Potential fish disease - could I get an opinion please?

[anddak]

Hi there,

It looks like all I have is problems since I introduced a blasto frag to my tank.

A bit of a background so far:

I have a 13.5g fluval evo with 10lbs aragonite sand and real reef rock, the tanks was fully cycled and it's been 2 months since I introduced the first inhabitants: a pair of clowns.

They were doing well so I added a firefish, 2 blue legged hermit and a blasto frag on the 6th of June. The blasto's skeleton looked a bit weird, I have a post here about it: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/what-is-happening-with-my-blasto.727762/page-2#post-7609568. This was my first coral so I could not tell if it's ok or not. Either way I dipped into Polylab, but I was too gentle when scrubbing off hair algae, a week later pulled it out, dipped again and scrubbed of the hair algae completely. Right now a second head is growing and it seems to be doing fine.

A few days ago I noticed a new organism in my tank that was ID'd as aiptasia: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/i...can-someone-please-id-it.730761/#post-7609517

I believe I introduced it with the frag, there is no other explanation.

I mentioned the above because it might be relevant, but the problem with the fish started a few days back:

The firefish is hiding more than usual in holes she usually doesn't hide. She's flicking off the substrate, not often, around 4-5 times a day (I am working from home and my desk is next to the tank so I can keep a close eye on them)

The clownfish were ok so far, but since yesterday they became a bit more lethargic occasionally and today I've seen the male rubbing off the acrylic back of the fluval evo.

It's worth to mention, I eradicated the visible aiptasia from the glass but discovered a lot on the acrylic mentioned above (would this cause harm to the fish maybe?) - I will be syphoning out today.

So here is a few theories I have:

- Stray voltage: I have a jebao sow-4 (regretted) and every time I turn it off they come alive a little bit, although this could be because I always turn it off before feeding. Once it's back on firefish hides again and clownfish becomes lethargic (not always).

- Internal parasites: I have no idea what it could be as I have 0 experience, but it would explain the rubbing to the acryllic by the clownfish or the flicking off the sand by the firefish. (Another observation I found weird and could also be a symptom: The firefish was shaking a few times like the clown does the submission dance - this is weird) Could it be that apart from the aiptasia I introduced something else with that danged blasto frag or with the firefish?

It's also worth to mention the fish is eating fine. The female clown is aggressive towards the male when it's feeding but that's normal I heard.

Water chemistry:

- Ammonia: 0
- Nitritre: 0
- Nitrate from 6 to 10 in 6 days (water change day is today)
- Calcium: from 440 to 390 in 6 days
- Magnesium: from 1350 to 1310 in 6 days
- Alkalinity: I am dosing Foundation B - that would explain he calcium drop I think - as aiming for 11 dKh. I raised it from 6.5 to 9 in 6 days: I raise 1.4 dkh/day (max allowed according to Red Sea) - what it drops naturally + I haven't dosed 1 day, when cleaning the aiptaisa as that was enough stress on itself lol.
- pH: 8.1-8.2 (whenever dosing dkH it spikes to 8.4-8.5)
- Phopsphate: 0
- Salinity 34ppt stable
- Temperature: 80-81F

Please find a few pics below:

1st picture: The white spot I mentioned: there was only 1 and it disappeared in 1-2 days, is it not a physical injury or something maybe?
2nd, 3rd, just random pics from today, they look ok, they look healthy, I think? - but then I couldn't capture when they doing those weird things
4th picture: So she had like 1 hole, she is now finding and hiding in these obscure holes.

I hope someone can advise, I am worried sick for these little guys.

Kind regards,

anddak

 

[TriggerFinger]

Hi @anddak, sorry for the troubles with your new fish. I’m not an expert but it sounds like your fish may have flukes. You can determine this by giving them a dip in rodi water that matches the temp and ph of your tank water. Have you ever done a fresh water dip?

 

[anddak]

Hi @anddak, sorry for the troubles with your new fish. I’m not an expert but it sounds like your fish may have flukes. You can determine this by giving them a dip in rodi water that matches the temp and ph of your tank water. Have you ever done a fresh water dip?

