Very Sick Juvenile Blue Diamond

[tyrancooper]

The runt of my group of 4 juvenile blue diamonds has protruding eyes, very dark color, loss of appetite and distended gills with what I believe to be shortened gill plates mentioned in the beginner section under "what not to buy". His scales are not protruding, so I do not know if he has "popeye" of if his eyes look the way they do due to emaciation. He is also very isolated.

Euthanasia is not my first choice!!!

In my "aquarium medicine cabinet" I have penicillin, formalin, spectrogram (a blended antibiotic), neomycin, and metronidazole.

I'd like to treat the entire tank (40 gal, planted), but I can set up a hospital tank if necessary. Along with the discus in the tank are 2 clown loaches, one SAE, two small plecos, 10 cardinals, and 5 rummy noses.

I really need some advice!

Tyra

[tyrancooper]

The reason why I want to treat the entire tank is for the following reasons:

1. all four discus came from the same source and wre the last to be added to the tank.

2. The other 3 discus are skittish, hide all the time, are very dark except for when eating, and all have one large white "speck" on them. The specks seem to be too large to be ick and there is only one speck per fish.


I do water changes once a week, but have been trying to increase that frequency to at least twice. WC's are difficult due to my work and school schedules. The temp is 84 degrees F. I've had the water tested for phosphates, ammonia, and nitrates and the results were normal.

All the other fish appear to be normal.

I am very concerned about my discus because this all appeared so suddenly (except for the skittish behavior).

Does anyone have any ideas?

Tyra

[tyrancooper]

It has been about 5 hours and I just got back in from school. My smallest discus appears to be fading fast. He seems very disoriented and is swimming/floating aimlessly around the tank. His eyes are really bulging. The other three discus are hiding.

I feel terrible.

I'm going to take him out of the tank and put him in my hospital tank with some aeration and a heater. I don't know what else to do.

Tyra

[BlueTurquoise]

Tough one Tyra,

Sorry to hear about your fish. How long have you had them for? before this happened he was fine?

I would raise the temperature slowly to 90 or there abouts and add salt (2-3 tablespoons per 10 gal). That should ease things up a little if it is not too late...

As far as the popeye is concerned, does it look anything like this:

http://members.tripod.com/discus_unlimited/images/popeye2.jpg

if so this is an advanced state of disease and it may very well be too late... :'(

Chong

[tyrancooper]

I've had the 4 blue diamonds since August, 2002. They were 2 inches when I bought them. The other three grew, but this one remained small. I read in other discussions here that runts were typical among any group of discus, so I just accepted him for what he was.

He never ate as much as the others and almost always stayed near the intake tube of the filter. I noticed that he was really not doing well early this morning.

As for the image you are showing me, I'm not very computer savvy. How can I view it?

Also, how should I deal with the tank with the other three discus?

Tyra

[Carol_Roberts]

Hi Tyra:
You may not be able to save this discus. It is very hard to raise healthy juvenile discus in a planted community tank doing water changes once a week. Discus in this situation become stressed, quit eating, hide in the back of the tank and become sick due to flagellates or bacterial infections. Yours may have both.

How big of a hospital tank do you have? Can you change water everyday?

If you have the money to automate your water change system with a holding tank and pump you could save a lot of time. Bare bottom tanks are very fast to clean.

Carol :heart1:

[BlueTurquoise]

Sorry about the pic,

please go ehre to see it:

http://members.tripod.com/discus_unlimited/images/popeye2.jpg

Chong

[tyrancooper]

When I first became interested in keeping discus, I started collecting books on the subject from LFS's. In additon to water parameters, maintenance and types of foods all of the books I read gave information on:

1. suitable plants for discus tanks
2. suitable tank mates for discus

I thought that a planted and limited community tank was the norm. One of my favorite LFS's always displays its dicus in a planted community tank and I patterned mine after theirs ( exact tank mates and all), thinking I was doing the right thing. Once I discovered "simply discus" I learned otherwise and now I feel horrible about the misinformation I received and my lack of sound knowledge.

It is possible for me to remove the 2 clown loaches and the SAE as soon as possible.. The plecos are very small and will be more of a challenge.

I only hope that my little discus is not suffering too much. I will change the water in the hospital tank every day for as long as the little guy is able to hold on.

Tyra

[BlueTurquoise]

Don't feel too bad. I started off with gravel too but I went bare bottom just before I got my first discus and since then I can't imagine how i did it with gravel *errk* the gunk that gathers there...

Anyway, sounds like you are on the right track. I would reserve one whole saturday to do it and remove all the gravel, wash out the tank, rinse the filters and start again. (you may as well go the full monty since you are going halfway there already and clean out everything.

Just take care of the filters while you are doing this so that the bacteria doesn't die.

LFS show their discus with planted tanks simply becuase it looks more acceptable as people are usually attracted to planted tanks. Care and maintenance of a planted tank is still possible but it's difficult. Bare bottom is much much easier.

