Please Help, Sick Gourami

[aimee]

Hi, if anyone can help me i'd really appreciate it.
first off, i don't have a full water testing kit right now, i will go to the shop tomorrow and get as much as i can for the problem. i'm really sorry. My nitrites are 0. I usually do a 15% water change once a week.

I have had two dwarf gourami deaths in as many weeks and my last remaining one is sick too.

the first one died from an undiagnosed disease, he basically wasted away over a long period of time. any opinions? i was worried it was tb?

just as he died, my strongest and largest dwarf developed a pink sore on his upper lip. it did not get better or worse as i treated with melafix. I dosed for 3 days and did a water change. then i noticed he was doing clear stringy poo. i got worried and my lfs told me to try interpret no.9. i dosed the tank but later that day he got really bloated, lost his balance, and keeled over and died!

i performed a 40% water change. now, two days later, my last gourami is doing weird poos too. Earlier today it was long, partly brown and partly clear. Now i just noticed it is solid (not clear any more) but quite red/brown. He also has a mark on his tail that looks like it might be thinning into a hole, is this tail rot?

I realise my tank water is surely unhealthy, and I will do a water change again. I know I should be more prepared for this (test kit/quarantine tank). All the other tankmates seem fit and healthy- my female guppy even gave birth unexpectedly a few days ago. I would just really appreciate some help and advice on medicating.

Sorry sorry for the essay. One last question I have a filter that takes prepackaged refils that contain carbon. Is it really ok to remove the whole thing while treating a tank as i was told on another forum?

 

[stang1]

Dwarf Gouramies are prone to bacterial infections and sadly don't seem to live very long. Most people avoid them as it is a common occurence, a better choice would be parkling or Honey Gouramies.
It's definitely worth investing in a liquid test kit so you can keep an eye on your water quality. As long as you are performing water changes weekly and not overfeeding, then your water quality should be ok.
I'm not sure on what medication to use as most of them seem ineffective when it comes to this infection. We tried two or three different ones but none of them worked.

 

[-germ-]

Everything sounds synonymous with serious bacterial infection possibly as well as a parasite.
The likely reason your guppies are fine, as mentioned by Stang, is that Dwarves appear to have an inherent weakness to bacterial infection.
The best you can do without access to a quarantine is water change daily (20%) with a gravel vac, try feeding the gourami mushed up pea and as long as no bloating is shown maybe a tiny bit of prawn....
If you didn't remove the carbon for the first treatment then it would most likely have proved inneffective.
Considering a fish died during treatment i'd try a half dosage to begin with.
As long as there is other media in the filter aside from the carbon (floss, sponge etc) removing the carbon should be fine.

 

[Spooky76]

Someone else posted in here about this not long ago. I had the same with mine (Hence my sig went from 2 dwarfs to 0). Nothing you can do really. Mine just seemed to go downhill over about 3/4 weeks then died.

His colour was OK, but I did notice he stayed around the top, not moving much for long periods. Even my honey gourami died shortly after.

I saved my last gourami, using Interpet Internal bacteria medication, and my last one seems to be OK. I think what stang1 said is a good suggestion. If they die, dont get anymore, get some honeys as mine is quite small, pearl, 3 spot and such like can get very big.

I would serioulsy get a testing kit, they last for about 100-200 tests and could save you alot of expense and heartache. Just dont get the strips they are cack, liquid are far better.

 

[aimee]

Thank you so much for your replies, I really appreciate it. I will, probably like many people, stay away from dwarves from now on. I thought it was a water quality problem but like you said Stang, I do change the water each week and only feed once a day, with frozen bloodworms every few days for my little clawed frog. I don't know. I will keep an eye on him and try the Interpret medicine again.
As for my filter, this is my concern - it has a bio foam pre-filter thing and then simply takes a single filter pad which also contains the carbon. So were i to remove this there would be nothing to filter the water. Obviously this is a rather simple and crap filter. I wasn't aware of any of this stuff when I got my tank.