My second gold ram is now experiencing the same respiratory distress that the first one showed. I don't know what to do.
I had pulled the sick ram out and put him into a hospital tank. The remaining three would periodically scratch in the gravel but aside from that, showed no other signs of illness. I thought I had it pinned down to a gill parasite and treated the tank they were in with Jungle Parasite Clear. They stopped scratching so I thought they were okay and I moved them into my 30 gallon planted, the only other inhabitant being a bristle nose pleco. Things have been GREAT for almost a week. They were playing together, having a good old time, no problems.
Since I heard that rams demand extremely clean water, I did a 10% water change on that tank on Wednesday. I used dechlorinator (Stress Coat) and let the water sit for several hours before adding it. I mixed the same percentage of RO I had when I set up the tank and checked to PH to make certain it was close to the tank water. Everything seemed fine.
*sigh*
Last night, I noticed the remaining gold ram was hiding. I found him hiding in a cave under some driftwood, showing the same respiratory distress the first one had before he got really weak. This morning, he was in the same spot, still breathing hard, and his eyes were starting to look the same as other ram who died (not popped out but sort of like a deer in the headlights kinda look).
I've also noticed some behaviors in my pleco that I thought might be odd but this is my first pleco so I can't be sure. He keeps hiding behind the filter intake, not moving around the tank nearly as much as he initially did but he was eating this morning so I don't know.
I'm so sad to be losing the gold rams but I will be heartbroken if I lose the whole tank to this. I'm really attached to the Bolivian rams! There are no white spots on the fish, but could this be ich? The symptoms are the same as the gill parasite minus the white spots, but that's why I thought gill parasite originally.
If its ich, how can I treat this safely for the pleco? Also, the tank is heavily planted and while the fish are my first priority, I'd like to not kill my plants if possible.
Please share your experiences... I need to figure this out before I lose them all.
I had pulled the sick ram out and put him into a hospital tank. The remaining three would periodically scratch in the gravel but aside from that, showed no other signs of illness. I thought I had it pinned down to a gill parasite and treated the tank they were in with Jungle Parasite Clear. They stopped scratching so I thought they were okay and I moved them into my 30 gallon planted, the only other inhabitant being a bristle nose pleco. Things have been GREAT for almost a week. They were playing together, having a good old time, no problems.
Since I heard that rams demand extremely clean water, I did a 10% water change on that tank on Wednesday. I used dechlorinator (Stress Coat) and let the water sit for several hours before adding it. I mixed the same percentage of RO I had when I set up the tank and checked to PH to make certain it was close to the tank water. Everything seemed fine.
*sigh*
Last night, I noticed the remaining gold ram was hiding. I found him hiding in a cave under some driftwood, showing the same respiratory distress the first one had before he got really weak. This morning, he was in the same spot, still breathing hard, and his eyes were starting to look the same as other ram who died (not popped out but sort of like a deer in the headlights kinda look).
I've also noticed some behaviors in my pleco that I thought might be odd but this is my first pleco so I can't be sure. He keeps hiding behind the filter intake, not moving around the tank nearly as much as he initially did but he was eating this morning so I don't know.
I'm so sad to be losing the gold rams but I will be heartbroken if I lose the whole tank to this. I'm really attached to the Bolivian rams! There are no white spots on the fish, but could this be ich? The symptoms are the same as the gill parasite minus the white spots, but that's why I thought gill parasite originally.
If its ich, how can I treat this safely for the pleco? Also, the tank is heavily planted and while the fish are my first priority, I'd like to not kill my plants if possible.
Please share your experiences... I need to figure this out before I lose them all.