Cory cat seems sick/wounded

[willdeed]

Hey folks,

I have a Cory that's been more sedentary than usual for the past week. I first noticed him in an unusual attitude (laying sideways) last week but could swim when disturbed. Since then, he's been just sitting mostly still on the sand when he's normally more active than that. He moves a bit but not really swimming any more.

I did a 1/3 water change of my 30g tank and then again the next day. Water tests showed 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and 10-20ppm nitrate. I add "ACID magic" which is muriatic acid to my water top ups, but the pH was not overly low. It was at about 7.4. I don't think the water parameters are the cause but I'm changing water more than normal just in case.

I also noticed what looks like white puss near his fin that I haven't noticed before (picture attached). Anybody know what this is? Injury? infection? I feel like this is the cause of the sluggishness but I don't know what to do about it (if anything). Thoughts?

 

[Aiken Drum]

Your fish also has a case of popeye. With it effecting both eyes, i would say its an infection rather than an injury.

 

[Andy Sager]

The fish appears to be bloated as well as having having " pop-eye" in both eyes which is usually a sign of Dropsy. If the scales are starting to protrude from the body, this would be confirmation of Dropsy. I also see signs of redness in the underside as well as the white "pimples" near the rear Dorsal fin. You will need to confirm this is what is there or just the exposure of the picture. If they are pimples, that would be a sign of worms coming out of the fish. If there is redness in the gut area, that's a sign of bacterial infection which would explain the pop-eye and dropsy symptoms.

Sadly, the worms may be treatable but the symptoms of the dropsy at the stage where the scales start to protrude or " pine coning" has an extremely low success rate of treatment so imo, euthanizing the fish would be the most prudent thing to do. That said, you do need to know if these symptoms are accurate so that you make the proper corrections to make sure nothing spreads in your tank to your other fish.

Hope this helps

 

[willdeed]

Thank you both for your replies - it's very helpful.

I took another look and the scales don't look to be protruding to me; however, the white does seem to be pimple-like.

I have noticed my danio and guppies are bloated, which I attributed to over feeding (no chance it's fry), so have been trying to dial down the food.

I don't see redness on the cory, but, after disturbing the tank from the water change, I do see a red spot on my otocinclus that doesn't look healthy.

I will post pictures of my oto, danio, and guppies shortly.

 

[willdeed]

Attached are pics. Do these also point to a disease and not just overfeeding?

Assuming it's not Dropsy, is there a good treatment? I've got the Cory in a 10g quarantine tank with 50/50 old/fresh water now and was going to let him settle for a night before starting something like maracyn (or if there are other recommendations).

 

[Andy Sager]

First, are you sure that's an Otocynclus and not a plecostomus?
The Guppies are females and pregnant so they are normal in shape ( and will get even larger the closer they get to delivering) but the danio is definitely overfed.
If you can, post a pic of your cory while looking down from above.

In order to recommend a treatment, you need to post your water parameters ( Ph, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate , hardness) so you use the correct ones for your water.

Because the main issues are with your bottom fish, try to get water samples close to the bottom of the tank. If you are using liquid tests, you can do this by placing the cap on the vial and lowering it to the bottom of the tank, remove the cap to fill the vial then place the cap back on the vial to bring out of the tank. If you are using test strips, using a disposable cup, collect water from the bottom of the tank then test that water with your strip. ( You can also just siphon some water out from the bottom of the tank into a container/cup.)

 

[willdeed]

Sorry, yes. Pleco, not oto

I did a liquid and strip test from siphoned bottom water and got:

ammonia = 0ppm
nitrite = 0ppm
nitrate = 5ppm
hardness = 150ppm
chlorine = 0ppm
total alkalinity = 160ppm
ph = 7.4

This is after a 50% water change, though. Honestly, the nitrates may have gotten in the 20-40ppm range before I noticed symptoms and started doing more frequent water changes.

 

[willdeed]

Here's a pic from above of the Cory

Thanks again for the help!

 

[Andy Sager]

Sorry, yes. Pleco, not oto

I did a liquid and strip test from siphoned bottom water and got:

ammonia = 0ppm
nitrite = 0ppm
nitrate = 5ppm
hardness = 150ppm
chlorine = 0ppm
total alkalinity = 160ppm
ph = 7.4

This is after a 50% water change, though. Honestly, the nitrates may have gotten in the 20-40ppm range before I noticed symptoms and started doing more frequent water changes.