Hi TriggerFinger, I’ve done it with my blasto frag last week after the polylab dip, I never heard with fish. Wouldn’t fresh (RO) water kill them cause of the sudden salinity change?

I read up on the disease and the process for sure, could you please tell me more also?

thank you!

 

[TriggerFinger]

Here’s a link to do freshwater dips on fish. It will confirm or deny flukes and also provide temporary relief for the fish. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/freshwater-dip.248898/
Also, it’s recommended to do the dip in a dark colored container so you can see easily if flukes were present. They will look like sesame seeds in the bottom of the dip container.

 

[anddak]

Here’s a link to do freshwater dips on fish. It will confirm or deny flukes and also provide temporary relief for the fish. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/freshwater-dip.248898/

Found it on the meantime, thank you!

 

[Lasse]

Stray voltage: I have a jebao sow-4 (regretted) and every time I turn it off they come alive a little bit, although this could be because I always turn it off before feeding. Once it's back on firefish hides again and clownfish becomes lethargic (not always).

If you put one of your hands at a grounded object and the other in the water - you will notice if there is ant stray voltage or not. its probably not the case.

13.5 gallon and a SOW 4 - it means - at max - you have a 80 fold turnover + a return pump - I would hide for lesser. Your aquascape is rather "open" - it will stress the fish and to seek places there they could hid.

Yes you can have a disease but there is other things that can explain the behavior of your fish - IMO

Sincerely Lasse

 

[anddak]

If you put one of your hands at a grounded object and the other in the water - you will notice if there is ant stray voltage or not. its probably not the case.

13.5 gallon and a SOW 4 - it means - at max - you have a 80 fold turnover + a return pump - I would hide for lesser. Your aquascape is rather "open" - it will stress the fish and to seek places there they could hid.

Yes you can have a disease but there is other things that can explain the behavior of your fish - IMO

Sincerely Lasse

Hi Lasse,

Apologies, not sure I understand you re the water flow (not native english here) you mean I don’t have enough water turnover/flow or I have too much? My return pump is the eheim compact 1000 (approx 20x) and I am running the jebao on level 3-4/8. (On the eheim i have an RFG nozzle). I have had this setup since before the firefish was introduced, but they started acting out in the past few days

Thanks for the other info(s) - btw re the rockwork, the firefish have a full tunnel system underneath the rocks, she has like 3-4 entrances/exits. What would you recommend to make it more “closed”?

Also, if you don’t mind me asking this: the pH is rather low in the RO waterI am prepping, how could I up that to match the one in the tank? The article says to add salt, but wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of a “freshwater” dip?

thank you!

 

[Lasse]

Apologies, not sure I understand you re the water flow (not native english here) you mean I don’t have enough water turnover/flow or I have too much?

I think the problem is that I´m not a native english speaker either . Yes i mean that the flow sounds rather high in such a small aquarium.

Your small aquarium have insight at least on 3 of the aquariums windows. If there is more light in the room - compared with the light in the aquarium - the fish see what´s happen in the room as good as you can see what´s happen in the aquarium.. It can cause stress responses.

When you do the fresh water dip - the pH is not very important. But the ion strength is. Pure RO water is too much for the fishes osmosis system to handle - even during a short time. You can use tap water (if it is good) or just add some small amounts of salt into the water - half a teaspoon to 10 liter is normally enough.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[anddak]

Thanks for your help so far guys, I really appreciate it!

So, I chased these little b*stards half of my day, but it's quite obvious I have no chance of catching them. I tried with a net, with hands, diy fish trap, etc. but no luck. I am starting to think, I am doing more harm than good.

I could catch the clownfish while they're asleep, but no chance of catching the firefish, only if I pull out the rocks, I really don't know if all that stress for the fish and the tank worth it as it's highly likely they've got flukes.

@Lasse what you said about the flowrate, open space etc. makes a lot of sense and I will need to address it at one point, however, based on the symptoms and the fact that they only started to act out it's more likely it's a disease, isn't it? Now that I checked all the symptoms it all fits, especially the firefish's tailfin is getting more and more damaged even despite there is no aggression from the clownfish.

