What is wrong with my fish?

[jkarp]

So I was doing an aquarium water change today and I noticed that my neon goby has some white spots on it. So I captured it took it out of the tank and put it in a cup. It ended up jumping out of the cup and onto the floor so I picked it up with my hand and put it back into the cup and when I looked at my hand afterwards it was covered in a thick slime coat and where I had touched its body it did not have those white spots anymore. The white spots also stick out and are not flat against the body. Currently it is in a bucket out of the tank in quarantine since I don’t know what it is. Does anyone know what this might be?

 

[Mike from TN]

Maybe this gentleman can help out
@Jay Hemdal
In the meantime, can you post a clear picture of the fish and give us some info About your tank, other livestock, water parameters, etc.

 

[jkarp]

This is the clearest pic I could get since it’s such a small fish. I have a 22.4 gallon aio Fiji cube tank with clownfish, damsel, and royal gramma with the goby plus a cleaner shrimp and an emerald crab, blue legged hermit crab and snails. I also have a bunch of corals. I don’t know about the parameters since I don’t have a tester of my own but I do know that the salt is 1.025 and the temp is 78. I started my tank is the beginning of January and this is my first saltwater tank.

 

[dedragon]

i hate to jinx it, but i think it is ich

 

[Qasimja]

could it have been sand?

 

[jkarp]

It’s definitely not sand. When I tried picking it up off of the floor it did not feel like sand. Instead it felt extremely slimy to the point where once I put the fish back in the cup in my hand had stretchy slime on it.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Gobiosoma species have pretty thick slime coats, that can catch sand, but they are also prone to ich. At first, I thought that since the spots dropped off, they were probably sand, but in looking at the picture you posted, it could be ich. There really isn't any need to keep it in a bucket, since if it does have ich, it is already in your tank. If it isn't ich, then holding it in a bucket will be too stressful. How long have you had this goby, and when was the last time you added an animal to the tank?

Jay

 

[jkarp]

I’ve had the goby since February. He was the first fish I got. I got new snails a couple weeks ago.

 

[jkarp]

I already moved him over to a quarantine tank. If it is ich what would be the best medication that I would use for it? Also do you think I should medicate the original tank it was in too? If so I would need something that is reef and invert safe

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I already moved him over to a quarantine tank. If it is ich what would be the best medication that I would use for it? Also do you think I should medicate the original tank it was in too? If so I would need something that is reef and invert safe

I would just watch the fish in your DT. The issue is that if it IS ich, the best treatment would be to move all of the fish into a QT and treat with copper for 30 days, and then leave the DT empty of fish for at least 45 days...not something you want to jump into doing is it turns out that it isn't ich...

Jay