How to treat fish with velvet

[jadedthought]

I lost a chinese algae eater and 3 serpae tetra to velvet.  (the serpaes at the pet store had it and still do)  I have 3 remaining silver lyretail mollies and one sunfire platy. 

I bought Maracide Concentrate and I started using that yesterday. 

I have a towel over the tank so there's no light, I removed the carbon filter and have an airstone going. I have the water temperature up to 82 degrees.

I had my water tested yesterday and everything was good except the water hardness was really high... I'm wondering if there's anything I need to adjust with the treatment because of the water hardness. (my test tube broke and a new kit is in the mail so I can't give readings but everything was very good as of last night and only thing that has changed is adding maracide)

I'm wondering if I should do any water changes in the next 5 days or not while the Maracide is in there, perhaps taking out a gallon of water and replacing that one drop of Maracide.

Should I remove the gravel from the tank they're in?  I bought new gravel for when I set the tank back up.

I am in the process of cleaning out the quarantine tank that I had the serpae in after I saw they were doing really bad.  I'm wondering if I shouldn't move the fish into that tank after treatment and after I get it all back up and running, or if the change would be too much for them.  Only thing I'm wondering about for that is I know I need to get the main tank cleaned out too, no?  And shouldn't it be up and running without fish in it for a while?

Let's just say that the pet store "fish specialist" wasn't very much help at all and I was giving him info on how to treat the serpaes and other fish...and which medicine would be better based on internet research (they didn't have the copper treatment) and he couldn't even recommend a good treatment other than the Maracide.  The tanks in the store are like 12 to a filter so that whole wall of tanks is infected..it's so sad.  I'm never going there again.  Anyways...I learned my lesson. 

Now I need some input...help, please

Jaded

 

[Gunnie]

Jaded,
I got this from another site and hope you find it helpful:

Velvet (Oodinium)

Velvet is caused by a dinoflagellate, classified by some as an alga because it carries Chlorophyll.
There are two main species, Oodinium limmneticum and Oodinium pillularis.
The free swimming stage of Velvet settles on the skin and gills of the fish,
adhering at first by its long flagellum, later putting out pseudopodia, (similar to fingers) that penetrate the skin and give it a very firm grip.
Velvet has a similar life cycle to White spot, feeding and becoming a cyst it produces upward of 200 young before dropping off.
The appearance is similar to gold or brown dust over the body and fins which at times may appear to move.
Symptoms are similar to White spot, glancing off rocks etc.
As Velvet is highly contagious it is important to eradicate this problem as soon as possible.
Treatment is aimed at the free swimming stage and there are good cures available from your local store.
Copper sulphate can be used at a concentration of 0.2 mg per litre or 0.2 ppm.
This should be repeated after 3 days to ensure eradication.

Since it is highly contagious, I think I would go ahead and treat them in the tank they are in since the other fish might already be infected. Unless it specifically says something about water hardness affecting the medication, I would not worry too much about that. Just follow the directions of the medication, and if they don't get better, try what I posted above. I've never had a fish with velvet, so I'm assuming the medication you are using is recommended to treat this illness. Making too many changes at once makes it difficult to see what you need to do next because you don't know what is or is not working in the tank. Hang in there!

 

[jadedthought]

Yes, it's labelled to treat Velvet. The only thing I've done so far is suck the debris out of the tank, let that water settle, and add the "clean" (top part of the water) back into the tank. (ONCE) I'm also using Melafix in conjunction with the Maracide and of course they have their usual 2 tbsp per 10 gals of Aquarium Salt in there. I'm hanging in there!

 

[jadedthought]

I'm excited to report that after the 5 day treatment my remaining Silver Lyretail Mollies and the Sunfire Platy are doing better! Going to keep an eye on them and see if they will need further treatment. I lowered the temperature down to 80 degrees and going to take it back down to their 76-78 degrees, they seemed to like, slowly.

Now I'm just waiting for my 20gal tank to get ready for fishies and for them to be stable, got my quarantine tank up and ready for new fish. Just know where I won't be going

 

[Gunnie]

Excellent!