dark fish, white fungus eyes and body

[hostaman]

HELP, I have a 55 gal. tank that I keep at 86-87 f, I have performed a water change of about thirty percent every other day. Friday I performed a water change like usual,and saturday morning half the fish are dark in color,have whitish blotches on there bodies, also there tail fins have small tan to white colored spots, not like ick, larger. Now there eyes are turning greyish white, fungus looking.What do I do and what seems to be the problem.I havee added salt to the tank on saturday after a 50 percent water change. I feed mostly frozen beef heart mix, except last weak I started feeding freeze dried blood worms(tetra) as a treat only.They are also rubbing up against things as if scratching an itch.
Please advice me if you can, fish are 9 month old
thankyou Hostaman

[BlueTurquoise]

Hi Hostaman,

Frees dried bloodworms if they have been thawed accidently in the past and refrozen can have a deadly amount of bacteria growth on them. I would suspect the worms for the cause if there has been no other changes to your setup (such as adding new fish).

Stop the blood worm feeding (if it is that, throw them out!), I would raise the temperature to 89-90F during your salt treatment (slowly raise it over 1 or 2 days), do daily water changes of 50% (don't forget to replace the salt lost during changes) or more for a few days (3-5 days) until you see improvement. I would wipe down the insides of your tank, heater chords, check filters and make sure everything is clean during the treatment, just in case. If the heat and salt is not enough for them to come around then you may want to look into medication but I am willing to bet that it will do the trick to turn their condition around if it is bacterial related.

Thaw a piece of the blood worm in a plastic bag or whatever. If the worms stink (and I mean a pretty bad smell) then that is a good indication that they are bad. Personally I would buy Hikari brand bu overall I am very weary about frozen BW in general.

Good luck with your fish!
Chong

[Carol_Roberts]

If bloodworms are freeze dried they are dry - not frozen. My discus won't eat freeze dried food.

Do you have gravel/plants/other fish?

Added anything new added to tank?

Maybe external parasites where high heat and salt will help, maybe not. Hard to guess at this point.

Is it like this? http://forum.simplydiscus.com//index.php?board=4;action=display;threadid=1077;sta rt=0

[hostaman]

Thankyou for the interest and advice. The tank is bare bottom,with only a sponge filter, and a acura submersible heater. No new fish.The parents were blue diamond but only several of these look like the parents , the rest look like a turquise of some type. They are about 4-4.5 inches and were looking good until now . I sure don't want to loose them. There are 11 of them in the tank. I added two tablespoons of salt per 10 gal and did a 50% water change , I also raised the heat to around 90 degrees. They still have a good appetite as of this writing. I try to feed 3 times a day (beefheart mixture).
thankyou Brent

[fcdiscus]

I would increase that salt dosage to a tablespoon per gallon. Or for every two gallons if you feel more confident in that. It should help. Frank

[brewmaster15]

Hi Brent,
What you are dealing with sounds to me like its an external protozoan. maybe the early stages of blue slime disease, or velvet. Fungus infections don't look like what you are describing and rarely cause cloudy eyes. Bacteria is possible, but doesn't look like what you saw on the tail.

My suggestion is to look up protozoan ailments and see if the fish in your tanks match. If they do, you may want to try one of these....a malachite green/ formalin (quick cure) based medicine, clout, or maracide. Copper is an option I know at least one breeder here uses, but you need to pay close attention to your pH/hardness as it can be toxic if used wrong. If you chose to try it let me know and I'll ask him to help you with it.

I would up my water changes to 50%-75% daily, shut all lights , and you can salt as Frank suggested at 1 tablespoon /1 gal water.

hth,
al

[EthanCote.com]

Hi Hostaman,

From your description, I would also check up on velvet disease as a probable curprit.

I would check your water for anything out of the ordinary. It appears all this occurs after your WC.

Did you do something else out of the ordinary? Did you accidentally used infected equipments (such as cleaning hose) during your cleaning??

I wish you luck and keep us posted.


Cheerio,

Chi.

brew, IMO, Velvet is very rare in tanks that have not been below 82 degrees for any length of time. I personally have not heard of it in 86-87 degree temps. I would say it is bacterial with secondary parasitic infestation. At this point--without seeing the fish--it is hazarding a guess. Where's the flashlight---I'm in the dark? Joe ???

[hostaman]

The fish appear to be improving, I added the salt and increased the temp to 90-92 ° f. Doing 50 % water changes daily.The cloudy fungus looking growth is still on the Eyes of the fish that have it, and does concern me, I also saw a very small 1/4 inch long ,and as thin as a hair worm wiggle in the water, what might that be? I was also wondering what you recommend for the number of fish and size of fish in 55gal tank. I have 11 that are about 4-4.5 inches and growing in the tank. I do have a 135 gal tank available if needed, but I do not like the thought and pain of water changes and upkeep on the the larger tank. Any Suggestions? I have no water holding resevoirs, tanks are in different rooms due to space, so all the water is bucketed from the sink.
thankyou Brent

[peety]

I indeed got velvet in tanks that were always set to 30. Killed my fish fairly rapidly and had a post mortem done to confirm. :'(

I also had a fish with cloudy eye. It is caused by a parasite that is carried by snails. Mine came in on some new plants. I still haven't been able to kill all the snails in my tanks so have started new bb tanks for my discus. Copper was the only cure that cleared the eye but you need to be very careful on doses. Furan-2 says it works but I had no luck. The copper did a great job but it took me too long to get some so it didn't clear the eye entirely.

PS I have also caused cloudy eye on my fish when transferring them in nets (they scratch their eyes) but that goes pretty quickly, if its a parasite you should notice some spots within the clouding...

Good Luck