Julio Cory dying?

[PygmyPepperJulli]

There is something wrong with my tank (or I’m just cursed)

Woke up this morning with Julii Cory lying on it’s side. Can still swim properly, however, it occasionally lolls over and lies sideways. Doesn’t look good.
It seems perfectly healthy other than slightly more orange gills, but I’m pretty sure it’s not ammoniq poisoning.

Am doing a large water change and quarantined it.

What could be the issue? Other than the swimming (but it can still swimming pretty well) it doesn’t have any of the symptoms of the dead neon.

Please help

 

[Obsessed with fish]

Can you please send photos of the fish, What are your water parameters and did you cycle your tank and for how long.

 

[Fishmanic]

You need a test kit to test for ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. You want to be more than "pretty sure it's not ammonia poisoning." You want to be 100% sure that it's not ammonia poisoning by properly testing the water.

 

[Colin_T]

The following are questions but my keyboard is stuffed so I can't put a question mark after them.

Any pictures and video of the fish.

In your other thread you mentioned you were on tank water. Is the rainwater tank lined with plastic or is it galvanised on the inside

Have you checked the rainwater tank for something that might have died in it
We used to get the odd reptile or bird that would drown in the rainwater tank and they can produce a lot of ammonia and bacteria.

Are there any farms that might be spraying chemicals around the area

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Ok…

Yes I’ve cycled the tank, it’s about a year and a bit old

I’m pretty certian it’s not ammonia poisoning because when I say ‘slightly more orange gills’ I mean, not red or even light pink, I can‘t even assure you they weren’t like that to start with, it is literally a really really tiny difference, just mentioned it in case it might help. It also does not have any red streaking or cloudy eyes, however I realise sitting motionless is a symptom.

Unfortunately, I cannot give you my parameters as I don’t have a test kit (I am very aware I need one, I’m saving up and will try to get to a pet shop to test it ASAP, but I can’t drive). I know the a/n/n SHOULD be low though because due to another post I just did a 75% water change.

As for the water tank- No, there would not be a dead bird or something in it, I can’t actually check and that’s how I’m sure, it’s a sealed and filtered tank that collects stuff off our roof and the roof of the shed. The closest thing might be any bird/bat poop that was on the roof, but again the water’s filtered, so rule that out. No pesticides. I’m pretty sure it’s lined with plastic? (It’s a plastic tank).

It honestly looks really healthy, but this morning I walked in and it was lying on it’s side and barely breathing (cue panic). It moved around feebly a bit, and when it went up to the surface to have some air (that’s normal, they don’t do it frequently and I don’t have a dissolved oxygen problem) it span around and kind of fell upside down a bit as it went back to the bottom.

I can’t post pictures at the moment (long story) but there would be nothing significant anyway- just a pretty normal looking Cory sitting on the floor, not really moving, with maybe very slightly orangy gills if you were looking at it reaaaaally hard. It doesn’t move, even when I put the net in (it might swim away very feebly but not really trying very hard). Am thinking about just putting it back in the tank, but am also very paranoid, so maybe not.

Thanks guys for answering

Edit- now it has a yellowy patch just behind the gills?!? (Again, very very pale, but def there). I’m looking up symptoms now.

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Uh oh…. Is this velvet? (Photo permission granted)

Now I’m really panicking because I did the darkness treatment in my main tank and one of my other Cories (pepper) has a greeny shine near the gills, which I think is normal, but it’s has some gold as well. I’ve never had velvet, pls confirm.

How to treat? I heard raising the water temp and black-outs are effective? I’ll do another water change as well and maybe quarantine the other fish if you guys think it has it. (I’ll try and get a pic). I also heard about using salt, but considering they’re Cories, I don’t think that’s an option. And just when the neon died too… I’m NOT having a good week in regard to fish.

The problem is, I can’t raise the temp in the container because I don’t have a heater… can I put it in a plastic bag and float the bag in the water maybe? And seeming as a fish in the main tank has it (maybe), should I put the qt one back in and threat them all at once, since the tank probably already has it? Not good.

Maybe that’s just what Cories look like?? None of the neons seem to have it…

 

[Lcc86]

I don't have any suggestions for what it might be but considering you lost a tetra already this week there could be something affecting your tank. Without a test kit it's hard to know if it's a water quality issue or something else. Fish are good at hiding issues for a while and we think they're OK.

