Whitespot or ...

[cldavid]

I'm fairly new in the discus world. I bought 3 days ago may first 3 discus.

My blue discus has brown spots on his back fin and some on his body. Is this white spot or something else?

Can I use Esha Exit and Esha 2000 to treat my discus for white spot?

113364

[cldavid]

Problem

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?
2h after introducing them to my new aquarium

2. Symptoms (i.e. turning dark, excess slime, not eating, clamped fins, flashing, darting, clamped gills, white/yellow/green poop, hiding, headstanding or tailstanding, white on tips of fins, rotting or fungus, blisters/white zits on fish, bloated, cloudy eyes, wounds).
Brown stips in the fins, fish is very active and feed well.

3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include dosage and duration of treatment.
none. First treatment is, don't panic.


Tank/Water

4. Tank size and ages, numbers and sizes of fish.
350l

5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).
10-20% every week.

6. How long has tank been running? Is it bare bottom? If you have substrate, what type and how deep is it?
5 years. 60 cm deep. substrate sand.

7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.
I treat my water with Easy live Filter medium.

8. Parameters and water source;

Note: Water Parameters are important in diagnosing problems within a tank. If you don't own test kits for the following information, you can purchase them, test your parameters and post this info as soon as possible.


- temp 30 degrees Celcius

- ph 6.9

- ammonia reading +- 0 mg/l

- nitrite reading +- 0 mg/l

- nitrate reading +- 10 mg/l

What type of water or combinations of water sources do you use? If it is an RO/tap/well water mix, please list percentages in the mix.

- well water 0

- municipal water 100%

- RO water 0


9. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.
Yes, my 3 discuss.

10. Please tell us what you feed your fish and how often. This can be critical information for solving the problem so be as specific as you can.
Discus are relative young, I try to feed them 2-3 times a day.


11. Include any pictures or videos you have which shows the symptoms. If you can't add them to this post, please provide a link to them.

[bluelagoon]

From looking at the pics and what you describe ,your tank looks too dirty for young discus to handle.Your WC's need to be daily or at least every other day,50% or more.Aged water is always better when doing large WC's.Altho discus can be raised in substrate and plants,there need daily WC's along with lots of substrate cleaning.When it comes to ich if that is what it is,I've have great success with just high temps greater than 86f.Malachit green and formalin work well on external parasites as well.Only 3 discus is trouble from the beginning.

[jmf3460]

the black on your discus is peppering. it is a trait that some discus fish contain that allows them to darken and try to camouflage in with their surroundings. It is not a disease. But you could do as Mervin says above and up your water changes to make the water more clean for your fish.

[cldavid]

Thank you for your reply.

Why do you say may tank is too dirty, is it because of the 10 mg/l NO3 or the coloring of my water. The green spots on my window are algee.

I do admit, that I'm suffering from small particles of debris that is floating around in my tank, I'm just not able to get it filtered out. There are days that my aquarium is crystal clear and a few days later it is back.
Tried everything more regular water changes, changing the filter cotton every 2 weeks. I'm starting to wonder that it is maybe a bacterial problem.

Just to be safe, I started with a treatment of esha exit (which contains Malachit green).
Do you propose that I also do the water changes during the treatment, and of course properly redose for the amount of water that I've changed?

Regarding 3 discus, it is just a starting point. You're probably referring to that fact that the group is to small and a dominant discus will may rise that will pick on the rest?

[jmf3460]

there is nothing that malachite green is going to help, your fish have no apparent disease. throwing unnecessary medication into the water when it is not needed only worsens a non existing problem.

[Jack L]

cldavid, welcome to Discus. but please spend more time reading up on their care and where to buy them, how many to buy, etc.

also, if you had ich, you might not even see it, but if you do, it looks a lot like grains of sand on them.