Goats and Water Changes Funny

No, I'm not going mad. The title is about the situation I've found myself in.

I am a pre-vet major. We have weekly barn duty; last night, I found myself charged with spraying antibiotic onto the heads/other parts of goats who'd been dehorned and neutered. The barn intern neglected to tell me that the antibiotic (Blue Kote) stains like no other. Of course, they told me AFTER I'd managed to thoroughly cover my right hand in it. I looked like a reject from a James Cameron film.

A thought crossed my mind as the interns told me it would take days to get off: "How am I going to do my water changes???"

I was able to scrub/wash most of it off on my left hand; save for a few tiny spots that should be gone with another couple of hand washings, it's clean. My right hand, though, the hand I mostly use for my siphoning, still has a considerable amount of blue stain on it. Hand sanitizer got most of it off, but there's some stubborn bits.

My question is this: would it be safe to do my water changes with this stain on my hand? By now most of the antibiotic itself has to be washed off, but I'm concerned the dye itself could have some ill effect on my fish. I have a friend who could do the changes for me, but I'd prefer to do it myself...

 

I have purple nitrile gloves; would those be safe?

 

If you have a python, and use the gloves, you should be alright. You should be able to keep your hands out of the tank, for the most part.

Or, perhaps for this week, just do a water change (not gravel vac).

 

For your hands, go to auto store and buy Go-Jo.

 

Yep, purple nitrile gloves should be fine (as long as they're not powdered... but I've never seen powdered nitrile gloves, which is one of the reasons so many places use them).
I would actually think that, if it stains that well, it would be relatively safe for the tank. The reason it stains is because it's apparently not water-soluble. Of course, I also believe that it's better to be safe than sorry, so I think you're right to take precautions.

 

They did not instruct me to wear gloves, but I've had no ill effects from the antibiotic itself. Just blue hands!

Thanks for the advice