Copperband from Live Aquaria

Eggpaul · Jan 27, 2019

So 9 days has passed and he eats A LOT. But yesterday I noticed his lower lip had a bump. Still eats a lot and is happy. I added some metro and will do a water change. What is it?

The other day I grabbed a clam shell out of the tank and he panicked and zipped away. Maybe cut the mouth somewhere?
@Humblefish
@Big G
@Crabs Mcjones

Crabs McJones · Jan 27, 2019

Could be from the clam shell. @HotRocks any ideas?

Eggpaul · Jan 27, 2019

Crabs Mcjones said:
Could be from the clam shell. @HotRocks any ideas?

Clam shell was in there for 5 min. He wasnt interested and I wasnt comfortable with it sitting in the tank, so I immediately removed it.

xhcl · Jan 27, 2019

Looks like he's starting to develop Lymphocystis which I'm pretty sure all CBBs that come in are infected with. It's viral so it can only clear up on it's own. As long as he's eating he'll get over it. I got one about a month ago from my LFS and he had a pretty terrible break out, but it cleared up after 2 weeks. He now fights with my Bimac Anthias over who is going to eat out of my hand and is pretty aggressive about it. I have dubbed him Mr. Fuzzy.

Big G · Jan 27, 2019

xhcl said:
Looks like he's starting to develop Lymphocystis which I'm pretty sure all CBBs that come in are infected with. It's viral so it can only clear up on it's own. As long as he's eating he'll get over it. I got one about a month ago from my LFS and he had a pretty terrible break out, but it cleared up after 2 weeks. He now fights with my Bimac Anthias over who is going to eat out of my hand and is pretty aggressive about it. I have dubbed him Mr. Fuzzy.

Welcome to R2R!

HotRocks · Jan 27, 2019

Welcome to R2R!!!

I agree as mentioned above it looks like he is developing lympho. Keep a close eye on this. As it is near the mouth and could start to impact the ability to eat. If so you may have to consider manual removal.

Adding supplements to frozen prepared food like vitachem and selcon seem to speed up the going away process as well.

xhcl · Jan 27, 2019

I wouldn't call myself new. Been lurking around for a while and thought it was time to chime in on my experience since I got my CBB recently as well.

Tamberav · Jan 28, 2019

Beautiful fish! I think if I ever try one of these someday, I will set up a live rock QT and purposely breed the hell out of aiptasia in there before adding one in case it doesn't take prepared right away. Sounds good in my head anyways

Eggpaul · Jan 28, 2019

HotRocks said:
Welcome to R2R!!!

I agree as mentioned above it looks like he is developing lympho. Keep a close eye on this. As it is near the mouth and could start to impact the ability to eat. If so you may have to consider manual removal.

Adding supplements to frozen prepared food like vitachem and selcon seem to speed up the going away process as well.

Ok, I've added selcon to foods. But mainly I feed live black worms and he will eat 50 of them if I dont stop feeding. So his eating has not slowed down at all. Will keep you posted. I did a water change today (about 35%).

So I dont need to add metroplex?

Eggpaul · Jan 29, 2019

CBB is still eating like a pig (live black worms and mysis with selcon). I did a water change. He looks like someone punched him in the face. Bottom lip is still big. Hopefully it goes away.

rkpetersen · Jan 29, 2019

It really does look like lympho in that last picture. As long as it keeps eating, if you keep the water clean and feed the fish well as you're doing, it should resolve on its own.

I wish I could find live blackworms locally; you're fortunate there.

Eggpaul · Jan 29, 2019

rkpetersen said:
It really does look like lympho in that last picture. As long as it keeps eating, if you keep the water clean and feed the fish well as you're doing, it should resolve on its own.

I wish I could find live blackworms locally; you're fortunate there.

Yes, local fish store has it for $2 each portion (used to be $1.50 ).
I just did a water change and nitrates are at 5. Should I do another water change soon?

rkpetersen · Jan 29, 2019

Eggpaul said:
Yes, local fish store has it for $2 each portion (used to be $1.50 ).
I just did a water change and nitrates are at 5. Should I do another water change soon?

I wouldn't think so. If it's in a qt, it may not clear the lympho until it gets into your dt with a larger and generally less stressful environment.

Eggpaul · Aug 28, 2019

Sad to report my copperband died yesterday. I am so confused. He was eating really well on Mondat. Came home Tuesday and it was dead and stuck on an mp40.

One thing I noticed the last couple months, his stomach looked pinched, and it wasnt like that when I first purchased it. Did I not feed enough? Did it starve to death? I noticed the last few days he looked skinny, but he was eating. Another thing is at night when everyone was sleeping CBB would be swimming around. I feel like in the beginning I was only feeding once per day. But the last month I fed 2-3 times a day. I did go on vacation for 8 days in July and my dad fed once per evening.

So confused. Had it 7 months.

ndrwater · Aug 28, 2019

Sorry for your loss.
If he was pinched in the middle, and more importantly, above his eyes to the beginning of the dorsal fin, he was not getting enough to eat .
What were you feeding? And.. was he eating aggressively?

Eggpaul · Aug 28, 2019

ndrwater said:
Sorry for your loss.
If he was pinched in the middle, and more importantly, above his eyes to the beginning of the dorsal fin, he was not getting enough to eat .
What were you feeding? And.. was he eating aggressively?

The only place that looked pinched was the little area below his gills and lower 2 fins. Isn't that the stomach area? The area above his eyes to his side fins were fine. I could see it was a little plump there. He would eat very aggressively. Live black worms, frozen mysis, brine, and a mix of the other frozen food which has 4 different types. I would put so many black worms in after a while everyone would slow down eating. I think the first few months I fed only once per day, and at times I would miss a day. Only in the last month did I get more aggressive in feeding multiple times a day (because I saw a CBB in Disney world and saw it was very fat compared to mine).

ndrwater · Aug 28, 2019

wow.. well, sounds like you were doing everything right..
There is an unfortunate truth in this hobby though. Fish sometimes die.
Unless there was a disease present, you may never know why..
Again, sorry for your loss..

Eggpaul · Aug 28, 2019

ndrwater said:
wow.. well, sounds like you were doing everything right..
There is an unfortunate truth in this hobby though. Fish sometimes die.
Unless there was a disease present, you may never know why..
Again, sorry for your loss..

It did look a little scrawny the last couple of weeks, although it was eating. Sometimes it would miss the food, as if it could not see well, not sure if the lights were too dark at those times. Where exactly is the stomach on a CBB? behind his ear or below his gills?

ndrwater · Aug 28, 2019

Their stomach is where you'd expect to find it. My reference to above his eyes is where they store fat. If skinny there, oftentimes the fish is to far gone to be saved. Not always, but often

Eggpaul · Aug 28, 2019

ndrwater said:
Their stomach is where you'd expect to find it. My reference to above his eyes is where they store fat. If skinny there, oftentimes the fish is to far gone to be saved. Not always, but often

Ok I see. Well, behind his eye he was plump, but that's probably where all his organs are. Above his eye to the dorsal fin it wasn't very thick. and below his gills the stomach was pinched. If you look above this thread I have pictures of the fish the day I got it and it looked great and full. I think next time I just have to feed it more often. Probably make a feeding contraption.