Strange and varying symptoms among fish

Hi all,

I'm new here so thank you in advance for your help and support!

To start, I have a 40g tank w/ 6 mollys, 2 keyhole cichlids, an EB acara and a hoplo catfish.

The symptoms my fish are exhibiting are:
- My mollys have some orange bumps and patches on them which have been subsiding with salt treatment. One of the males is beginning to swim vertically and rest on the bottom. One of the females seems to have a slight bend in her back, but it is possible this is due to pregnancy.
- My catfish has an obvious bend in his spine that developed while I was away.

Also, I lost a firemouth a couple of months ago, he slowly "wasted" and eventually died.

My research has led me to conclude it is either fish TB, or possibly prolonged exposure to poor water parameters. The issues seem to start when I started rotational work and the tank was neglected which makes me think it is related to water quality, but at the same time some of the symptoms seem pretty consistent with fish TB.

Any thoughts or advice would be appreciated, I am now routinely cleaning and treating the tank with salt but I am worried about contracting the bacterium from the tank.

Thank you!

Could you provide photos of the affected fish?
Do you have a test kit to test the water parameters? If so please post them.
The first thing to do when you notice a disease is water changes! I cannot stress this enough! Do a 50% water change daily

Hi and welcome to the forum

Post pictures and short (1 minute) video of the fish.

Test the water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH, and post the results here.

What is the GH (general hardness), KH (carbonate hardness) of your water supply?
This information can usually be obtained from your water supply company's website or by telephoning them. If they can't help you, take a glass full of tap water to the local pet shop and get them to test it for you. Write the results down (in numbers) when they do the tests. And ask them what the results are in (eg: ppm, dGH, or something else).

Do you add salt to the tank all the time?

FISH TUBERCULOSIS (MYCOBACTERIA)

Fish can be infected with TB for months or even years before they show any signs. The most common symptoms include: the fish swelling up overnight, breathes heavily (usually at the surface or near a filter outlet), stops eating, does a stringy white poop, dies within 24 hours of showing these symptoms.

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Fish Mycobacteria (TB) is a very slow growing bacteria. Most common bacteria can double every few hours. Mycobacteria takes days or weeks to double.

In cold water, TB grows slower and goldfish can carry the bacteria for years before it affects them. In warm water, the bacteria grows quicker, but it's still a slow growing disease.

If fish are big, it takes longer for the bacteria to build up in numbers and kill the fish. A small fish has smaller organs and less bacteria are needed to damage it.

The bacteria kill the fish by destroying internal organs and causing organ failure. Basically a fish becomes infected by eating TB contaminated food or ingesting the bacteria with contaminated water. The bacteria settle into an organ somewhere in the fish's body and start growing. They grow slowly and build up over time. Eventually the bacteria damage the organ they are growing in and the fish swells up and dies.

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You can't treat fish TB because Mycobacterium cells are covered in a waxy coating, which prevents chemicals harming the bacterium and also protects it from the elements. The bacterium can remain dormant in shady areas or mud for many years. A fish health scientist I contacted about this in 2006, told me he found live but dormant fish TB in a dry river bed down south. The river had not had any water for 7 years, yet they still found live bacteria there. Hot and dry conditions kill the bacteria quicker. It dies in a couple of seconds at 60 degrees Celcius.

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People can catch fish TB, however people with a healthy immune system are less likely to develop a fish TB infection. People catch fish TB when open wounds in their skin are infected with TB contaminated water. If you wash your hands and arms with warm soapy water after working in a tank, you are less likely to contract the disease. If you have cuts, scratches, sores or any open wounds on your skin, avoid getting fish tank water on them. Wear a pr of rubber gloves or just stay out of the tank until the wounds have healed.

People with a weakened immune system (heart disease, lung problems, diabetes, cancer, HIV, old people, babies, etc), are more likely to develop localised TB infections.

If you develop any sores on your hands or arms that don't heal up normally or quickly (within 2 weeks), see your doctor and inform them that you keep aquarium fish. The doctor will probably try to put you on anti-biotics, however this is not a good idea. Ask the doctor to take a swab of the sore and send it off for testing to see what is growing in the wound. The lab should culture the swab and test various treatments on it to find out which medication will work best. The results will be sent to the doctor, along with a list of medications that treat the disease. The doctor will then find a medication that is safe and suitable for you.

Do not take anti-biotics for a small sore that hasn't healed until it has been swabbed and identified in a lab. Then take the anti-biotic that works best on that specific bacteria.

People have gone to the doctor with small sores and been put on anti-biotics before a swab was taken. The anti-biotics don't work and the bacterium simply becomes resistant to that sort of anti-biotic. Because the anti-biotics don't work, the doctor prescribes another type of anti-biotic and this continues for months with no improvement. Eventually the doctor will take a swab and send it off for culture, but that can be 6 months later and by then you have big sores on your skin that are gross and can potentially contaminate other people with open wounds.

So just make sure you tell the doctor you keep fish and want any sores swabbed and sent off for culturing before you take anti-biotics.

Before you go to the doctors, or while you're waiting for the results, you can try using raw honey. You wash the wound with warm soapy water, dry it with a tissue, then rub raw honey into the wound. Put a bandage over the wound to stop the honey going everywhere. Remove the bandage and wash the wound and re-apply honey 2 times a day. Raw honey has chemicals in it that kill viruses, fungus, and bacteria and might help with fish TB. You normally see results after 3-4 days of applying honey and you continue using it until the wounds have healed over.

I'm interested in what your pH is on this tank

Thanks for the help everybody!

The hardness of the water I am using is about 120 mg/L calcium carbonate. As for salt there is always some in the tank, usually about a tablespoon per 3-4 gallons. I am currently out of testing strips but will update with parameters soon. In the meantime, I have some photos of the fish.

Photos of the hoplo catfish with the swayed spine:


Some images of the orange bumps and dots on the mollies:


Images of the slight downward bend in one of the mollies, tough to tell in the pics but in person it is noticable:


Thanks again everybody

The bent spine in the hoplo looks genetic. The bend is too far along the body for TB, which normally occurs in the internal organs that are located further to the front of the fish.

The curved molly can be poor water quality, low GH or external protozoan infection.

The orange bump is interesting. I need more pictures and video of that. It could be a cyst or bacterial infection causing blisters. You could try moving the fish to another tank and adding more salt. Mollies can cope with 4 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres (5 gallons) of water. Keep the salt level high for 2-4 weeks and see if it helps.