Looking for some advice

[wdebenedettojr]

So I have a 30 gallon qt tank being treated with copper. Currently I have two clowns (been in the qt for 3 months, was letting my display tank go fishless for 3 months), yellow tang (5 weeks in qt), and a blue hippo(5 weeks in qt) in the tank.

I have qt’d fish with copper for years and never had an issue.

I’ll start by saying that the tangs are not fighting with each other which is very surprising.

Problem is none of my fish are showing any signs of ich now except the hippo. By signs I mean the hippo is scratching on the sand still, I can’t see any spots. Right after I added the tangs the blue hippo had a minor outbreak of ich and that was cleared up in about a week. I know a proper treatment for copper in 30 days so I kept them in there the whole time. About a week ago I noticed the hippo scratching and I was like WTH you were fine and all of a sudden started scratching. I have been monitoring my copper level very closely the last week,using copper power so the range is 2.5ppm, every day and copper is still in the therapeutic range. Last night I did a 50% water change to see if that changes anything; guess I’ll check when I get home from work. This am all fish looked fine the qt.

Any ideas why the hippo would start scratching and showing signs of ich after a 5 week treatment?

 

[Chris A.]

is it scratching a lot or just every once in a while? Some fish like hitting rocks ( don’t know why)
I read somewhere that there fish got addicted to being in copper ( or some other med ) and every time they put them in normal water they’d start acting weird again

 

[wdebenedettojr]

He will go through moments where he will do it for a few minutes straight then stop for a bit. Then do it again

 

[gzr918]

I've read cases of people doing copper treatment and it not killing the ich. I always do tank transfer method to follow up copper to be sure it's gone. It's not as time intensive as people make it sound and as long as you're careful about using sterile equipment each transfer it adds the most peace of mind for fish treatment

 

[wdebenedettojr]

Forgot to add also that he is eating voraciously and swimming normally.