Saltwater newb here.. kept FW tanks for years and finally decided to make the leap. Tank has been up a month now.
With some coaching from a veteran reefer, I quick cycled with biodigest and vodka, and added a pair of clowns when the ammonia was gone. A week later I added a pintail fairy wrasse.
The wrasse and all other inhabitants have been doing great(I added a Tomini tang and some CUC during this time as well). Everyone has been eating great and getting along very well. Water Params are good, nothing really changed in the tank recently, but my wrasse just started swimming funny and doesn’t appear to be eating even though he seems interested in the food.
From my research, it sounds like these fish are quite prone to swim bladder issues and spinal injuries. And as far as I can tell, it looks like my guy is suffering from the latter. No bulging near swim bladder and doesn’t seem to have trouble regulating buoyancy and is not swimming nose down all the time. Swimming with almost zero tail fin, he can wave his back end side to side at times but doesn’t seem to have much control over the movement. He isn’t strong enough to fight the current with just his pectorals/dorsals and gets flipped around every once in a while. Videos attached.
In your opinion, am I correctly diagnosing the issue and is there anything I can do to help if it is a spinal injury?
With some coaching from a veteran reefer, I quick cycled with biodigest and vodka, and added a pair of clowns when the ammonia was gone. A week later I added a pintail fairy wrasse.
The wrasse and all other inhabitants have been doing great(I added a Tomini tang and some CUC during this time as well). Everyone has been eating great and getting along very well. Water Params are good, nothing really changed in the tank recently, but my wrasse just started swimming funny and doesn’t appear to be eating even though he seems interested in the food.
From my research, it sounds like these fish are quite prone to swim bladder issues and spinal injuries. And as far as I can tell, it looks like my guy is suffering from the latter. No bulging near swim bladder and doesn’t seem to have trouble regulating buoyancy and is not swimming nose down all the time. Swimming with almost zero tail fin, he can wave his back end side to side at times but doesn’t seem to have much control over the movement. He isn’t strong enough to fight the current with just his pectorals/dorsals and gets flipped around every once in a while. Videos attached.
In your opinion, am I correctly diagnosing the issue and is there anything I can do to help if it is a spinal injury?