I hope your fish's condition picks up! :-\

Chong

[tyrancooper]

I just got home from work. When I looked in the hospital tank I saw that my little discus had died.

I tried to feed the other 3 discus in the forty gallon tank. They will not come out to eat.

Until I am able to make some major changes in the 40 gal. tank, is there any "preventive" treatment (for infections, parasites, etc.) that I can treat the entire tank with? I'm really not sure what killed my smallest discus.

I don't know how to insert smilies, but just imagine the most sad, discouraged and depressed facial expression inserted here___. That describes the way I feel right now.

Tyra

[Carol_Roberts]

First line of defense is always extra water changes. You want to dilute the pathogens.

[fossil]

Yes, lots of water changes should help but don't go over 2 a day it could become too stressful on your discus. When my discus start looking down I just do water changes and maybe raise the temp a little bit, that makes them be happy again.

You might want to try removing the other fish, although I am new to discus they seem to do better on their own IME.
Look on the bright side with the extra room you might be able to add a couple more discus. (sorry about the lil guy)

Like everyone is suggesting you might want to keep them in a bare bottom untill they grow up a little. Also keeping them in a bare bottom with little or no decore could aslo help your discus to become more "bold." Studies have shown that fish kept in a bare bottom when young are more likely to be more active in a planted when moved to one later in life.(so you can actually see them in the planted)

PS- To insert a smilie or in your case a frowny just click on the faces to the left of the typing box it will put it in for you.


* I hope I said something that helps :) g/l with your fish

[Torben]

Hi all,

First of all, sorry to hear about your fish. I myself are experiencing some major problems that I have never experienced before in my 7 year long discus career. Somehow I have managed to get 2 different illnesses in my tank at the same time, and they do not seem to respond much to the medications I give them.

This was not the reason I am writing though.

It seems to me that almost all americans and australians keep their discus in bare tanks and see no other solution than this. I just want to tell that in Denmark, Norway and Sweden (and many other european countries) most of us raise our juveniles in planted tanks with roots and gravel, and seldom experience major problems.

I have heard of none europeans who raise their juveniles in bare tanks. However they do raise their fry in such tanks. So in my opinion it is absolutely possible to raise juveniles in planted tanks, also together with clown loaches. Just be careful how many other fish you keep since some will stress your discus.

This just to give a "danish/european" viewpoint to rasing juveniles in different tank setups.

Torben

[Monette]

We are also pretty new to the *Discus world* but I thought I would pass on some advice I received from a breeder/importer when our BD juvies stopped eating.

After going through all the normal Parameter checks (which were all okay)
He said...
1)drop ph to 6.0

2) raise temp to 90

3) salt (start w/1 TBLS per 10 gal) *plain salt*

4) keep the water clean. daily 50% w/c's replace salt with each w/c,
(that is, if you have a 20 gallon tank, you are using 1 TBLS per 10gal. so you have 2 TBLS in tank...when you do a 50% *10gal* w/c, you replace 1 TBLS.)
After a week (5 to 7 days)of high temp start dropping it by 2 degrees until you are back at 84.

5) very important...he said take away ALL hiding spots.

If they can hide...they WILL.

6) add extra air

Just thought I would share the yrs of experience that he shared with me....but in the end it's your fish, you can see them, you have to make the call. :)

Personally, don't like to jump into meds without an absolute diagnosis. Which is hard sometimes because ppl want quick fix to the problem (I am no different there)
but clean water goes a LONG WAY. ;D

Good Luck..HTH

[Carol_Roberts]

I would be very carefull about attempting to lower the pH. Unless you are very experienced and have fairly soft water you can cause more harm than good with pH swings.

Folks with naturally soft water just don't understand how hard it is to lower and stabilize the pH of well water like mine.

[tyrancooper]

Thank you so much, everybody for the information and the encouragement. Its hard when you're trying so hard to be a responsible pet owner and things still go wrong.

I'm going to carefully try some of Monette's suggestions for now. I use mainly R/O water for my water changes, but I've also started adding a little bit (3-4 gallons) of dechloriniated tap water after reading a discussion in the beginner's section.

It will be a little difficult to remove the hiding places because the tank (40 gallon breeder) is so deep from front to back.

The "Asian" fish (SAE and clown loaches) in my tank will soon be moved into a tank of their own.

If I later decide to go with a bare bottom tank, it might be easier to set the discus in a brand new tank than to tear this one down completely...

Like I've said before, I am so glad to be a part of this forum.

Tyra

[Monette]

You are absolutely correct Carol! Very important!

I apologize for not remembering to mention that, I have gotten use to our soft water in which the gh/kh ranges between 3 and 4, so going to a stable 6.0 is a little easier.

In fact when we were trying to raise the ph it was much harder!

Good luck Tyra

Please also remember that you still need to do what you think is best. Watch for any other signs.