Help! I'm panicking! CPDs with white fuzz

[Emihk73]

Ok so to start off. I sorta new to the hobby. Kept betta fish for years but ive been lucky so the only probem i have run into so far has been fin rot. This is a whole new senario. So I have this 20 gallon that's been up for a couple of months using media from an establishehed tank. Good amout of live plants in there. Been dealing with some algea problems but working on getting that all balanced out. It's been very stable after the first few weeks. But I noticed today that the celestial pearl danios I have in there have a little white spot on their bottom lips. I think every one but one has it. They are so stinking tiny and fast its super hard to get a real good look at it. I think I might look fuzzy? This is the part I might be over thinking it but I kinda looks like their gills are more red than usual too. There is a slight film on the top of the tank too. I removed it all a couple days ago but it's back. Had one die right when I got them but everyone has been fine since then. All fish still very active and eating. I have a hospital tank I can set up but I have no clue what to put in it. Ammonia and nitrite is zero and my nitrate is barely above zero. Please help! I have been scrolling through Google and half the post say they are gonna die and I'm freaking out! Tried to get some photos but they are really fast.

 

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Don't panic, it's nothing to worry about. Seriously, it's a fat lip from bumping into something. The fish are active swimmers and when first introduced into an aquarium, they dart about and can bump into things and get a fat lip. The fish then produces more mucous over the damaged area and it looks like they have a white bump on their nose or mouth. In a few days it should go away on its own.

Fish naturally have a thin layer of clear mucous over their body and fins. It helps them slip through the water easier and also provides a first line of defense against microscopic organisms in the water. If the fish are stressed out or injured, they produce more mucous and it can appear as a cream, white or grey patch or film over part or all of the body. In this case, the fish have damaged their mouth and produce more mucous over that part of the body to help protect it.

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BASIC FIRST AID FOR FISH

If you want to do something to help them heal faster and reduce the chance of secondary infections, do the following.

Test the water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. This removes the biofilm on the glass and the biofilm will contain lots of harmful bacteria, fungus, protozoans and various other microscopic life forms.

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week. The water changes and gravel cleaning will reduce the number of disease organisms in the water and provide a cleaner environment for the fish to recover in. It also removes a lot of the gunk and this means if any medication is needed, it can work on treating the fish instead of being wasted killing the pathogens in the gunk.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it. Wash the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and re-use the media. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the garden/ lawn. Cleaning the filter means less gunk and cleaner water with fewer pathogens so any medication (if needed) will work more effectively on the fish.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration to maximise the dissolved oxygen in the water.