Help identifying sickness

[0motive]

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?

White spots on fin lesions on body
Still eating slight color change less active

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).

White on tips of back fins

3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include dosage and duration of treatment.

Paragard 1 treatment today as soon as I noticed the issue


Tank/Water

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

140g tank 15 discus 3.5-5” size 1 angelfish adult size 30 adult lemon tetra 12 neon tetra 1 Raphael catfish 1 small green pleco

5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).

40% change every 3 days


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

Tank running for 2 months bare bottom

7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.

I use RO water for water changes


8. What type/brand water conditioner do you use? Do you add it to the tank or aging barrel? How much do you use?
Prime conditioner added to tank 2-4ml every week

9. 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 85

- ph 7.2

- ammonia reading 0.50 ppm

- nitrite reading 0 ppm

- nitrate reading 10-20ppm

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 0

- RO water 100


10. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.

8 new discus added 1 week ago

11. 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.

Home made mix of beef heart, spinach, salmon, dried krill, garlic, multivitamin

Ocean nutrition brine shrimp plus flakes

Omega one super color small sinking cichlid pellets


12. 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.

[Iminit]

It looks like fin rot and the .50 ammonia may be the cause. Check your tap water for ammonia. Did you quarantine the new discus before adding to main tank? If the rest are fine I would remove this fish into a qt tank and treat with 1 tbs salt per 5 gal. See if that cures it. Next I would up your water changes to 50% daily for at least a month.

You do know the Raphael and the pleco will both get large. Being your discus are 3.5” they need lots of clean water and food. Why the ro water. What’s up with your tap water and why 100% ro? Aren’t you adding anything to it?

[0motive]

I’m new to fish keeping (1 year) and have only been keeping discus for a few months. I have been filling with RO water during water changes and I’m only adding salt. I was not aware that I needed to add anything else. Did not have a quarantine tank big enough for 8 discus

[jeep]

I would like to see your regular tap water parameters and why the need for RO. Discus do fine in most tap water sources no matter the harness or ph as long as the parameters are consistent. Discus actually should have the mineral content of most tap waters.

Ammonia should be 0. .5 is too high and can cause major issues such as burnt gills, frayed fins and can be lethal. It sounds like your tank may not be fully cycled, which could explain the ammonia reading due to increased bioload especially since your tank may be a bit over stocked.

Cross contamination could also be an issue since 8 discus were introduced to an existing tank.

I don't understand the use of Prime, You do 40% water changes every 3 days but you add Prime @ 2-4ml weekly? Prime acts instantly and should only be needed at the time of water change even if using RO because RO doesn't always remove chloramines.

Unless there's a specific reason you're using RO then I would either remineralize your RO water or switch to aged tap water. Increase water changes to every day or other day. in the end, discontinue using salt all together. I would also discontinue Paragard...

[0motive]

I am using RO because my tap water is inconsistent due to poor infrastructure in my area. I have been adding small doses of prime to detoxify the small ammonia/nitrite readings I have had since moving the tank from a 75g to a 140g. One of the 8 new fish had some ammonia burns which cleared up after one paragard treatment. I test my RO regularly to ensure it is removing all chlorine/chloramine

[Iminit]

Ok I do believe Brian is saying don’t use salt on a regular basis. As in when doing water changes. But the fish you photographed should be put in qt and given salt.

Next you need a qt tank. 15-30g or both. It just required with discus. Right now you don’t want to treat the whole tank with meds. In a smaller tank it’s less meds and you need to remove sick looking fish before the whole tank gets sick. Now being you just added 8 discus to your cycle you may now be in a mini cycle. The new fish have added to big of a load to your existing cycle so it can’t process the waste yet. It should get through this in 2 week tops. While doing this you need to change water to keep the ammonia down. Why do you believe your tap water is bad? Do you use ro water for your drinking water or just for the tank. Test your tap for us. Do you have a api test kit? If so test the tap for everything than let the water sit for 24 hrs and test again. Give us both results.

When you went from the 75 to the 140 did you move the filter and anything else from the 75 to the 140?

[captainandy]

Daily water changes 80%

Discus are extremely hardy when water parameters are met.
Don’t add salt or anything else.
Is this fish bullied? Eating well?