Wouldn't it be better if instead of chasing and stressing them I would treat the tank with Flukesolve? Apparently it's safe for the crabs and corals and given the fact that it's a freshly built system with dry rock, I probably can't do much damage by treating the main tank instead of setting up a QT. I've seen quite a few people went down this route.

What do you guys think? How crucial is the freshwater dip, etc?

Thank you all!

 

[anddak]

Hi All,

I hope you enjoying the weekend so far, it's pouring down here in the UK, but frankly, it's great after the heatwave.

@Lasse @TriggerFinger thank you for your input on the above.

On the weekend when I reported this, I wasn't able to pull the fish out (I've chased them all day), so I took my chances and dosed some FlukeSolve (UK equivalent of PraziPro) that supposed to be reef safe and a very reliable solutiong against the flukes. Unfortunately nothing changed.....

....so I managed to pull out the firefish today and dip it in fresh water for 5 minutes, nothing came out. So considering that the fluke-solve was useless and fresh water dip also shown no signs of flukes I am fairly confident it's not flukes.

So I am thinking what could it be that didn't kill my fish for weeks but it's still there? Symptoms since we last spoke:

- The firefish is the main suspect, she stopped flicking/rubbing to sand for about 2 days after the fluksolve dosage (I might have missed it, however I sit next to my tank 8/10 h a day)

- Clownfish shows no symptoms of anything most of the time,except a couple of observartions: I did see stringy poo once or twice (I feed them mostly mysis so could be mono diet, need to change this) in the past couple of weeks + very rarely (like once in 2 days) either one or the other rubs their "nose" against the wall (only the black/plastic back wall).

- Firefish getting increasingly worse, their fins are melting away (sometimes it's white where the fin is melting away), now part of the top fin (not sure how is called) is missing as well (defo not aggression). Also started to breathe heavily and it's just generally in a bad shape.

- There are no issues with feeding, very rarely the firefish skips a feeding cause arrives late from her cave. (it hides approx half of the 1/3 of the day)

So...what could this be considering that the fish living with it for weeks and not dead yet, it not flukes and frankly not sure if the clownfish is just very tough or why they also not in the same shape as the firefish.

Added a few pics from today (the last picture: that's not flukes but salt as I added a half tbsp to buffer)

I hope someone can advise!

Thank you

 

[Lasse]

If you can treat this fish outside the DT - I would use some antibacterial products that works mainly for external bacteria. Waterlife and Aquarium Munster have such products.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[anddak]

If you can treat this fish outside the DT - I would use some antibacterial products that works mainly for external bacteria. Waterlife and Aquarium Munster have such products.

Sincerely Lasse

thanks Lasse. Given the circumstances it is hard for me to setup a qt tank right now, but i seriously started to consider. Ideally it would be good if i could do it in the dt in case if whatever is it, it infested the tank.

I am really puzzled as of what this could be, but then again I am a “reefkeeper” for 2 months so I’ve seen nothing yet.

 

[Lasse]

It could be a question of some bacterial disease - but it is very difficult sitting at this side of the North Sea and judge. If you look for external bacterial treatment and if there is a brand that have short times bath - it could work. This is normally pure chemicals (no antibiotics) and it works for external infections. There is fish drugs containing nitrofuran that´s are active both against external and internal bacterial infections but I think they are banned in the UK. They are also very tuff to handle because they are considered to be cancerogenus. Always gloves when handle this stuff. They pass your skin.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[anddak]

It could be a question of some bacterial disease - but it is very difficult sitting at this side of the North Sea and judge. If you look for external bacterial treatment and if there is a brand that have short times bath - it could work. This is normally pure chemicals (no antibiotics) and it works for external infections. There is fish drugs containing nitrofuran that´s are active both against external and internal bacterial infections but I think they are banned in the UK. They are also very tuff to handle because they are considered to be cancerogenus. Always gloves when handle this stuff. They pass your skin.

Sincerely Lasse

Ah great advice, I'll see what can I find, thank you.