CAN ANYONE ID THIS ILLNESS??

[GoldFinger]

Any help would be much appreciated. My Madagascar Cichlid has some skin lesions and white spots that occur randomly over his body.

It doesn’t appear to be Ich and I originally treated it with a salt bath and then repeated water changes while adding salt.

My fish is in a 20G hospital tank now and all other fish from the main 305G are fine. Temp is set to 84F. It went away after a week or so and is now back a week later and harder to get rid of than before!

Water parameters are perfect in both tanks as I run a drip system into a seperate 120G sump and keep everything tip top. Tried melafix for 3 days so far as well with no results. Appetite is still fine too. No new fish introduced and main tank was at 80F.

Attached are pics to help. The photo where it looks worse is from the original time. Second pic doesn’t look as bad but in the right light his skin is peeling almost by his fin.

 

[Rocksor]

It could be fungal or gram negative external infection. You can try something more potent than melafix, yet still mild compared to other medications like Seachem Paraguard. It has to be dosed everyday, so buy enough for a 2-3 week treatment. If you see no improvement after 1 week, I would switch to either Seachem Polyguard (a bit stronger than Paraguard plus gram negative antibiotics) or Seachem Kanaplex.

 

[Stephen St.Clair]

My guess is that you are dealing with Oodinium. Your treatments are probably knocking it back just enough to keep the fish alive. Besides the very fine yellow dusting of parasites (difficult to see in bright light) "skin peeling" is also a disease specific symptom.
IMO, Coppersafe is the best med for Oodinium.

 

[GoldFinger]

It could be fungal or gram negative external infection. You can try something more potent than melafix, yet still mild compared to other medications like Seachem Paraguard. It has to be dosed everyday, so buy enough for a 2-3 week treatment. If you see no improvement after 1 week, I would switch to either Seachem Polyguard (a bit stronger than Paraguard plus gram negative antibiotics) or Seachem Kanaplex.

I picked up the Kanaplex today as my LFS was out of the other two. I’ll try it for a week and re evaluate thanks so much

 

[GoldFinger]

It could be fungal or gram negative external infection. You can try something more potent than melafix, yet still mild compared to other medications like Seachem Paraguard. It has to be dosed everyday, so buy enough for a 2-3 week treatment. If you see no improvement after 1 week, I would switch to either Seachem Polyguard (a bit stronger than Paraguard plus gram negative antibiotics) or Seachem Kanaplex.

What should my water temperature be while using kanaplex? Should I turn off my bubbler or crank it up to oxygenate? Do I still feed my fish etc? Any info on the best practise for this treatment would be appreciated.

 

[pops]

fish size and how many.
tank size.
water change schedule.
filtration.

 

[GoldFinger]

fish size and how many.
tank size.
water change schedule.
filtration.

1 fish 4-5” size in a 20G quarantine every test is 0 and just did a 75% water change and added kanaplex and stability and water conditioner. Temp is 85F

 

[Rocksor]

You dont need to set your heater temp that high. Many fish "fungus" can get worse if temp is above 75f. That fish can thrive at 68f.

 

[GoldFinger]

Looks worse today but better pics

 

[GoldFinger]

He didn’t respond to the Kanaplex after the three rounds of doses (20G tank = 4 scoops every 2 days for 3 days). Should I be trying the Paraguard next?
Rocksor or any others have ideas?
Thanks in advance