Laying on Bottom - Sick?

[Clawhammer]

Hello everyone.

Three days ago I combined my two groups of discus after a 2 month quarantine.

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showth...ast&highlight=

Today one of my discus is quite lethargic, sitting on the bottom, dorsal fins clamped. I just saw him laying flat on the bottom. When I approach the tank he perks up and swims toward me. I saw him eat this morning, but his appetite seemed less than normal.

Could this just be stress or possible illness? There is one other discus who is more sluggish than normal and with droopy dorsal fins. I am on heightened alert and may be oversensitive, but I have never seen behavior like this from this discus.

[Clawhammer]

I tested the water.

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 10

I have done nothing else to the tank besides add the fish. 50% daily WC.

[Clawhammer]

Video of the fish. Apologies for the glare and CNN on in the background.



Video of the rest of the tank inhabitants:

[Clawhammer]

I just did a 80% water change. No improvement. Im worried this guy is dying and I have no idea why. He is increasingly laying flat and breathing is becoming very shallow.

[Clawhammer]

It looks like all my existing stock are stressed, fins clamped, lethargic. The new fish are not. I think this is an ominous sign. Any advice or guidance would be appreciated.

[Clawhammer]

I have noticed a couple of the fish have a large hazy patches on them. It kind of looks like when they brush against something and get scratched up, but this covers a large area. I see this on a couple of the darker fish. I can't see if this is affecting the silver pigeon because of his color. Is this an external bacterial infection?

Ugh. I have had the worst luck. I may have to say sayonara to this hobby, just too much heartache for all the time, money, and effort. I have had the worst luck.

[Ryan925]

Man Eric what a bummer. I hope there is a good solution for you. Would hate to see you give up after all the hard work.

Hopefully one of our resident illness experts will have some good info for you.

Good luck man

[Clawhammer]

Thanks for the kind words Ryan.

[Ryan925]

Thanks for the kind words Ryan.

Did you do the hero fish thing?

Maybe something that didn't bother the Asian discus but is effecting the stendkers?

[Clawhammer]

I did not do the hero fish thing unfortunately.

There definitely seem to be white patches on many of the fish. I am going to add salt and hopefully someone will read this and know what is going on. I am sure it is related to the two different sources, all these fish were doing great before today.

[Phillydubs]

Do you have any air in the tank?

[Phillydubs]

It sure sounds like a prime case of a classic group mix where both groups seem more than healthy yet once mixed one group becomes infected by another due to them not having the same immunities. I guess this is why the hero fish is the preferred method because then you only have one sick fish as opposed to a whole group. I am honestly not sure what to tell you to do except to keep trying clean water.

I had some success early on when mixing a group of wilds with a medication called ParaGard it covered a lot of bases yet seem to be mild on the fish

[Clawhammer]

Do you have any air in the tank?

There is a sump with overflow. In the sump, I have a couple airstones.

[Phillydubs]

If you happen to have a spare air pump laying around and some other air stones I would add them directly to the tank just to help get some more oxygen going if they are having trouble breathing due to whatever this is

[Clawhammer]

I will do that now, thanks Phil.

I have kanamycin, metronidazole, nitrofurazone, and potassium permanganate on hand and ready to go if they are needed.