Clownfish Sick - What to try next?

[Captain45]

My Tank is a Fluval 13.5. About 3 months old, cycled, established with some CUC and Ricordia's.

Water parameters are good except nitrates/Phos are bottomed (trying to fix that)

Temp 78
Sal 1.025
Amm 0
Nitrite/trates 0
Phos 0
Ph 8.0-8.2

My two clowns are the first and only fish to the tank and they are young. First week they were fine, Second week they were eating less and less and having white lumpy poop. I decided to start feeding Metro+Focus. they ate a bit the first day then stopped entirely. I stopped dosing to recover their appetite, since then they wont really eat anything at all. Ive tried Frozen: Brine/Mysis/Emerald Cuisine/Marine Cuisine, Pellets: TDO Chroma, New Spectrum, PE Mysis, all with an w/o garlicguard.

Now they are looking pretty lethargic, thin and heavy breathing, they probably havent eaten much in over a week. My little one is starting to swim strangely. Thoughts on next step? Should I move to a Hospital Tank (dont have one setup currently) and try dosing water directly? Any idea's as its starting to weigh heavily on me

Clownfish Swimming

 

[Sharkbait19]

Can you add some pics - the video isn’t working for me (can you try to relink it?).
The symptoms point to internal parasites, but I don’t want to jump to conclusions yet. I’ve used levamisole in the past to treat for it. If they aren’t eating, the only options are to treat the water or force feed.
Often it’s best to treat in qt.

 

[vetteguy53081]

My Tank is a Fluval 13.5. About 3 months old, cycled, established with some CUC and Ricordia's.

Water parameters are good except nitrates/Phos are bottomed (trying to fix that)

Temp 78
Sal 1.025
Amm 0
Nitrite/trates 0
Phos 0
Ph 8.0-8.2

My two clowns are the first and only fish to the tank and they are young. First week they were fine, Second week they were eating less and less and having white lumpy poop. I decided to start feeding Metro+Focus. they ate a bit the first day then stopped entirely. I stopped dosing to recover their appetite, since then they wont really eat anything at all. Ive tried Frozen: Brine/Mysis/Emerald Cuisine/Marine Cuisine, Pellets: TDO Chroma, New Spectrum, PE Mysis, all with an w/o garlicguard.

Now they are looking pretty lethargic, thin and heavy breathing, they probably havent eaten much in over a week. My little one is starting to swim strangely. Thoughts on next step? Should I move to a Hospital Tank (dont have one setup currently) and try dosing water directly? Any idea's as its starting to weigh heavily on me

Clownfish Swimming

Suspect is brooklynella but will need some pics under white lighting to confirm

 

[rmorris_14]

I was able to watch the video. The fish aren't showing any external parasite/disease symptoms. Could be internal parasites since there is a presence of stringy white poop and lack of appetite or flukes.......#fishmedic

 

[Jay Hemdal]

My Tank is a Fluval 13.5. About 3 months old, cycled, established with some CUC and Ricordia's.

Water parameters are good except nitrates/Phos are bottomed (trying to fix that)

Temp 78
Sal 1.025
Amm 0
Nitrite/trates 0
Phos 0
Ph 8.0-8.2

My two clowns are the first and only fish to the tank and they are young. First week they were fine, Second week they were eating less and less and having white lumpy poop. I decided to start feeding Metro+Focus. they ate a bit the first day then stopped entirely. I stopped dosing to recover their appetite, since then they wont really eat anything at all. Ive tried Frozen: Brine/Mysis/Emerald Cuisine/Marine Cuisine, Pellets: TDO Chroma, New Spectrum, PE Mysis, all with an w/o garlicguard.

Now they are looking pretty lethargic, thin and heavy breathing, they probably havent eaten much in over a week. My little one is starting to swim strangely. Thoughts on next step? Should I move to a Hospital Tank (dont have one setup currently) and try dosing water directly? Any idea's as its starting to weigh heavily on me

Clownfish Swimming

They likely have internal protozoan issues. They don't seem to have any external disease signs.

The trouble with metro+focus is that it can never really work! If you dose too high, it is so bitter that it puts the fish off feed. If you dose too low and it won't work. Hitting the "sweet spot" is virtually impossible without a gram scale. You need to bind the metro into the food at 5000 ppm.

That said, you can also dose metro in the water of a treatment tank and get some benefit that way. 25mg/gallon daily for three days is a common dose.

Jay

 

[Captain45]

Thanks, Setting up my Hospital tank now, should have it ready by the morning. I don;t have much hope for these two but trying is better than doing nothing.