Large daily water changes may help as you are overstocked, is there any way you can get hold of some bottled water to help? Unfortunately your situation is far from ideal with limited access to water and no test kit so this is all guesswork to an extent.

You can use salt with cories but again large water changes are going to be needed with salt treatment, and without knowing what the problem is it may not help.

Has anything else changed in the tank recently?

 

[Colin_T]

The julii or whatever it is appears to be really skinny. It could be dying from lack of blood caused by intestinal worms or gill flukes.

The yellow on its belly could be a bacterial infection or colouration. It's unlikely to be velvet unless you have added new fish in the last month.

Velvet causes fish to rub on objects, breath heavily, and in later stages the fish can develop a yellow or gold sheen to part of their body.

 

[GaryE]

That is a misshapen Cory that has been ill for a long time to be like that. It looks to me like a chronic illness or parasite arriving at its end game.

I could go digging for your other posts to understand your tank(s), but could you just give an idea of size, stocking and species in there? The julii is probably a trilineatus, for as much as that matters. But the first thing to establish is whether the death of the neon and the impending death of the Corydoras (sorry, but he's in a bad way) are related.

So, what species?
When did you acquire them (very important);
what size tank;
what numbers of each fish;
what feeding routine, and with what?

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

I haven’t really seen it flashing or anything. The Cory isn’t actually as skinny as it looks in the photo, it was due to the light I was shining on it. I wouldn’t say it looks malnourished, but it isn’t eating at the moment. I have added fish in the last month… the fish affected is actually new, but hasn’t shown any symptoms before now like what you said lcc86.

how likely is it if it’s velvet? Is the gold sheen velvet-ish? (Sorry the picture qualities are bad)

If it is velvet, I was planning on blacking out the tank and maybe increasing the temperature, but I don’t want to do anything drastic, and I don’t have meds either. Could I add it to the tank in a plastic bag or something so it doesn’t use the same water but has the advantage of the heater? Or just add it to the tank? (I’m thinking if that fish has it, the whole tank might, but also don’t want to add it in case it doesn’t).

If it’s bacterial, what would you suggest?
And if it’s colouration, suggestions on it’s I’m dying state?

Thanks for the speedy replies, sorry this one took so long my device went flat halfway through the message.

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Ok… (pls don’t get mad and say it’s overstocked, I already knew that)

10 gal heavily planted Tank (my first and only) with

9 neons (one died recently of suspected parasite/worm thingo, which was the other thread)
3 Pygmy cories
3 pepper cories
2 julii (or trilineatus, i had been wondering if it was a false julii)

I obtained the pepper and julii Cories around three weeks ago (don’t ask, we went for one more Pygmy because one died via filter and despite my protests came out with 5 fish). They were all healthy after a very intense check-up by me, but fish hide diseases very well.

I feed them alternate days with Hikari sinking wafers and micro pellets (both protein based) and in summer I breed mosquito larvae, but they haven’t had that in ages (about 8 months)

I repeat, the Cory is not super skinny. I’ll attach a proper photo of it without the velvet investigation light. (Again, not a great photo, but you get the idea).

Also, when I was trying to take photos, he started swimming, which is good… the only problem is he’s swimming like he’s having a seizure (going upside down and in circles and stuff)

 

[Lcc86]

Ok… (pls don’t get mad and say it’s overstocked, I already knew that)

10 gal heavily planted Tank (my first and only) with

9 neons (one died recently of suspected parasite/worm thingo, which was the other thread)
3 Pygmy cories
3 pepper cories
2 julii (or trilineatus, i had been wondering if it was a false julii)

I obtained the pepper and julii Cories around three weeks ago (don’t ask, we went for one more Pygmy because one died via filter and despite my protests came out with 5 fish). They were all healthy after a very intense check-up by me, but fish hide diseases very well.

I feed them alternate days with Hikari sinking wafers and micro pellets (both protein based) and in summer I breed mosquito larvae, but they haven’t had that in ages (about 8 months)

I repeat, the Cory is not super skinny. I’ll attach a proper photo of it without the velvet investigation light. (Again, not a great photo, but you get the idea).

Also, when I was trying to take photos, he started swimming, which is good… the only problem is he’s swimming like he’s having a seizure (going upside down and in circles and stuff)

He still looks skinny in that picture too your overstocking issue is what it is at this point, I think the bigger worry is whether these new additions have introduced some kind of disease. Your tetra seemed to have quite different symptoms so it could be totally unrelated and just a coincidence. Do you have any pictures of the other fish you could share? People may be able to spot something. If this fish isn't eating he's unlikely to recover. It may be less stressful to put him back in your main tank but see what other people recommend. If it's a parasite they may all have it by now anyway.

