female golden killie and protruding scales - what to do?

[xyyz]

here are the answers to the questions:

1~What type of fish is afflicted? In addition, please describe what is wrong with the fish to the best of your ability (i.e. cotton like growth, bloated, etc.).

a female golden killie. the problems are: rapid breathing, no appetite, protruding scales around all around the first 1/3 of the fish (mouth to pectorial fins)

2~What are your tank parameters (ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, temp, pH)? Please give exact values.

the total ammonia is around 1ppm. however, since the pH is low @ around 6, the free ammonia is almost negligible. nitrites and nitrates, according to the test strips are close to 0ppm. the pH is an issue. it is usually at or below 6, and with water changes it comes up to about 6.6, but then drops to 6 or below through the night. the temp hovers between 78-84F depending on the time of day/night.

3~ How large is the tank? How long has the tank been set up?

the tank is a 29 gallon tank. it's been setup for about 3-4 weeks.

4~What type of filtration are you using? Please give the name and number (i.e. Fluval 304) and amount of gph if known.

i have two filters. one is a marineland penguin biowheel 200 , which filters & 200gph. the other filter is a powerhead with a large sponge. i don't know the specs on the powerhead.

5~How many fish are in the tank? What kinds of fish are they and what are their current sizes?

there are 5 golden killies (2 male adults, 3 female adults), 4 silver angelfish (1 male adult, 3 unknown juvenile), 1 opaline gourami (male adult), 1 feeder goldfish (unknown ~2")

6~When is the last time you did a water change and vacuum the gravel? How often do you do this? How much water do you remove at a time?

i haven't started the gravel vacuuming yet. i usually change around 15-20% of the water. i've slowed it to every 3rd or 4th day.

7~How long have you had the fish? If the fish is new, how did you acclimate it/them?

i've had them for almost 8-9 months. i had them back when i was in jersey, and i had them transported from jersey to california about 3-4 weeks ago. unfortunately, i could have done a better job of acclimating them. they weren't shipped in the best conditions, so i was more worried that they needed some warm clean water.

8~Have you added anything new to the tank--decor, new dechlorinator, new substrate, etc.?

the tap water here has a high pH of about 8.4 and was well buffered with a kH of about 150-180ppm. not knowing better, and stressing because the water back in jersey (princeton) was at a neutral 7 with no buffering, i went out and bought seachem's acid buffer. what a distaster. since i added a small amount, i can not get the pH to rise and stay at a higher level, no matter how much water i've changed. the aquarium is moderately planted. i'm using seachem's flourite as my only gravel/substrate source.

i use kordon's amquel+ and novaaqua+, along with seachem's stability to prime the water and get the biological filter going. since the fish started to show signs of lethargy, i add a dosage of melafix and pima fix nightly.

9~What kind of food have you been feeding your fish, have you changed their diet recently?

i feed them tetra's tropical crisps 2x day. i also feed them some crushed alge discs, and the occasional freeze dried brine shrimp, freeze dried krill, and frozen bloodworms.

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i noticed this fish breathing rapidly about a week back which is when i started the pimafix/melafix. today, i noticed she had protruding scales.

unfortunately, i have never had any success with successfully treating fish, so i'm at a loss. i don't want to lose the fish, so someone please help me out with what i outta do. i'm going to get a small quarantine tank tomorrow to isolate and treat the fish, but i have no idea what i i should use to treat the fish.

 

[xyyz]

here's a picture. i'm sorry if the protruding scales aren't very clear.

oddly enough, no other killie went anywhere near her before, now that they scales are protruding they're all there. :/

is this condition contagious?

 

[xyyz]

more pictures

here are some more pictures. hopefully, these are a bit better.

 

[xyyz]

unfortunately the fish died.

i wish someone at least suggested what to do.

 

[JohnPaul]

I'm sorry about your loss. I just saw your thread now. When a fish puffs out like that the condition is called "dropsy" and it means there is some sort of internal infection. Here is a clip I got from another site that might explain a bit about it (as well as another internal infection, popeye):


With symptoms where the fish fattens up and its scales stick out like a pinecone you can be sure it has dropsy, a bad case of internal bacteria. Interpet has a remedy for this and Esha2000 has been found to prolong life in this case, but as it is contagious and nearly always fatal, I'd consider putting down affected fish or at least isolating them in a separate hospital tank.

