Clown Catfish (i Think) Strange Covering

[MrWhipster]

Request Help

Sorry dont have a full suite of testing kits.

Tank size:36 x 15 x 15
pH:8.0
ammonia:0.6
nitrite: ?
nitrate: < 0.1 mg/l
kH: ?
gH: Dont know but live in hard water area
tank temp:26C

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

Only one fish, the Clown Catfish, showing visible signs of some kind of disease. Yellow crusting over whole body. All other fish are ok. except for very occasional rubbing against things in the tank. Other fish have no visible sign of any problem. All fish are feeding quite happily. Clown Catfish did hide under a rock for a few days but has now ventured out into open water and seems content clinging to the internal filter, occassionaly swimmnig around for a few minute or two.

Volume and Frequency of water changes:

29 UK Gallon - weekly approx 1/5 change

Chemical Additives or Media in your tank:

Carbon filter pad in Ehiem Pro II external filter
I also use a Fluval 304 internal filter as a backup

Tank inhabitants:

5 Catfish (1 x Cuckoo , 1 x Royal Pleco, Clown Cat?, 2 x not sure)
13 x Malawi Cichlid

Recent additions to your tank (living or decoration):

8 young Malawi Cichlids about 4 weeks ago. All surviving with no casualties yet.
Ocean Rock about 4 weeks ago

Exposure to chemicals:

None to my knowledge


Digital photo (include if possible):

 

[tttnjfttt]

Wow! A newbie who read the pinned article! I am truley impressed. There are multiple things to talk about here - stocking levels, identifying your cichlids, water chemistry, cycling, and also the disease (adressing these now will help avoid future problems).

Looking at your water stats, you REALLY need to get a nitrite level on your tank. The reason I am saying this is you still have ammonia in your tank, and your nitrate level is VERY low. This means your tank is still cycling (the process by which bacteria grow to break down the waste). The essentials is fish produce ammonia, which is turned into nitrIte, and an end product is nitrAte. Ammonia and nitrite are both toxic to fish, and cause stress. How long has your tank been set up for?

The symptoms you are describing - a yellow crusting and flashing (scratching) are very consistant with a disease called Velvet. Velvet is a parasite, similar to ich. This is very contagious, so you will need to treat the entire tank, not just the infected fish. It has begun to spread as you have seen other fish flashing. To treat it, you will need an anti-parasite medicine. I have used copper safe before with good results. This med can also be added at full strength for scaleless fish, wich is somethign you need to be careful with since you have the cats in your tank.

The last issue I want to adress is stocking levels and needing to identify your african cichlids. African Cichlids are a very diverse group fish with very diverse needs. Some are herbavores, others are carnivores. Some are EXTREMELY agressive, others are more tame, yet still considered agressive. Some stay around a few inches, others grow to be over 12". One of my biggest pet peeves is pet stores that sell mixed cichlids. It is very important to know what you have in your tank. Knowing what to provide for your fish as well as knowing how large they will grow is very important. If you don't know, post some pix in the african cichlids section, they are very knowledgable there and can help you figure out what you have in your tank and if you are over stocked.

 

[MrWhipster]

Wow! A newbie who read the pinned article! I am truley impressed. There are multiple things to talk about here - stocking levels, identifying your cichlids, water chemistry, cycling, and also the disease (adressing these now will help avoid future problems).

Looking at your water stats, you REALLY need to get a nitrite level on your tank. The reason I am saying this is you still have ammonia in your tank, and your nitrate level is VERY low. This means your tank is still cycling (the process by which bacteria grow to break down the waste). The essentials is fish produce ammonia, which is turned into nitrIte, and an end product is nitrAte. Ammonia and nitrite are both toxic to fish, and cause stress. How long has your tank been set up for?

The symptoms you are describing - a yellow crusting and flashing (scratching) are very consistant with a disease called Velvet. Velvet is a parasite, similar to ich. This is very contagious, so you will need to treat the entire tank, not just the infected fish. It has begun to spread as you have seen other fish flashing. To treat it, you will need an anti-parasite medicine. I have used copper safe before with good results. This med can also be added at full strength for scaleless fish, wich is somethign you need to be careful with since you have the cats in your tank.

The last issue I want to adress is stocking levels and needing to identify your african cichlids. African Cichlids are a very diverse group fish with very diverse needs. Some are herbavores, others are carnivores. Some are EXTREMELY agressive, others are more tame, yet still considered agressive. Some stay around a few inches, others grow to be over 12". One of my biggest pet peeves is pet stores that sell mixed cichlids. It is very important to know what you have in your tank. Knowing what to provide for your fish as well as knowing how large they will grow is very important. If you don't know, post some pix in the african cichlids section, they are very knowledgable there and can help you figure out what you have in your tank and if you are over stocked.