I was going to say, that was an awfully large mouth for an Oto. but no worries, it happens to the best of us.

Even if your nitrates were in the 20-40 ppm range, it shouldn't have caused this kind of reaction so something else must be going on. The spot on the bottom of the pleco could be an exit wound from a worm ( bottom fish are known for carrying worms ) so I would put the pleco in the quarantine with the Cory and treat them both with a dewormer. I like the Fritz line using Paracleanse ( https://fritzaquatics.com/products/fritz-paracleanse ) for this kind of worm but any product containing Praziquantel and Metronidazole should work as well if you can get something faster than the Fritz line.
To treat the pop eye and wounds left by the worms, use Kanamycin ( usually found as Seachem's Kanaplex) along with the paracleanse. This should also help with the wound on the bottom of the Pleco. Use these meds in the Quarantine tank, not the main tank.
TBH, I don't hold much hope for the Cory but as long as you are treating him, there is always a chance, even if it's slight.

Just so you know, Maracyn is Erythromycin ( EM) and honestly, there are very few conditions in fish that Erythromycin actually treats ( even tho many suggest using EM) best. There are much better antibiotics available but need to be chosen by water parameters and disease and not as a " just in case" medication.

 

[willdeed]

Okay, I do have some paracleanse, so I will start that tonight and order some kanamycin. Thanks for the suggestion!

Possibly important info: both the pleco and Cory were given to me by a neighbor that was giving up their tank. This was several months ago, but maybe they've had the worms for a while. I did quarantine them both for a month but I didn't treat them with anything at the time.

 

[willdeed]

Related to the overfeeding, I'm not really sure how to feed my middle swimmers when my danio and guppies swarm the food immediately when I put it in.

Any ideas?

I do supplement with zucchini and cucumber every once in a while, but not sure that makes much difference.

 

[Andy Sager]

Okay, I do have some paracleanse, so I will start that tonight and order some kanamycin. Thanks for the suggestion!

Possibly important info: both the pleco and Cory were given to me by a neighbor that was giving up their tank. This was several months ago, but maybe they've had the worms for a while. I did quarantine them both for a month but I didn't treat them with anything at the time.

Related to the overfeeding, I'm not really sure how to feed my middle swimmers when my danio and guppies swarm the food immediately when I put it in.

Any ideas?

I do supplement with zucchini and cucumber every once in a while, but not sure that makes much difference.

Yeah, these kinds of worms usually live within the fish's flesh so not really obvious until they mature and leave the fish so they may have been in there all along. It's a good idea to deworm all bottom fish when you get them in their quarantine tank. It's a simple process that unless you really screw up, doesn't hurt the fish even if there are no worms there. Unlike antibiotics that fish and diseases can become accustomed to, dewormers are short term usage so resistance is unlikely.

As for feeding techniques, I like to use a turkey baster ( from the dollar store, don't use the family baster for the Thanksgiving Turkey ) for mid level and bottom level fish. If you are feeding flakes or pellets, drop them into a cup of tank water to wet them then suck them up with a baster and squirt them into the mid or bottom level of the tank while sprinkling some dry flakes on the surface to feed the upper level fish.

 

[Andy Sager]

Here's a pic from above of the Cory

Thanks again for the help!

Yeah, the fish definitely has bilateral pop eye.
But regarding the scales, from above, the fish just looks like the scales are not laying flat. If you go to this page https://keepingcatfish.com/cory-catfish-dying/and and scan down to the section on Starvation, you can see how smooth the scales look on the fish, the same even on the other pics of corydoras. Your's just looks rougher than should be imo but not as bad as in the other pic. Hopefully the Kanamycin can clean that up.

 

[Colin_T]

What does the fish's poop look like?
Is the fish eating?

Just throwing this out there, but do Corydoras have scales. I thought they are scaleless. If so it could still have dropsy.

The white stuff on the body near the tail is excess mucous produced by the fish because something in the water is stressing it out. The fish is covered in excess mucous so it could be water quality or something the fish is being exposed to on the substrate.

The fish has an infection in the skull, which is noticeable by the red area in the face in the picture in post 8.

