questions about velvet. need advice.

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biohazardcustomz

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Jan 4, 2010
519
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illinois
i had my breeder pair of jags in their own tank and they spawned at least once a month if i removed the fry. i was selling some fry that i grew out and i was giving away littles ones to people spreading mfk awareness lol. i ended up overwelmed by them and they sort have became my feeder source for a few larger fish and my snapping turtle.

well my tank got struck with velvet somehow. no new additions and no goldfish or feeders. i lost my male jag the day the disease was properly diagnosed. i got some copper sulphate and started treatment. it has been over a week. since then the female is out of hiding looking much much better. she is eating again and doing well. i can tell she misses her mate tho. she laid down beside him the night he died and wouldnt budge. not even when i had to retrieve him with the net she tried to swim into it and come with him.

heres the questions. i want to put a pair of convicts in there to start up a feeder source again. to do that i must move the female jag into a community tank and put them in. i worried about a) transferring the disease into my community tank. and b) giving the convicts the velvet and the spreading it to other tanks with their offspring.

is there anything i can do to make this safer? i dont want to worry about loosing my stock constantly. i miss my male jag terribly and i dont want to go through that all over again. sorry if im long winded but i need answers.
 
I would give it more time. There could still be some parasites in there. Wait maybe 1 more week. Keep up with water changes etc..
 
i dont plan on doing this right this moment. i know im not done treating the tank. im not a newbie. im just not familiar with this disease as ive only had ick once before and that was because i was stupid and tried to "save a fish" from walmart. it was in a complete different tank and had nothing to do with these fish. i need advice about velvet. its much more serious than ick and highly contagious. it killed my 10 inch male jag in 3 days. im sorry no offense but im looking for more detailed info than wait longer. and if i dont get any other advice ill just bleach the tank. but then i still have to figure out what the hell im going to do with my female because i dont want her to carry it to my community tank. i will give her away or euthanize her before i wipe out $700 worth of stock. this is a little more serious than just "wait it out"
 
Often velvet will come on from a big cool temperature shift (in my experience).

When I dealt with it recently, it took about 6 weeks of treatment for it to be fully gone. Once the disease is gone, your tank should be fine. I would not move her into a community until she is asymptomatic and treatment has been complete for at least a few weeks. Velvet is a tough one.

Another thing you can do to help with the treatment is turn out the lights.

You may find this article helpful: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/FA/FA04100.pdf
Piscinoodinium is a sedentary flagellate that
attaches to the skin, fin, and gills of fish. The
common name for Piscinoodinium infection is "Gold
Dust" or "Velvet" Disease. The parasite has an amber
pigment, visible on heavily infected fish. Affected
fish will flash, go off feed, and die. Piscinoodinium is
most pathogenic to young fish. The life cycle of this
parasite can be completed in 10--14 days at 73--77°F
( Figure12 ), but lower temperatures can slow the life
cycle. Also, the cyst stage is highly resistant to
chemical treatment. Therefore, several applications of
a treatment may be necessary to eliminate
the parasite. For non-food species, chloroquin
(10mg/L prolonged bath) has been reported to be
efficacious.
Click to expand...

This is another link I found helpful: http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/disease/p/velvet.htm
 
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