Help with my lion fish

[shaunyh22]

Anyone help me, I’ve just noticed my lion fish looks like it’s got a hole in his chin and a bone sticking out of it! I don’t no how he’s done it and I don’t no what I can do for him!! Please help

 

[lion king]

How long have had him and how has he been eating. I've never seen this before, but I would be curious to know how long it has been going on. My 1st thought is parasitic but infection would also be a concern. General cure may help on the parasitic side, and kanaplex would help on the bacterial side and guard against infection. Water quality must be addressed as well as diet. Give water parameters and what are feeding. @Jay Hemdal

 

[lion king]

While I've never seen this in a lionfish, it could be heximita, and the treatment would be metronidazole, Seachem metro. I prefer treating lionfish in the water column. What's the tank setup, is he in a qt, or is it possible to remove to an observation/hospital tank. Optimum water quality and a proper diet is a must. Check out some of my threads for diet recommendations, click my name and "find all threads". Waiting on @Jay Hemdal for a confirmation.

 

[lion king]

I don't claim to be a disease expert but I do know a little about lionfish and prefer to be proactive, because the more time goes by the more risky a bad outcome occurs. My 1st line of defense is perfect water quality and live food. If you can move him to an observation tank alone with optimum water quality that would be best. If he can not be moved post your tank situation, size, reef or fowlr, tank mates. The nutrition of live food can not be rivaled and contains so many things that alone with quality water heals many things even without medication. In this case I would treat with metronidazole, it's a relative safe medication that lions tolerate well. Live food recommendations include ghost shrimp, guppies. and mollies; fish are the best complete package with live gut flora that is invaluable.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Anyone help me, I’ve just noticed my lion fish looks like it’s got a hole in his chin and a bone sticking out of it! I don’t no how he’s done it and I don’t no what I can do for him!! Please help

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

On some scorpionfish (Stonefish and Rhinopias) they develop "rub marks" on their chins that can get infected. I've seen those in lionfish, but not as often. If those lesions become infected, there can be tissue loss. Did this come on gradually, or did it show up mostly all at once?

I'm concerned about the overall coloration of the lion as well....seems really pale.
Can you post a video of it? (linking to Youtube works well)


Jay