Quarantine failure, please help ID this disease

Patrick Fenis

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Hi everyone, first time poster but long time lurker on these forums.

Please ID this disease on my Purple Tang. Sorry this is the best photo I can get as he's a bit skittish at the moment.

PT.jpg


Background: So in the past year I've gotten back into the hobby after taking a break for several years. I quarantine all new fish in a 30 gallon tank with 1.008-1.009 salinity concurrent with 14 days of feeding API General Cure (Praziquantel & Metronidazole) with Seachem Focus and Seachem Garlic. I run carbon for the first 14 days with 20% water changes every 48 hours. Then I remove the carbon and dose Seachem Metroplex directly into the water for another 21 days. If there are still signs of disease at this point, I will add liquid Prazipro to the tank, perform a water change after 5 days, and then redose the tank with Prazipro on day 7. I tend to use Prazipro only as a last resort as I find certain fish are quite sensitive to it. At day 60 I begin to slowly increase the tank salinity to 1.018. At day 70 I perform a final analysis of the fish and then add it to the display tank using an acclimation box for as long as I think necessary.

So far this has been working great! My display tank is a 180 gallon FOWLR (no crustaceans) with about 150 pounds of (dry) Life Rock. Currently I have 1 foxface, 2 perc clowns, 1 orchid dottyback, 1 lawnmower blenny, and my latest addition is the aforementioned purple tang.

The purple tang has been in the tank for a few days and suddenly it started showing these spots. He never once had spots in quarantine which leads me to believe that something is in my DT. I don't understand how this happened? The white spots are raised and an irregular shape so I don't think it's ich. Just to be safe, I lowered the salinity to 1.009. None of the other fish seem to be affected by it, but the clowns' appetite has severely decreased since lowering the salinity. They don't have any marks on them at all though.

Could this be a rare case of lymphocystis having multiple spots on a fish? I have seen lymphocystis on every fish in my tank at one point or another over the past few months but it was always isolated to a single spot that went away on its own after a few days.

I also did have a flameback angel that died a few months ago after it appeared to have a bacterial infection. The infection went away after a few days of treating the DT with Seachem Kanaplex. I did still complete the recommended Kanaplex dosing even after the fish improved.

Water parameters are all top notch. Any help would be much appreciated! What is this and how do I treat it?

EDIT: Just noticed some white stringy poop coming from my foxface and both clowns. I'm assuming this is some type of worm? I'm going to start feeding the API General Cure again. Thoughts?


TL;DR - My purple tang came down with a disease after rigorous quarantine procedure and I need some help with an ID and treatment.


Thanks in advance!!
 
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vetteguy53081

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It is NOT advisable to treat a tank with hyposalinity- its one or the other which may be the issue.
Pic is fuzzy to fully confirm what you have- Could be flukes or ich, but UNconfirmed.
While it can be, lympho does not spread in this manner.
As for flukes, if fish is NOT breathing heavy, you can give it a 5 minute freshwater dip with tap water the same temperature as display tank. Add if you have some, a pinch of baking soda to the water for the ph. After this time, return tang to the tank and look on the bottom of pail or bucket and see if you can spot what looks like sesame seeds or fish scales. Use a flashlight if needed.
If so, those are flukes. If not can be other ailments. Please provide a clearer pic under white lighting
 
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Patrick Fenis

Patrick Fenis

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Thanks for the quick reply! Not sure if you saw my recent edit but I added that I just noticed some white stringy poop coming from my foxface and both clowns. I'm assuming this is some type of worm? I'm going to start feeding the API General Cure again. Thoughts?

I would prefer not to rip the tank apart trying to catch him but I will do that if absolutely necessary.

None of the fish seem to be showing any behavioral symptoms. No scratching/flashing/heavy breathing/etc. Just the decreased appetite for both clowns.

I got some better pics. In these pics I actually notice some pitting where it appears a previous infection may have been? I'm confused because I never saw spots until recently. His fins also look a bit tattered which makes me think there could be a bacterial component?

thumbnail_IMG_4266.jpg thumbnail_IMG_4267.jpg thumbnail_IMG_4268.jpg
 

vetteguy53081

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@vetteguy53081 any thoughts on the new pictures?
Crypto and requires full 30day treatment in quarantine with coppersafe at 80.5 degrees
Assure you monitor copper levels with a reliable test kit
Therapeutic level is 2.25-2.5
Monitor Ammonia level during treatment
 

Jay Hemdal

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Thanks for the quick reply! Not sure if you saw my recent edit but I added that I just noticed some white stringy poop coming from my foxface and both clowns. I'm assuming this is some type of worm? I'm going to start feeding the API General Cure again. Thoughts?

I would prefer not to rip the tank apart trying to catch him but I will do that if absolutely necessary.

None of the fish seem to be showing any behavioral symptoms. No scratching/flashing/heavy breathing/etc. Just the decreased appetite for both clowns.

I got some better pics. In these pics I actually notice some pitting where it appears a previous infection may have been? I'm confused because I never saw spots until recently. His fins also look a bit tattered which makes me think there could be a bacterial component?

thumbnail_IMG_4266.jpg thumbnail_IMG_4267.jpg thumbnail_IMG_4268.jpg

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

Those spots are large, and are unlikely to be ich or flukes. I would say they are what I call "idiopathic mucus plugs". Meaning - we don't know what causes them, but they are just mucus. I've scraped many of these over the years and looked at them under a microscope and always just see mucus.

It seems related to some irritant, often times that can't be identified though.

Here is an article I wrote up on fish mucus (the PDF link is on the right):

The feces issue with the foxface and clowns is unrelated. That can have three primary causes; bacteria, flagellates or "dyspepsia" (something off in their diet). Worms do not cause white feces. Avoid just soaking food in GC, you have no idea what the dose is then. Metronidazole at 5000 ppm in food will help with flagellates.

Jay
 

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