Question about my angel

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K

k13k07

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Dec 15, 2014
42
0
6
Florida
Okay, so some background first. I've had my angelfish for about a year, stuff happened about 5 months ago and I had to move. My tank is currently sandwiched in the only place I can get it and I'm making due with what I have. It's been rough being able to do all my water changes because I really don't have room to keep/warm my water. I have not been able to do all my changes but I've been doing the best I can at the moment.
About a month ago, maybe 1.5 months ago one of my angels developed a white fuzz on his pectoral fin. I've kept my tank between 78-80 consistently, so I added a little salt to the water and it started to go away. When it didn't go away, I started noticing what looked like little white spots on his body near his head (NOT ick, they were pimple-ish in texture). Soon after, he started acting strange; normally when he saw me he would come up to the side of the tank and basically swim in place - it looked like he was wagging his tail like a dog; he doesn't really do that anymore. That's not all, normally he would eat anything he could, then scavenge on the bottom. He stopped going to the bottom and began what looked like gasping for air every time I would open the lid to the tank - but he would only do so where the bubbles from the filter were. He was and is still eating, I just drop the food on him and watch him eat. (And the other angel is completely fine - he/she's still a complete pig and acts completely normal lol.)
I asked my LFS person (they actually closed suddenly last week so I can't ask them) and they said it sounded like hole-in-the-head. I did treat with Kanaplex and Melaplex - they did help a lot, and he did seem a lot better after the doses. What I'm worried about is that it seems like he's not getting better, but I'm not sure because with his coloring, I can't really tell. He's primarily a black and silver angel but in the light silver, gold and blue come out. I have to shine a light on him, and even then I'm not sure if he's still sick or I'm just being worried. I will try to post pics but even not acting like himself, he doesn't like to stay still and my other angel loves to get in the way.
I think he has holes in his head near his nose - they seem bigger then his nostrils. He doesn't always act like he can see me - usually when I wave my hand near the tank he reacts, now he only reacts sometimes; I'm worried he may have vision problems. The white "fuzz" is still on his fin.
Current water parameters are:
PH: 6 (I have to use R/O water)
Ammonia: .5
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: looks to be a little darker then 80ppm but not as dark as 160ppm
(Also, I am about to do a water change, I just needed to get my worries out)
 
This is the best pic I could get of him - what looks like a hole near his nostril and the white "fuzz" on his fin. What is also strange is his eye used to be almost all red, now it seems like the red has broken up. That weird part can be seen better in the second pic, except for his eye, his right side seems to be completely normal. The third pic is just another pic of his left side, I believe the first pic is better to see it but the more details the better

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IMG_5754.JPG
 
Try soaking their food in Epsom salt(there is a sticky in the disease section of MFK's). I may suggest a round of Metronidizole in addition. Hope that helps and good luck.
 
I was using the Metroplex, which has Metronidizole - it helped but I don't want to go too crazy with it :/ I thought Epsom salt was supposed to be a laxative? At this point it's worth a try :) He's a bit of a picky eater so it'll be interesting to see - hopefully my other angel won't eat everything, he's a bit of a fatass lol
 
Here's a excerpt from RD's sticky on treating Hex. Feel free to read it in its entirety in the disease section. Also Hexshield is a newer medication with Metro and Epsom salt premixed. Once the condition has advanced you'll need to dose with Metro in my IMO. If you can get a very close up in focus shot, that would help; just so we know were dealing with hex.

Treating Hexamita aka Spironucleus with Epsom Salt Solution


This is a rather safe way to treat any newly imported fish, as a prophylactic, just as one would use a de-wormer. It's not only an extremely cheap way to treat fish, the active ingredients are readily available world-wide, and it's also much safer than using most forms of medication. Unlike most medications, there should be no worries about flagellates/pathogens building up a resistance to it, and excess magnesium is easily flushed from a fishes system. In my experience, it's very easy on fish, even very young juvenile fish. The best part - it works! (If the fish has worms when arriving, the epsom salt solution in the feed will also help with purging any worms)

While Metronidazole has always been the drug of choice when combating internal parasites such as hexamita and/or spironucleus, metro (or any other type of medication) should never be used on a regular basis as a prophylactic, and doing so may cause flagellates/parasites to develop a resistance to the medication, and possibly even mutate and become super bugs. It's also been stated by at least one researcher that excessive use of metronidazole can cause organ damage in fish.

aquarium settings it has been suggested that it can precipitate out of solution within 6-8 hours, and it can become rather expensive when treating large systems.

While doing some online research on spironucleus I came across an interesting study that mentioned the use of Magnesium sulphate (Epsom salt) in treating internal parasites in angel fish.
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-120399-140825/unrestricted/ANGEL.PDF

A long read (200+ pages) but the idea of using something as basic as epsom salt to treat internal parasites in fish intrigued me, which in turn lead me to dig deeper.


This is where it got interesting ........
 
It does sound like your fish has hole-in-the-head. I don't know much about it, but I'm sure you could find some cures in about five minutes of research. The white fuzz sounds like fungus. I've used medicine from my lfs and it's worked. You should have 0 ammonia in a cycled aquarium and your nitrates are way too high. They should be in the 20-30 range. If you don't already have them, try getting live plants. They use nitrates as fertilizer.
 
Wailua Boy: Finally found a med by API that has metro and the prazi, going to try that, hopefully it will work!
Stephen: I have done some research, it's a difficult disease because it seems like it affects fish differently. I'm here hopefully to find someone who has dealt with it and were able to save their fish, and what works for them. I know what my tank parameters should be and I'm trying my hardest to keep them good - as I said before, those were pre water change. I have one live plant, and have tried to keep them in the past, the problem I run into is my feather-fin loves to uproot them and chew on the roots >.<
 
Start doing water changes, 80ppm nitrate is really too high; if might be difficult, but needs must. You might also invest in products to convert the ammonia into ammonium while your tank establishes, those readings you provided seem off, unless there is zero ammonia?
 
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