Adf Injury

[0241135]

Request Help: Adf wound

Tank size: 5g
pH: 7.5
ammonia: 0
nitrite:
nitrate:
kH:
gH:
tank temp: 78

Fish Symptoms (include full description including lesion, color, location, fish behavior):

I have a female ADF that seems to have nose-dived into the gravel or somehow cut her nose. I noticed it a week and a half ago as an inflamed nostril and did and immediate water change to prevent infection. It has gotten worse and I started using Melafix on tuesday to help her pull through. The tank is over a year old and is well cycled. The thing that bothers me now is I think the Melafix is affecting her sense of smell because she is not eating anymore or even looking, neither is my healthy male! Should I stop using it?? ANY idea of what I can use on her and I can isolate her but I thought it would stress her out and she may make it worse... other option is to move the healthy male to a different tank while treating the female. Either way she is still being affected by the melafix I am pretty sure. They are still a healthy weight but havent really eaten for two days since I started treating them.

NOTE: the assassin snail can still smell out the bloodworms though... just the frogs don't seem to be registering to all the hints of food being there (i turn the light on, turn the filter off and lift the lid. The frogs usually know this is feeding time and if they don't figure that out, usually the smell of food gets them out) Today my male did find the food after two hours

Volume and Frequency of water changes: 25%- 40% once a week (depending on how much food is left over) but the treatment doesnt want me to change the water until next tuesday so it will go a week and a half till I can change it.

Chemical Additives or Media in your tank: added melafix on tuesday, no charcoal in filter just cheesecloth to catch debris

Tank inhabitants: two adfs, one assasin snail, pond snails

Recent additions to your tank (living or decoration): none

Exposure to chemicals: melafix

Digital photo (include if possible):
http/i1023.photobucket.com/albums/af357/Mconroy17/Snapbucket/8CFF48E3-orig.jpg
http/i1023.photobucket.com/albums/af357/Mconroy17/Snapbucket/35C0E85A-orig.jpg

 

[0241135]

Well the male ate again today (took him almost two hours again) and the assassin snail figured it out right away but my female didnt eat. She still seems a fine weight but her nose seems to be more red now. I took out the anubias plants in there and left her the two terracotta plants just so I can see her more without stressing her out too much. I also turned the filter down so she can float better but I don't see any progress... should I use something else other than melafix? The emergency forum seems a little slow so any help would be greatly appreciated...

http/i1023.photobucket.com/albums/af357/Mconroy17/Snapbucket/855A83EF-orig.jpg

this was her this morning.

 

[Athena]

Hi - how is your ADF today?

From the pics it looks as though she has reddened patches elsewhere on her body (e.g. legs and back) so it may be that the nose injury has caused a bacterial infection to develop.

Yes, the nose injuries can happen when they crash into the gravel substrate (they are not very good swimmers, as you know, and after swimming upwards for air they tend to nose-dive and clumsily crash land). It might be an idea to change your substrate to sand, to prevent this happening.

Anyway, for now I would do a good water change and then use a good anti-bac med (the one I use is Myxazin). Don't bother with the Melafix, it's not a strong enough anti-bac to deal with any serious problems, plus some aquatic life find it rather harsh and irritating on their skin. That's not to say I don't ever use it - I do but only for certain things like nipped fish fins and even then I use half dosages.

Regards, Athena

 

[0241135]

Thank you so much for the reply, it's not getting any better and I put the charcoal back in the filter to see if it helps her appetite. I do think she ate a little bit and the male found the food right away thank goodness. I will go out this afternoon and see the medicine you mentioned and maybe that will help.
As for the gravel, I was worried about impacting with sand? Do you think sand is safer? I do feed them on a terra-cotta plate so that would help aviod impaction. Moving them to another container for feeding is impossible because they just don't eat. But if you really think so then maybe I should change the substrate.

http/i1023.photobucket.com/albums/af357/Mconroy17/Snapbucket/026BA57F-orig.jpg

 

[0241135]

Well... Did some snooping around and it sounds like in Canada you cannot buy antibacterial medicine for fish from the pet store... so I called all the vets in my phone book and no one has any -.- so I am kind of bummed. I started another round of melafix for now and gave her a good water change... I hope she can pull through

 

[0241135]

Well I brought my male home and put him in my tank at home. He sang allll night looking for her (kept me up alot of the night lol) so i think I am going to have to move the tank out of the bedroom.

She doesnt look any better this morning, it actually looks like its taking over her whole nose and she just floats at the top the poor thing. Is she suffering? Is there something I can maybe apply directly on her nose? I did find a little bit of medicine at petsmart including E.M. Erythromycin but from my research I think its toxic to frogs.

They carry some of this kind of medicine so if anyone knows if anything in this line is ok for frogs can you let me know? Im willing to spend the $16 dollars on her.

http/www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=10850834&keepsr=0&clickid=prod_cs

I couldnt get a very good picture of her today as I think I spooked her.

http/i1023.photobucket.com/albums/af357/Mconroy17/Snapbucket/D8CE4088-orig.jpg

 

[Athena]

Hello again! Is there any way you could take the frog into your local vets for their opinion? I really can't comment on the Erythromycin as I've never used it. I did a quick search online but comments about it seem a bit vague with some saying yes it's ok to use and others saying it's toxic to ADFs. I read that Maracyn 2 is ok to use but, again, I've not used this med so can't give my personal experience of it.

If the frog has a damaged nose then she may have lost her sense of smell and, hence, why she cannot locate food easily and it may be painful for her when trying to eat.

If the problem isn't treated with the correct medication soon, I don't hold out much hope for this poor froggy.

There is someone on the forums who is quite knowledgeable about ADFs and ACFs (forum name of Jenste I think). Have a look on the other forum named "Invertebrates, Amphibians and Aquatic Repties" and scroll down a bit then you will see a post by Jenste titled "I'm back" - you could try sending her a PM, or post a note on that forum board with a link to these current posts and mention you're in desperate need of urgent help.

In the meantime, keep your water pristine by doing small daily changes.

Wish I could help you more!

Regards, Athena