Blue tang ich? Tang disease? Both?

[Wunderboiy]

Hi all,

Over the past week and half my tang of 2 or so months has come down with what could be ich, but appears slightly different.

The spots are not the size of sugar / salt, they are closer to the size of course salt and appear to be attached to the body, but not under the skin. Additionally they seem to be leaving small black dots on the tang. The tang has scratched and also seems to have developed a collection of these near one side of his face.

No other fish in the tank so any signs of illness and blue tang is still eating like a pig. I have enhanced his diet, increased feedings,and will be adding a combination to focus & metroplex to his food.

Is this just plain old ich? Something else? Or a combination of diseases.

I am not against qting the fish, but at least want to know what I'm dealing with before stressing him out.

Some pictures below, but hard to get a good one. He doesnt like the camera.

 

[aykwm]

If you can take higher resolution photos or closer photo to the tang that will be ideal because I can't tell whether its ich or bacterial infection. My guess will be its black ich that got infected. If thats the case dosing prazi will take care of it and the fish should be able to fight the infection and good news is that prazi is reef safe (except for ornamental worms) so you can dose it directly to the tank, although its always preferred to do it in QT. If you want to treat fish for bacterial infection you need to remove it to QT tank as antibiotics are not reef safe. You must medicate the tang and other fish in the tank to cure it from black ich. Also observe for possible ich or other parasites.

 

[Wunderboiy]

Appreciate the quick response, attached are a few more. I agree could likely be a combination of things, however seems odd for them all to come at once. But then again when it rains it storms.

 

[ngoodermuth]

It looks like ich to me, hippos tangs are quite susceptible. And the black spots do sound like black ich (which are actually worms)

You could try the PraziPro treatment in-tank for the worms, however to address crypto all of your fish would need to be treated in QT and the display left fallow.

 

[Jeff Hall]

Or you could just keep water quality prestine and feed your fish a high quality diet and they will mostly likely be able to fight off ich.

 

[melypr1985]

I agree that some of these pictures look like ich, but then others change the way I see it. For diagnostic purposes, I'd suggest a freshwater dip for the hippo. I'd be interested to see which of these spots are effected by it and how. I would follow that up with an acriflavin dip then into QT. That's just a suggestion of course