Please help with sick Scribbled Angel

[Aquarium Dan]

I bought a 5 inch Scribbled Angelfish a little over two weeks ago. He was placed in 30 gallon tank by himself for routine quarantine. He seemed very healthy as he was active and eating voraciously.
After 14 days I noticed his behavior began to change. He became less active, his breathing appeared slightly labored, and his overall color faded. However, he continued to eat well. I saw no other physical signs.
I decided to check the ammonia and was surprised to find it at 1ppm. This is normally not the case with a new fish in my quarantine tank, but this fish was really eating and likely producing an abundance of waste. I was feeding him scallops, shrimp, squid, mussles, and a green seaweed from a clip.
I Immediately performed a 40% water change and added bacteria. This brought the ammonia level to 0.5ppm. The next day I performed a 20% water change in the morning and another at night. I also added more bacteria. The ammonia level is now about 0.1ppm.
The last few days his poop has become very stringy. He is now swimming less and either positions himself head up on the bottom of the tank or horizontal at the top. He is still breathing hard.
I have Copper Power and General Cure at my immediate disposal. I was not sure which to try, however, I read an article that indicated copper should not be used with angels. Yesterday, I treated the water with General Cure.
This morning is the first time he would not eat. I hope I end up not losing this fish. He cost me $500 and was so full of life when I received him.
Any suggestions are deeply appreciated.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hi - welcome to Reef2Reef. Sorry to meet up under these circumstances. That is an expensive fish, so the stakes are very high!

Can you get me a respiration rate on it? Try counting the number of gill beats in 15 seconds, do that a few times, then average the counts and multiply by 4. That helps give me a general idea as to the magnitude of the issue.

Can you post a picture of the fish and the setup?

At this point, if the fish doesn't have ich or velvet, I would opt for the General Cure first. Angels don't like copper, but I quarantined some big scribbleds back in 2015 using Coppersafe and they were fine.

Jay

 

[AC1211]

I bought a 5 inch Scribbled Angelfish a little over two weeks ago. He was placed in 30 gallon tank by himself for routine quarantine. He seemed very healthy as he was active and eating voraciously.
After 14 days I noticed his behavior began to change. He became less active, his breathing appeared slightly labored, and his overall color faded. However, he continued to eat well. I saw no other physical signs.
I decided to check the ammonia and was surprised to find it at 1ppm. This is normally not the case with a new fish in my quarantine tank, but this fish was really eating and likely producing an abundance of waste. I was feeding him scallops, shrimp, squid, mussles, and a green seaweed from a clip.
I Immediately performed a 40% water change and added bacteria. This brought the ammonia level to 0.5ppm. The next day I performed a 20% water change in the morning and another at night. I also added more bacteria. The ammonia level is now about 0.1ppm.
The last few days his poop has become very stringy. He is now swimming less and either positions himself head up on the bottom of the tank or horizontal at the top. He is still breathing hard.
I have Copper Power and General Cure at my immediate disposal. I was not sure which to try, however, I read an article that indicated copper should not be used with angels. Yesterday, I treated the water with General Cure.
This morning is the first time he would not eat. I hope I end up not losing this fish. He cost me $500 and was so full of life when I received him.
Any suggestions are deeply appreciated.

Any decor or is it an empty qt I usually buy some dry rock or one of those freshwater flower pots whenever I have to quarantine. (I only qt delicate species.)

 

[Aquarium Dan]

Hi - welcome to Reef2Reef. Sorry to meet up under these circumstances. That is an expensive fish, so the stakes are very high!

Can you get me a respiration rate on it? Try counting the number of gill beats in 15 seconds, do that a few times, then average the counts and multiply by 4. That helps give me a general idea as to the magnitude of the issue.

Can you post a picture of the fish and the setup?

At this point, if the fish doesn't have ich or velvet, I would opt for the General Cure first. Angels don't like copper, but I quarantined some big scribbleds back in 2015 using Coppersafe and they were fine.

Jay

Hi Jay,

He has about 190 gill beats a minute.
This is now the fourth day since I began to notice a change in his behavior. Each day he appears a little worse.
Thanks for your help.

Dan

 

[Aquarium Dan]

Any decor or is it an empty qt I usually buy some dry rock or one of those freshwater flower pots whenever I have to quarantine. (I only qt delicate species.)

I run it pretty bare - just a PVC pipe to hide.

 

[Aquarium Dan]

This is a photo from a week ago, before he became ill.

 

[artieg1]

That is a gorgeous fish, but huge. I would be curious if it is still suffering from ammonia exposure in a 30 gallon tank. If it were me, I'd change more water (and continue to do so every few days) and feed it minimal amounts and try to stabilize the environment. I don't trust ammonia badges. My QT has always gone better since I started aggressively doing water changes.

 

[Aquarium Dan]

That is a gorgeous fish, but huge. I would be curious if it is still suffering from ammonia exposure in a 30 gallon tank. If it were me, I'd change more water (and continue to do so every few days) and feed it minimal amounts and try to stabilize the environment. I don't trust ammonia badges. My QT has always gone better since I started aggressively doing water changes.

Thanks. I am learning not to put too much trust in the badges. I used an ammonia test kit by API to get a better read on the ammonia level.
I am wondering if the fish is suffering from the ammonia exposure and not a parasite.
I plan to perform another water change tonight.
My display tank is 350 gallons and ammonia has never been an issue. Maybe it has caused some complacency with my quarantine tank.
Thank you for your input.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

For a fish that size, 190 BPM is above the highest reading I have in my database...so I don’t know what to tell you, if I suggest anything stressful, it might push it over the top. The color change in the two pics bothers me - it could be from the ammonia, but I can’t rule out velvet.
Jay

 

[Aquarium Dan]

For a fish that size, 190 BPM is above the highest reading I have in my database...so I don’t know what to tell you, if I suggest anything stressful, it might push it over the top. The color change in the two pics bothers me - it could be from the ammonia, but I can’t rule out velvet.
Jay

Thanks for your help Jay.
Since he quit eating after adding the General Cure yesterday and General Cure is not a treatment for velvet, I think I will start diluting out the medication with my water changes. If ammonia has been the problem, I can make the water as clean as possible.