Another symptom of internal bacteria is popeye, where one or both eyes bulge out. The eyes remain clear unlike in cloudy eye. This afflicted my female betta and she died within the day.


If the fish should die and its popeye rupture or its body be cannibalised by other fish, it can release bacteria into the water or infect other fish, so if you cannot isolate the fish it is worth considering putting it down as the chances of recovery are slight.


Note that usually the internal infection caused by dropsy affects the fish's kidneys. When the kidneys cannot function correctly, the fish's body fills with fluid--this is what causes the bulging, the buildup of fluid internally.

It is my own experience that even doing everything right (immediately removing the sick fish from your main tank, putting it in a smaller "hospital" tank, and administering the correct treatment), treating aquarium fish for diseases is a very expensive and seldom successful endeavor. You could easily spend ten times the money on antibiotics that the fish cost you to begin with (or even 20 times), and still maybe only have a 10% or 20% chance of actually saving the fish. If you are willing to spend the money, it is worth the attempt--presuming you have a hospital tank to do it in. Otherwise, euthanizing the fish is the humane thing to do, as I have never heard of a fish spontaneously recovering from dropsy.

So the moral of the story is the fish was probably a goner no matter what. The important thing over the next week or so is to keep a very close eye on your other fish to make sure none of the rest of them were infected.

P.S. -- I used to have some Golden Wonders, they are great killies. Just be aware they actually grow quite large, they are real jumpers (if you have even an inch of space near the water flow from your biowheel eventually one will find it and leap out of your tank, and they have big mouths and anything that fits in them fits in the "food" category in their brain. I put 3 in my 29 gal community tank when they were juvies, and they were great citizens in there until reaching adult size, when over the course of about two weeks they ate an entire school of (adult) neon tetras. At first I didn't notice what was happening, other than my tetra school was slowly diminishing in numbers. But knowing tetras can be on the sensitive side, I just chalked it up to the fish dying and the other tank occupants getting to them before I noticed. That was, until one day when I heard a "splash" noise from the tank, looked over, and saw one of my killies with half a neon sticking out of his mouth, still thrashing around. Then the light bulb went on and I realized where all my neons had dissapeared to!

 

[kimo]

By the time the Dropsy symptom has appeared, there is no hope for the fish.
Kidney function has already started to cease.

One sign that tank parameters are bad. (old water, high TDS, etc)

 

[Zagz]

I am so sorry for your loss and having missed this thread. The fish definately had dropsy. I've had success only once curing dropsy unfortunately. The dropsy most likely occured as a result of the tank cycling. The ammonia and nitrite in the tank can be hard on a fish. I'd recommed doing water changes to keep your ammonia and nitrite to as close to 0ppm as you can as the move has obviously caused a recycle.

The only chemical you need for your tank is a good dechlorinator. The products that claim to help the beneficial bacteria and cycle your tank do not contain any live bacteria. Bio spira if properly refrigerated does contain live bacteria but is not available in all areas.

 

[xyyz]

thanks for the comments. i'm really not comfortable with the euthansia idea, which is why i was really hoping for success. i think the move was too hard on the poor fish.

thank God, the rest of the fish are alright though.

the tank is still cycling. the ammonia's still high at around 2ppm. fortunately, since the pH is still so low (around 6) it's still all in the form of NH4. the nitrites are very slowly starting to decline from 2ppm, to 1ppm, and now they're around 0.5ppm.

the cycling still has some way to go.

as for the killies. they're a great bunch. they're either really playful or just hungry. i get the occasional nibble when my hand's in the tank. they do eat everything that fits in the mouth don't they? i remeber dropping a ghost shrimp into the tank. the shrimp happened to come in contact with the killie on it's way down. startled, the killie, didn't run; instead it's panic response was to wolf down the poor shrimp.