Upside down Raphael cat

[wherryj]

I have a betta that developed a very well demarcated area of swollen, discolored skin and what appears to be everting scales (like a dropsy, but very discretely outlined like an erysipelas) on his ventral surface bilaterally. It is near his caudal fin and has caused his fin to essentially rot away.

This normally voraceous eater stopped eating, so I put in NeoSulfa (a combination of the usual four sulfas), and put in some Malachite green in case it was an early recurrence of the columnaris that he had earlier this year.

At this point my spotted Raphael catfish started to act strangely. He was found stuck to the inflow of my Eclipse12 intake. He would swim away when I briefly turned it off, at first briskly but then more weakly after a day or so. Tonight I found him floating upside down, breathing in an unlabored manner, but weakly swimming.

Is this related to the medication? I assume that it's some sort of swim bladder problem. Is there potentially a fix since it seems related to medication. By the way, I place the carbon back into the filter yesterday morning when he first showed signs and the tank seems cleared.

Also, any idea about the issue with the betta? He's a very special fish, and I'd like to save him if possible.

pH=7.0, NH4/NH3- =0, NO2 and NO3 barely detectable, GH=3, KH = 3.

 

[wherryj]

Well, the betta lives, but the cat died about 5 minutes after I posted this.

I'm not sure why, but he's showing signs of significant early fungal growth.

I believe that it could be our water here in town. It's fairly notorius among the LFS owners, and comes out of the tap with a pH of 8-8.5 and nitrate levels of about 10.

 

[Pufferpack]

If I had to guess I would say that the Malachite green was the probable culprit I believe the Raphael is scaleless and the Malachite green was probably too harsh for him.
I have also read that it is dangerous to mix medications in the same tank, so this may have also been the cause (I could be completely off the beam as I'm not really familure with Neo-sulfa, so keep in mind this is all just my guess)

edited for spelling

 

[BIANCA]

well your spotted raphael is scaleless and you should have used medication that was safe for scaleless fish.

 

[wherryj]

It CLAIMED to be safe, but perhaps wasn't.

I added the Malachite after both fish started to show signs of trouble, and the betta was looking more like columnaris.

He's still hanging in, though still not having an appetite, and mostly hanging out on the bottom or in one of the plants. He moves around the tank about hourly. Somewhat encouraging, but I'd like to see more improvement.

 

[wherryj]

BTW: This mixture was to try to recreate a betta specific mixture that has worked well for this fish in the past.

The LFS was out of it, but I know the ingredients and amounts. Both CLAIMED to be safe, though I can't remember if the combo product had the same claim.