dosing tank with formalin please help if you have experiance

[ataylo87]

I have a 90 gallon fish only tank that has a 20 gallon refugium on it. i am almost positive that i have velvet and i am close to loosing my pearl scale butterfly and next is my blue hippo tang. my question is should i dose the whole tank with formalin or should i do a dip. If i do a dip wont they be covered with it when i stick them back in the tank. also what about the other fish in the tank i am worried i am starting to see signs on them as well.

fish
- pearl scale butterfly
- blue hippo tank
- lunar wrasse
- porcupine puffer
- yellow headed sleeper goby
- lawn mower blenny
- maroon clownfish

do i dip everyone in the tank or just the infected ones or should i just go ahead dose the whole tank and make sure everything is gone. i did this a LONG time ago and covered the tank for a week no feeding no peaking and everyone lived but i cant remember exactly what i did back then. i know i need to act quickly or i can loose everything but i just want to make sure that i go about everything the right way since this stuff is nothing to play with. thank you everyone for your time and happy reefing

[jnc914]

It will not help dipping the fish if you are putting them right back into an infected tank, you will be just further stressing them out. If it is indeed velvet, and you are able to see it on the fish, it is likely already too late. I lost an entire 180 to velvet in 2006, and it happened quickly and it was devastating. You do not want to dose a main tank with meds, especially formalin. It sounds like you are running a mixed FOWLR/Reef set up?

I know you are not going to want to hear this, but if you are serious about treating your fish, you will have to do it in a QT/hospital tank and let your main display go fallow for 8-10 weeks, doing large water changes. Hopefully it is just ich and not the dreaded velvet.

Copper or quinine sulfate should work with either velvet or ich. Good luck.

[MrTuskfish]

Originally Posted by jnc914

It will not help dipping the fish if you are putting them right back into an infected tank, you will be just further stressing them out. If it is indeed velvet, and you are able to see it on the fish, it is likely already too late. I lost an entire 180 to velvet in 2006, and it happened quickly and it was devastating. You do not want to dose a main tank with meds, especially formalin. It sounds like you are running a mixed FOWLR/Reef set up?

I know you are not going to want to hear this, but if you are serious about treating your fish, you will have to do it in a QT/hospital tank and let your main display go fallow for 8-10 weeks, doing large water changes. Hopefully it is just ich and not the dreaded velvet.

Copper or quinine sulfate should work with either velvet or ich. Good luck.

Good advice. Assuming this is velvet, this is the ONLY thing that will work.