Pleco with Cloudy Eye

[mwippern]

I have a pleco who I just noticed today has 1 cloudy eye. He was sitting on the bottom of the tank (not sucking) and his eye has some white goo on it. The goo has since fallen off and his eye is just cloudy now. I have moved him to a QT immediately after noticing it. I have also noticed his tail fin to be a bit ragged, but all other fins seem fine. Might this be pop eye? I can't really tell if the eye is protruding or not. I have lowered the temp of the tank water to increase saturation of the aeration, just in case.

Water was changed and tank cleaned about a week ago. The following water parameters were tested before I put the fishes back in the tank.

GH 5
KH 6
pH 7.5
Nitrite 0
Ammonia 0.25

No other fishes are displaying any problems. These are the other fish in the tank:

Ordinary Pleco
Red Nose Tetra
2 x Painted Tetras
Rainbow Shark
Irridescent Shark
Dwarf Frog
Banjo Catfish

Can anyone suggest what this might be? What should I look for while he is in the QT? And is there any use in treating him for anything yet?

Thanks

 

[Allivymar]

Cloudy eye can also a sign of disease although it may be a sign of other things as well. One of the major causes of cloudy eye is poor water quality, followed by injury and infection. I notice you do have readable levels of ammonia; is that in the main tank or the QT tank?

Also....what do you mean by cleaned the tank and put the fish back in? I'm wondering if by cleaning you mean removing gravel and decor and cleaning it all up. If so, chances are you are destroying your bacterial colonies which deal with ammonia and nitrites (they live on the flat surfaces) and that would readily explain the measurable ammonia levels. How often do you do that? And how often do you water change (or do you do both the cleaning and the water change at the same time)?

I would start by making sure he is in water with no measurable amounts of nitrogen waste and watching him closely. If he continues to do poorly and the eye doesn't look any different after a few days, I would suggest a broad spectrum antibiotic such as tetracycline or kanacyn

 

[mwippern]

The measurements are all from the main tank. Although those measurements were made with a home-test kit. So that reading is the closest I could find on the colour chart.

I change the water partially every 2 weeks. However at the last cleaning I drained more water than nomal as I was vacuuming between the gravel.

I have been watching him in the QT and it seems that the right eye is the cloudy one, and the left eye seems to have a small bubble in it. I tried to see if the cloudy one has a buddle too, but so far I have been unable to tell.

I am a little worried about the amount of air in the water through the water change and susequent aeration. That is why I have lowered the temp of the water slightly. I have also removed one of the under-gravel air bubblers. I noticed that there seem to be a large amount of very small air bubbles ciculating below the surface of the water. There are visibly less now that I have made the changes.

 

[Allivymar]

Keep a close eye on your water parameters in the QT tank; if its not cycled things can change quickly in there.

Also, do know bubbles won't add any O2 to the tank water. The way oxygen gets into the tank is thru O2/CO2 exchange at the surface. What the bubbles do is agitate the surface to increase the exchange rate.

The other thing that comes to mind, although I'm probably way off base here, is gas bubble disease. I can't get to my resources atm; there seems to be some problems connecting to some sites (maybe due to the hurricane?), so I'll try to drag em up later and explain. Its related to dissolved oxygen content tho.

 

[Terry]

Cloudy eye, ie.... whitish clouding or the appearence of a whitish fim over the eye of the fish.

The majority of cases results from poor water quality (NITROGENOUS WASTE), which should be always investigated first.

Cloudy eye can also denote: Secondary infection (FUNGAL INFECTION) following damage of some sort.

There is also Mucus Hyperproduction as a reaction to a protozon parasite infestation, Skin Slime Disease from poor water quality ie.. Ammonia,Nitrite,Nitrate,and inapproppriate PH (ACIDOSIS).

ALKALOSIS POISONING including Chlorine, Chloramine or an inappropriate or incorrectly administered chemical medication.

There is also EYE FLUKES in this case the white clouding is in the lens rather than the surface.

External Bacterial Infection.

Vitamin Deficientcy, especially vitamins A,B2,C.

I do hope i didn't get to technical but this is from my A-Z of fish diseases.