobby. Most of the advice I got was from 2 LFS & no one ever mentioned anything about quarantine. As I said earlier I have gained 50% more useful knowlege just from reading all these fourm posts. And even though it's somewhat too late for adding so much to my reef. I hope to resolve this matter as best as I can.
The dark brown spots do look a little like salt but seem to be more imbedded in fishes scales.
Also what about the now thousands of swimming parasites in my reef tank? Will they all die off after their life cycle is complete or will they attach to my inverts & corals ?

 

[beth]

The "bugs" you are seeing in your tank are reef critters and nothing to be concerned about. Ich is in there, and, in the absense of fish in the main tank, that will die off within a month.
The brown spots sounds like black ich. You will have to use 2 treatment to treat 2 different infestations. Black ich is more easily seen on yellow tangs, or lighter colored fish; however, it is quite possible that the other fish have it as well. You need to take a really close look at them.
Hyposalinity for the the ich, and formalin bathes for the black ich.
The procedure for hyposalinity is as follows:
O.S.T. stands for Osmotic Shock Therapy which is commonly referred to in the hobby as hyposalinity [water that is deficient in sea salt]. Essentially, O.S.T. simply places the infectors [Cryptocaryon parasite---ick/ich] in an environment in which they cannot survive while the host, (or infected fish) can. This remedy WILL NOT work in reef systems, invert tanks or FOWLR as it incorporates lowering the specific gravity of the entire system to 1.009 Specific Gravity which is not tolerated by inverts or LR.
To drop the salinity, this is done as you would do a normal water change. However, you are simply replenishing your tank with fresh RO/DI water---not salt water! Monitor the lowering closely so as to not reduce it too fast. Usually over a period of 48 hours is fine. The bacteria colony which is the biological support for your tank will survive, the fish will be perfectly fine, but the ich will not. By lowering the salinity, you will also be lowering the osmotic pressure of the water. Boney fish tolerate this treatment very well, in fact, once the water become hyposaline, you will likely note a significant improvement in your fish health and appetite. There is no reason to fear this treatment. You can do a water-change out, in small increments every half hr or so.
Your goal is to drop the specific gravity to 1.009 [48-hrs] gradually. Once all signs of the parasite are gone, then keep your fish in this hypo-saline water for 3-4 wks. If all is well, then you can gradually [over the course of 4-5 days] bring the specific gravity [salinity] back up to normal levels . If all is well after a week, then return the fish to their main tank.
When the fish are eating, offer them quality and varied food soaked in garlic, zoe/zoecon, vitamin C.
The procedure for formalin bath is:
Using water from your tank [in this case, you hyposaline QT] placed water in a deadicated container and aerate the water. Use the formalin medication as per the instructions. Allow the fish to bath in the water for 45 mins, every other day, for 3-5 days.