Thanks for your response. I'll try and fill in some of the blanks you pointed out.

The tank was purchased as a secondhand setup in January. I reused most of the original water and refilled to about half and the rest with new water. I put the fish in and they were all happy until the beginning of March. I had in total 7 catfish and 10 cichlids.

I have since removed 1 clown catfish like this one only about twice as big. My father-in-law was very happy with his new fish. it was a nice looking fish and is still going strong. I have also removed to another new tank a large adult Blue Dolphin Cichlid, an adult Livistonee Cichlid, a female johanni and a large shieldheaded catfish (don't know what it is yet). The Dolphin was costantly attacking the Livistonee, plus I had a male Johanni which was harrassing the female Johanni. The fish I have removed are in smaller 20" x 12" tank and need to be moved to somewhere, yet to be decided.

I then introduced 8 small mixed Cichlids bought from the Fish store. I bought 8 with a view that some might not survive. However all have survived and a quite happy and have never been harrassed by their tank mates. I'll try and get photos of all the fish and post them in the Cichlid forum to get them all identified.

I did a water change of about 15%. I used a vaccuum gravel cleaner and cleaned all the rocks and ornamants (in the removed tank water). I also cleaned the Ehiem Pro II external filter and replaced the filter pads. I have not touched the Fluval internal filter for now.

What can I do to get the nitrate levels up? I'm using Stress Coat when I do water changes. This is supposed to have friendly bacteria to help the tank bacteria levels.

I'm going to redo the tests tonight to see how things are now. I'll post the results later on.

 

[tttnjfttt]

Unfortunately, there isn't much you can do to speed up the cycle. Most products that claim to have beneficial bacteria in them are worthless. Stress coat, which you are using as a dechlorinator, claims to also help with the health of the bacteria. I am not sure if that will actually help or not, the best thing you can do is plenty of water changes and watch the levels. It is very important to find out your nitrIte levels.

My guess is when you changed the filter pads, you removed alot of the beneficial bacteria, causing the mini-cycle you are currently experiencing. In the future, you never want to completely replace your filter material, especially the pad where teh bacteria grow on. If it gets clogged up, shake it out in old tap water and put it back in.

Good luck!

Looking above the dorsal fin, is the light pink patch his natural coloring or is that an open wound? I just noticed it in the picture.

 

[MrWhipster]

There is no open sore by the dorsal fin that I can see. He is hiding at the moment. When he pops out again I'll try and get a better photo.

 

[tttnjfttt]

Ok, i wouldn't be too worried, just saw the color difference. The other photo is clear enough to catch the velvet, just the color difference and it looked indented, so wanted to make sure.

 

[MrWhipster]

Hi,

New tank stats:

Tank size:36 x 15 x 15
pH: 7.2
ammonia: 0
nitrite: 0
nitrate: 250 mg/l
kH: 3
gH: > 16
tank temp:26C

I'm using a new testing kit so that might explain the pH level being so different.

The gH and the Nitrate are on the high side. Is there anything I can do to lower the Nitrate, or is this ok. The testing kit says that around 50mg/L is ideal.

I used some interpet Anti-Slime and Velvet, left it 48 hours and did a water change. He is looking much better and he is much more lively now. I've moved him to another tank now, along with the other large catfish. The incidences of itching and scratching are much less now. If anything the behaviour of the cichlids has switched to mating shimmering and dancing.

The only other thing I can see really wrong with the clown is that one of his gills is considerably more open than the other and the insides look red. I'm thinking he has got some kind of gill problem. I'll try and get a good close up picture. Tricky since he wont stay still long enough to get a good one.

 

[tttnjfttt]

Ok - what type of test kits were used for the first results and then for the second. Also, is it possible you confused nitrIte and nitrAte in the first post? It doesnt make sense to have the nitrates jump from trace amounts to over 250.

What is your tank maintence routine? How much do you feed the fish? 250 is extremely high, to the point where it can begin to do damage. In general, you want to keep it below 40. The exception to this is if you live in an area with high nitrates in the tap water. What are your tap water nitrates? Even though this is no where near ideal, you don't want to make any drastic changes. Begin daily water changes, no more than 10% to begin with. Also do a very good gravel vac as decaying foods will lead to increased nitrates. Keep working with the cichlid people to determine if your tank is over stocked, as an over stocked tank will also have very high nitrates.

As for the gills being open wide and red, that means he is having trouble breathing and is gasping. There is a range of possible causes from bacterial to parasitic to water quality. It is possible the high nitrates are the cause, but i would first rule out other possible causes. Do you still see the clown pleco flashing? Is he trying to rub stuff off his gills? If so, that probably means there is either some velvet living in his gills or another parasite (gill flukes). Are the edges of his gills discollered in any way other than red?