Pescado Guy
New Member
Hey everyone - After reading your forum for the past year or so, I think I'll finally formally ask my first question! It's amazing how much knowledge I've been able to gain just by browsing threads but now I'm really looking for some advice on this one.
I had aquariums when I was a kid but just set up my first reef tank in a couple decades a couple months back. I cycled the tank, added a couple clown fish, corals, snails, etc. and everything was going swimmingly. I then went to the same LFS that I bought the clown fish and a couple weeks later decided to buy a royal gramma. I didn't quarantine him (once again, new here but spent tons of time reading what I should have done differently...) acclimated him and dropped him in. Over the first week he behaved completely normal, ate well, active, no apparent issues at all. A week or two ago however, I noticed him rubbing up against rocks and sand regularly. He has a couple marks on his sides but they look more like scratches from rubbing on things, not the typical pictures I've seen of Ich, Velvet, brook, etc. Plus, he's been showing these signs for about the last 1-2 weeks with no obvious decline in function beyond the scratching. I know it's probably impossible to diagnose without a picture but hopefully my description will be a good starting point. Based on this, I'm starting to think he has some type of intestinal parasite or possibly flukes.
So here is the predicament... I've been trying to catch him to put him in a hospital tank for the past week and i've pretty much given up. Every time I go near with a net he darts into one of the rock caves and the holes in the individual rocks are big enough for him to hide in, so I can't get him out without breaking apart rocks which doesn't sound feasible. So here are the options I'm considering:
1 - Let this play out and see if his condition worsens or improves
2 - Treat the whole DT with Prazipro which is supposedly "reef safe" but I'm a bit paranoid about this approach since I realize that's not the ideal way to apply this product. Based on his conditions, I think Prazipro might be the fix, otherwise he'd probably be dead by now after dealing with this for the past 1-2 weeks.
3 - Anything else??
Any advice here would be greatly appreciated!!
I had aquariums when I was a kid but just set up my first reef tank in a couple decades a couple months back. I cycled the tank, added a couple clown fish, corals, snails, etc. and everything was going swimmingly. I then went to the same LFS that I bought the clown fish and a couple weeks later decided to buy a royal gramma. I didn't quarantine him (once again, new here but spent tons of time reading what I should have done differently...) acclimated him and dropped him in. Over the first week he behaved completely normal, ate well, active, no apparent issues at all. A week or two ago however, I noticed him rubbing up against rocks and sand regularly. He has a couple marks on his sides but they look more like scratches from rubbing on things, not the typical pictures I've seen of Ich, Velvet, brook, etc. Plus, he's been showing these signs for about the last 1-2 weeks with no obvious decline in function beyond the scratching. I know it's probably impossible to diagnose without a picture but hopefully my description will be a good starting point. Based on this, I'm starting to think he has some type of intestinal parasite or possibly flukes.
So here is the predicament... I've been trying to catch him to put him in a hospital tank for the past week and i've pretty much given up. Every time I go near with a net he darts into one of the rock caves and the holes in the individual rocks are big enough for him to hide in, so I can't get him out without breaking apart rocks which doesn't sound feasible. So here are the options I'm considering:
1 - Let this play out and see if his condition worsens or improves
2 - Treat the whole DT with Prazipro which is supposedly "reef safe" but I'm a bit paranoid about this approach since I realize that's not the ideal way to apply this product. Based on his conditions, I think Prazipro might be the fix, otherwise he'd probably be dead by now after dealing with this for the past 1-2 weeks.
3 - Anything else??
Any advice here would be greatly appreciated!!