Clean water and salt might help but if it does have dropsy, then it's probably doomed unless it's still feeding. Then it will require antibiotics as suggested by Andy.

------------------

Depending on what the pH of the tap water is, you might not need to reduce the pH.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Just throwing this out there, but do Corydoras have scales. I thought they are scaless

Had to look this one up, as corys are often referred to as scaless, but quite clearly appear to have scales.

Corys have what are called scutes, which are hardened bony or horny plates that on corys have the same appearance as scales. Turtle shells are scutes, as are the ridges on the backs of crocodiles.

Thats my new thing learnt today.

 

[willdeed]

What does the fish's poop look like?
Is the fish eating?

I haven't noticed him pooping, but I can keep an eye on it. He doesn't look like he's eating, unfortunately. Just sits there and squirms a little bit to re-adjust every once in a while.

Clean water and salt might help

By salt, do you mean Epsom salt or Aquarium salt? I have both, but I've heard corydoras are extremely sensitive to aquarium salt, so I haven't added any yet.

 

[Andy Sager]

Had to look this one up, as corys are often referred to as scaless, but quite clearly appear to have scales.

Corys have what are called scutes, which are hardened bony or horny plates that on corys have the same appearance as scales. Turtle shells are scutes, as are the ridges on the backs of crocodiles.

Thats my new thing learnt today.

Sometimes you have to be a little less technical when it comes to description. Scales or scutes, in this case, doesn't really matter. They do not look like they are sitting correctly on the body to me.

 

[Andy Sager]

I haven't noticed him pooping, but I can keep an eye on it. He doesn't look like he's eating, unfortunately. Just sits there and squirms a little bit to re-adjust every once in a while.



By salt, do you mean Epsom salt or Aquarium salt? I have both, but I've heard corydoras are extremely sensitive to aquarium salt, so I haven't added any yet.

If the fish isn't eating, there shouldn't be much coming out. Intestinal worms would come out as white tubes similar to the mucus the fish expel when they are not eating so you usually only see the difference by observing if the stuff is alive or not. I don't believe your worms are intestinal but in the body meat based on the injury location on your Pleco.

As for salt, there is much debate about using aquarium salt when treating dropsy because you are trying to remove the fluid from the body and salt (NaCl) does not always do that. ( It all depends on which "salts" are making up your GH and our aquarium test kits do not differentiate that. ) That's more something Epsom salt would do because Epsom salt is really just Magnesium Sulfate with no chlorides or sodiums. That said tho, neither one of those will treat the internal bacteria issue the Cory is facing. You know it's an internal issue because both eyes are effected which pretty much rules out from injury. Most internal conditions are from Gram - bacteria which is why you need meds that are absorbed through the gills and skin.

 

[willdeed]

If the fish isn't eating, there shouldn't be much coming out. Intestinal worms would come out as white tubes similar to the mucus the fish expel when they are not eating so you usually only see the difference by observing if the stuff is alive or not. I don't believe your worms are intestinal but in the body meat based on the injury location on your Pleco.

As for salt, there is much debate about using aquarium salt when treating dropsy because you are trying to remove the fluid from the body and salt (NaCl) does not always do that. ( It all depends on which "salts" are making up your GH and our aquarium test kits do not differentiate that. ) That's more something Epsom salt would do because Epsom salt is really just Magnesium Sulfate with no chlorides or sodiums. That said tho, neither one of those will treat the internal bacteria issue the Cory is facing. You know it's an internal issue because both eyes are effected which pretty much rules out from injury. Most internal conditions are from Gram - bacteria which is why you need meds that are absorbed through the gills and skin.

Very informative - thanks!

I picked up some Kanaplex and gave a dose of that plus Paracleanse in the quarantine tank for the pleco and cory.

Is it better to continue feeding or withhold food while they're in quarantine?

 

[Andy Sager]

Very informative - thanks!

I picked up some Kanaplex and gave a dose of that plus Paracleanse in the quarantine tank for the pleco and cory.

Is it better to continue feeding or withhold food while they're in quarantine?

Feed sparingly and siphon out any uneaten food after about 30 minutes. Decaying foods will only create poor water quality which is the opposite of what you are trying to keep.
You will also need to siphon out any poo on a daily basis to confirm the fish are eating and keeping the water quality up.