Would it be better to direct water dose General Cure over just Metro?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Thanks, Setting up my Hospital tank now, should have it ready by the morning. I don;t have much hope for these two but trying is better than doing nothing.

Would it be better to direct water dose General Cure over just Metro?

Yes, if you have GC, use that instead.
Jay

 

[Captain45]

Transferred to Hospital tank, that was fun trying to net them.

Jay, what would you recommend for a GC dosing schedule on 10g tank? I see dose every 48 hours, and I see dose once between 5-7 days etc. Just want to make sure I follow the proper application.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Transferred to Hospital tank, that was fun trying to net them.

Jay, what would you recommend for a GC dosing schedule on 10g tank? I see dose every 48 hours, and I see dose once between 5-7 days etc. Just want to make sure I follow the proper application.

That's a bit of an issue! GC is dosed one way for its metronidazole component and another for the prazi (grin). Since you are going for the metronidazole activity, I would go with the every two days (which I believe is what the package says). If you were targeting flukes, then the prazi component is more important, and I would dose twice, nine days apart.

Jay

 

[Captain45]

Update, they are on day 5 in the hospital tank and have gone through two GC treatments. They are no longer laying on the bed gasping which is Great, they are swimming around a bit and showing more energy and health, still haven't eaten (that I've seen) but are beginning to chase food a tad and still producing white lumpy poop but they're not dying so there's that.

Wondering of I should water change and add carbon to remove meds and monitor for a period or if I should redose soon? Also trying to figure out what to feed them that I haven't tried already, something they really can't resist.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Update, they are on day 5 in the hospital tank and have gone through two GC treatments. They are no longer laying on the bed gasping which is Great, they are swimming around a bit and showing more energy and health, still haven't eaten (that I've seen) but are beginning to chase food a tad and still producing white lumpy poop but they're not dying so there's that.

Wondering of I should water change and add carbon to remove meds and monitor for a period or if I should redose soon? Also trying to figure out what to feed them that I haven't tried already, something they really can't resist.

The GC packet says to limit it to two doses, so that is probably best. 48 hours after the second dose, use carbon and a partial water change. I would probably have some GC on hand in case the symptoms relapse over the next two weeks.

Jay

 

[vtecintegra]

Also trying to figure out what to feed them that I haven't tried already, something they really can't resist.

I've got this brine shrimp hatchery. I generally have shrimp a little after 12 hours. It's my go to for problems like this. It seems like if they don't eat live baby brine shrimp, they won't eat anything.

 

[Captain45]

The GC packet says to limit it to two doses, so that is probably best. 48 hours after the second dose, use carbon and a partial water change. I would probably have some GC on hand in case the symptoms relapse over the next two weeks.

Jay

I've got this brine shrimp hatchery. I generally have shrimp a little after 12 hours. It's my go to for problems like this. It seems like if they don't eat live baby brine shrimp, they won't eat anything.

Thanks Jay,

Cool, I just purchased one of those hatchery's from BRS, we'll see if they'll eat them live!

 

[vtecintegra]

Dummy me, meant to post a photo of the brine shrimp hatchery I use.

 

[rmorris_14]

Dummy me, meant to post a photo of the brine shrimp hatchery I use.

i just started using the same one. There are very little things that are easy in this hobby. This was one of them! I was so pleasantly surprised and all my fish (except my sick cardinal that I bought it for ) went crazy for them.

 

[Captain45]

Sweet, thats the one I ordered! Should be here friday, hopefully my clowns keep kicking till then. Ill report in then

 

[Captain45]

Man those brine hatched In Like 10 hours, crazy. Might have added too many lol. a little goes a long way apparently . My smaller clown went to town snacking for about 30 minutes, my bigger clown hasn't seemed too interested, he's looking lethargic again. So many brine in the water column, not sure what problems this may cause but at least I don't have to feed for a bit.

 

[vtecintegra]

You'll learn on how many to hatch. The filter will eventually suck them up. Might want to rinse it periodically.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Man those brine hatched In Like 10 hours, crazy. Might have added too many lol. a little goes a long way apparently . My smaller clown went to town snacking for about 30 minutes, my bigger clown hasn't seemed too interested, he's looking lethargic again. So many brine in the water column, not sure what problems this may cause but at least I don't have to feed for a bit.

One issue - if you overfeed brine, the fish have difficulty seeing "the forest for the trees" and may stop feeding on them altogether.

Jay