 

[GaryE]

The fish, a male, is still very thin. That probably dates back to the store or the farm, and not to you. The indicator is the size of the eye relative to the body. that says a fish wasn't well fed or was sick in it's early days, as a pre-sale sized juvenile.

I see no velvet. It's a creature I know well because I too have soft water, and it thrives in low mineral conditions. It needs light, but this parasite doesn't vanish with darkness alone. That's a wishful myth popular right now online. People latch on to easy solutions and broadcast them, especially when they fear meds. I wish these things worked, but they don't.

I use darkness and a med with formalin. Formalin is nasty stuff, but velvet is nastier. Salt will slow its spread, but it is also bad for Corys, and doesn't eliminate the parasite. But I don't think that's your issue.

You recently bought new fish. Probably, you bought them online, sight unseen. The seller said the Corys were julii, a very rare species when he/she could have told you the real species name quite easily. That raises flags. Plus, a certain percentage of farmed fish are always sick, and you almost always lose some.

We're well trained, somehow, to assume we buy healthy fish and are killing them with uncycled tanks. But if your tank is cycled, no problem there. You can get a test kit to learn how the cycle works if you are chemistry inclined. Or you can change 40-50% of the water in that tank EVERY week without fail, since it could be overstocked even if I'm not supposed to say that. It can be managed easily.

It's good to know the quality of your water to start, but the tests are pricey in Canada, and I assume where you are too. I don't do a urine test on my puppy before I take her out, and I don't test my tanks before I do my weekly change. People somehow think a water change is an awful chore that eats up time, but I take my dog out many times a day and spend more time every day on caring for her than I do in a week of fishtanks.

I wouldn't treat, as panic treatments accomplish little good. I would take a strong light, sharper than your phone, and direct it along the area behind the heads of your fish with the lights out. In North America we'd call it a penlight or a flashlight. You may use "torch", which to me is what villagers chase Frankenstein's creature with. If you see a velvety textured coppery film on the spine between the head and the dorsal, it's velvet. You may also see a whitish version, a similar parasite. But I'm hoping you won't.

 

[Colin_T]

if the fish is swimming weird, we need a video of it

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Ok, thank you all so, so much for your responses, and especially for all that info GaryE

I checked my fish again with my ‘flashlight’, then (haha, this made me smile) and, hooray I think, it’s not textured as such. All the sources I read just said something along the lines of ‘gold or red shimmering stuff that you see when you turn the light on it in a dark room’. It’s more like sparkling gold dust, and as far as I can see not raised at all. So, not velvet? Is it just in dire scents from the Cory’s plating? (Hope so ) HOWEVER, all of my neons have a gold-ish line that runs along the very center of their spines. It’s completely strait and unbroken, upraised and seems to be under the skin, so I’m thinking it’s not velvet and is more like a tiny different coloured version of their main stripe. If anyone on this thread has neons, can you shine a light on them to see if they have the same thing?

Back to the Cory- I’m not sure why it’s acting unhealthy then. Again, none of the other fish are showing signs, but I said that just before this incident, so who really knows. Like GaryE said, it might be a producer thing.

I do do water changes every week (I did around 25% before it was overstocked, but now thanks to the other thread I’m trying to do 40-50 each week). So, although I will try to get a kit at some point, thank you so much about that (and I didn’t mind that you said my tank was overstocked, I was more concerned that I would be trashed (although the people on this forum are really good) about an issue I was already aware of and actively trying to solve).

The fish has been eating pretty well in the actual tank, it’s probably not eating at the moment because the poor thing is by itself in a small glass container with no heater. I’m considering putting it back in tomorrow (In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a slightly trigger-happy quarantiner due to an infestation of NTD in my first few weeks of Fishkeeping I’ll never forget. I‘m thee equivalent of that one person that let’s their kid stay home because they sneezed (precovid) ).

I wouldn’t actually mind about them mislabeling the false Julii as a Julii, except they totally scammed us and made us pay $50 (AUS, don’t know what that is in American money). Hmph.

THANK YOU ALL for your amazing advice (and Colin I’ll try to get a vid)