Sunken stomach and no eating.....

[Yellow Eye Tang]

Hey I've got a question about my red tail black shark. I got him from the LFS and when I got him home and released him I noticed he didnt look very healthy. He is very small so I didnt notice as much at the LFS. Now that I've had him a couple of days I'm seeing his belly is sunken and he eats nothing. Even kinda floats around on the current. My water conditions are good and I'm tryin to figure this out! Any help or ideas out there would be great. Thanks.

 

[Zagz]

It sounds like an internal parasite. Since he isn't eating I would QT him and treat with an internal parasitic medication. I like prazi pro, but Jungle makes a couple of different internal parasite meds.

 

[Yellow Eye Tang]

Thanks Zagz,.. I've had a rocky start to a new tank and so far have not lost anything. I'm currently fighting ich (thanks to my LFS) and it has spread. I've got heat up and just treated with jungle ich guard 2. I'll get it under control but I'm fighting my behind off here to keep all of them safe and alive. Would it be ok to treat for parasites while treating the ich problem? I know I can cure the ich, done it before with my old tank.... but can i treat two problems together? I have no Quarantine tank to work with now. Drat!

 

[Zagz]

Ich is a parasite. You should definately QT this fish and don't add any more fish until the fish are healthy. For ich you can use the heat method alone. The medication will help the ich, but is not necessary IMO. If the fish are weak to start with, the medication can make them weaker.

Make an emergency QT, get a clean rubbermaid container and a heater and an airstone. If you can't QT, I would return the shark to the lfs.

What size tank do you have and was it cycled before adding fish?

 

[Yellow Eye Tang]

Its a 20gh...Yes it cycled for a week before I added anything. I was also doing 25% water changes every other day, adding stress-zyme once that week. The LFS here is at partial fault... I went in today and told them I was shocked at how sick the fish are there. Seems like they all have ich or some sort of parasite. I'd say the fish I'm trying to save are lucky I brought them home. I'm now going to go to a different lfs - I walked in today for the first time and wow. Can't wait to really get this tank going. Thanks for your help Zagz! Soon enough I'm going to get into a 55 gallon.

 

[Zagz]

I'm afraid to say your tank could not have cycled in a week. You will need to test your parameters daily and possibly do water changes as ammonia and nitrite will start spiking if they haven't already. The cycle will weaken the fish and make it harder to treat them. You can save the fish with lots of water changes and matching the temp of the water for ich treatment.