fish deteriorating!

[fishbguy]

HELP!!

This 'desiese' has killed all of my male cichlids. I just noticed it today on my last male.

It is swollen, but it has the hole. It has about the size of a quarter on my johnjoansonae, a little smaller on my other males. Now it's about the size of a dime.

HELP!! I don't want my females to get it or my baby cichlids.

[TheOldSalt]

Yikes.

Well, first of all, why are these sick males and your females & fry still together in the same tank? Keeping sick fish with healthy ones is a very good way to get more sick ones.

This is an infection, obviously, and a nasty one. Begin a course of medicated fishfood and/or other antibiotic treatment. Keep your hands out of the tank, as this looks like it might possibly be fish tuberculosis, which can spread to humans. It might just be pseudomonas or aeromonas or any of a number of lesser evils, but better safe than sorry.

[fishbguy]

What kind of antibiotic medacations do you recomend?

I noticed the fish last night, and tried to catch him, but being a cichlid tank, there are tons of hiding spaces, so it's harde than it looks to catch them.

[fishbguy]

I don't think that it is TB, as none of the symtoms match up with what my fish is doing.

I am still trying to catch him so I can move him to a QT tank.

Background on the fish....

I got the fish about a week before christmas from aquaone aquatics in grass lake MI.

Since then, they have spawned pretty pirodically, but only started spitting fry successfully in the past month.

I first noticed these wierd growths on my males when I got back from up north on the 13th of july. I lost the 3 males in the 3 days after that. 2 on Monday, the other on Tuesday. The tank was full of green water so the visibility wasn't that great, and by the time I found the fish dead, that's when I first saw the growths. I thought nothing of it as the tank still had 5 other cichlids, a 6.5 inch, and a 4 inch bristle nose pleco, so I thought that the fish had eaten the holes in them. Fish eat dead fish, and my male (6.5 inch pleco) has a pretty large mouth...haha The fish were acting fine before that, and in their last days, they were just sulking in the corner. They swam away when ever I got close, which is unlike african cichlids.

I got a UV sterlizer from my work to clear up the green water on Wednesday the 16th. I ran it till saturday, then returned it.

Then, this morning, I noticed the growth on my other male. All the rest of the fish are still fine. Swimming, eating, even breeding.

I normally do waterchanges every week, 10%. Because I've been so busy, it's been about 3 weeks since I've done a watercange in that tank. But this shouldn't be hurting anything, as I normally do waterchanges in my 20long every month. The water is still crystal clear, and I haven't noticed anything different about them.

Should I get the UV sterlizer back and use it just incase there is something in the water that could be doing this?

[lohachata]

try this place that was posted by ian...... http://www.fishforums.com/forum/dise...t-diagnos.html

[fishbguy]

The thing has gotten bigger. I caught him and put him in a holding tank.

Would it hurt to put some Hydrogen Peroxide on it? I figure that if he is going to die anyways, why not try everything I can. I just don't want to kill him before his time, which is why I ask about it.

[TheOldSalt]

Try it, sure, but I don't think it's going to help much. These boils are caused by subcutaneous infection where the peroxide cannot reach.

You might wind up having to try a number of meds, but concentrate first on those the label says are good for gram-negative bacteria.