Please Help ID Clownfish Disease

[N00bMaster69]

Hello all, this is my first post on here and I first want to say thank you to everyone that contributes on here. This place has helped a lot this past few months. And although I’m still struggling to find balance in my reef tank, I’m thankful for all the advice I have found on here. Now I wanted to see if you fellow reefers could help me save my last fish. I had a total of four and so far 3 have died. Please keep in mind I’ve had all these fish for months and I did a 30+ day quarantine on them following the instructions on the humble fish website when I first received them. The last fish I have is a chocolate clown fish who unfortunately seems to be hanging by a thread. When I first pulled him into the QT he only had what looked like ich. Multiple white spots. Spaced out and really apparent. I gave him an H2O2 bath (30 mins) and released him into the QT at 1 ppm copper power (checked by Hanna). Day two I raised the copper by .5 and today again by .5. But after I dosed the tank and took a closer look I realized he had gotten a lot worse overnight. Significant fin rot and also some sort of discoloration. In a panic I doser metro, kanoplex, and nitrofurazone as it seems bacterial. I just wanted help identifying what he might have, if I took the right steps, and what my chances are. Thanks again everyone. I’ve lost them all and this guy is my last one and I am really hoping he pulls through.

 

[N00bMaster69]

Here are some pictures that I hope help. From this morning.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Here are some pictures that I hope help. From this morning.

Good news is this is not a disease nor do I see one. What you have is a victim of aggression from another tankmate. now is a matter of " who dunn it"
What other tankmates do you have in the tank?
The tail and rear cavity is shredded from biting and something another clown, wrasse or trigger would do.
As for the fish, I see you have in in acclimation container but may need to be treated in quarantine with use of Kanaplex by seachem to assure no infection.

Regarding Humblefish and treatments- It is important to get proper treatment based on proper assessment and the copper would have been administered at incorrect level over too long of a period and peroxide of no use. this is the result of jumping around forums and you see the result.
If you'd like to work with us, great. If youre going between forums, i will not as many be the middle man and get blamed for poor diagnosis.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hello all, this is my first post on here and I first want to say thank you to everyone that contributes on here. This place has helped a lot this past few months. And although I’m still struggling to find balance in my reef tank, I’m thankful for all the advice I have found on here. Now I wanted to see if you fellow reefers could help me save my last fish. I had a total of four and so far 3 have died. Please keep in mind I’ve had all these fish for months and I did a 30+ day quarantine on them following the instructions on the humble fish website when I first received them. The last fish I have is a chocolate clown fish who unfortunately seems to be hanging by a thread. When I first pulled him into the QT he only had what looked like ich. Multiple white spots. Spaced out and really apparent. I gave him an H2O2 bath (30 mins) and released him into the QT at 1 ppm copper power (checked by Hanna). Day two I raised the copper by .5 and today again by .5. But after I dosed the tank and took a closer look I realized he had gotten a lot worse overnight. Significant fin rot and also some sort of discoloration. In a panic I doser metro, kanoplex, and nitrofurazone as it seems bacterial. I just wanted help identifying what he might have, if I took the right steps, and what my chances are. Thanks again everyone. I’ve lost them all and this guy is my last one and I am really hoping he pulls through.

Hi, were the other 3 fish clownfish also? Did they die from a similar issue or did they have different symptoms? In almost every case, once most of the fish in a group have died, it is very difficult to turn things around in time to save the remaining ones.

Off the cuff, I would say this fish has a secondary bacterial infection stemming from a slowly controlled ich infection. Depedning on the dose you used, the H2O2 may not really have helped. Copper power needs to be brought up to 2.5 ppm more quickly. Since you have a Hanna checker, overdosing is less of a risk.

The question is - what to do going forward? If you are following the package instructions for the Kanaplex and Nitrofurazone, and if the ich is now under control. that would be the best course of action. Antibiotic can take 5 to 7 days to work though. The metronidazole really doesn't have any use in this case.

Jay

 

[N00bMaster69]

Jay thank you for your response!

I had a goby who died from what I thought might have been lack of eating. He was paired with a pistol shrimp and didn’t come out much. This happened about 5 weeks ago. Then I had a royal gramma that died a week ago but could not see exactly what they might have. They were bloated when they died. Should admit I probably should have taken action then but again figured maybe it was just bad luck as the other two fish seemed fine and showed no signs. Then two days ago my male clownfish died. They were white so if they were infected with ich I couldn’t tell but no blotches or discoloration like the remaining one. Actually looked very normal. But once he died I immediately paid more attention to my remaining one and could see what I think is ich as the spots were few in between and significant. Not dusty.

I agree with your assessment of secondary infection but did want to reach out and see if this could be confirmed by the community. The H2O2 dose was based on 3% using 5ml for 1 quart. This was measured using a pipette. I will raise the ppm to 2.5 today. I just didn’t want to shock him either. Also, I read copper suppresses the immune system?! Not sure if this is true but if so I feel like I’m fighting an uphill battle.

I’m glad to hear that two of the medications I dosed should help. I hope it wasn’t a little too late. I am not sure on how to dose the nitrofurazone. Attached is what I got from my lfs. Should I follow these instructions? Specifically the w/c?

thanks again!!!

 

[N00bMaster69]

Another question, if not urenema, would another H2O2 bath help? Or could this be more harmful at this stage?

 

[MnFish1]

I would personally go with what's already been said - I'm not sure all the dips people do help much - and probably stress out the fish/and their organs more. With the exception of a severe fluke infection/diagnostic test. I would follow the course with the antibiotics. Be patient, keep up oxygenation, etc. What are you doing with the rest of the fish in your tank?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Another question, if not urenema, would another H2O2 bath help? Or could this be more harmful at this stage?

H2O2 baths are not really effective - at the level needed to treat ich trophonts, the fish themselves would be harmed. Low dose H2O2 has been used in tanks to kill ich theronts, but that is still very experimental and it has failed on people.
I haven’t used nitrofurazone for many years, so I would defer to the instructions your store gave you.
Copper may reduce a fish’s immunity, but that is mostly anecdotal, and if the alternative is to let the fish die from ich, then it is something that needs to be done.
Jay

 

[N00bMaster69]

Thank you everyone for the information and help. Unfortunately he didn’t make it past early afternoon yesterday. I’m now going to look into possibly testing my reef tank to see what diseases remain.