Sick Discus Juvies

[FMA4ME]

Hi all
About a month ago I picked up my first 7 Discus juveniles, 2 weeks later I added another 2. They are in a bare bottom 60 gallon with an AC110 and a sponge filter. Shortly after, the new two fish had a short bout with ich. I think I caught it fairly quick. I immediately bumped the heater up a couple degrees and treated with aquarium salt per directions on the bag. In a matter of 3 days all signs were completely gone. A week later I noticed 1 of the original 7 began isolating itself. At that time I really couldn't see anything physically wrong with the fish, no markings, no clamped fins, no darkening, maybe the opposite even, more pale than the rest, and not eating from what I can tell. The fish are young so not having much color, it was hard to say. Well it's been a little over week and now and that fish has not improved. There are also now 2 other fish keeping the original sick one company. These 2 however have been eating and growing, unlike the first who looks like it hasn't grown or put on any color since I got it. It also looks like it has a full belly, yet lost weight. I know something is going on, but have no clue as to what. I am interested in how to narrow down the possibilities to begin a treatment, please help
I'll include pictures below, thanks guys

 

[FMA4ME]

Well I'm having trouble posting pictures of course :/

 

[Evz jardini]

I'm no discus expert rocky never kept them but it could just be there's a more dominant male in the tank taking over causing the other to stunt , it happens quite a lot with groups of jags etc I have , I've even had it happen with catfish once I split them up the smaller one starts to gain weight and mass , I was only thinking it could be this as you said they were feeding fine and there's no signs of disease or external damage , and I'm presuming your waters fine etc

Sent from my Nexus 7 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App

 

[Woefulrelic]

Did you lower temps after seeing improvement? Ich will generally take 7-10 days to die off depending on how established it was, and that's at 89F. If his constitution wasn't as strong as the others he would be the first to show symptoms, and that isn't necessarily going to show as white spots on the body immediately. This would be my first guess, and that the ich colony was heavily reduced. Treatment would be the same thing as listed, 10 days of 86+ temps and good water changes. High aeration is important, but imagine an air pump and ac 110 would be sufficient in this regard. Fish will feed more voraciously, which means more water changes if you are going for growth. If ich is not the case I would try to offer him some highly desirable foods, such as blood worms. I would keep an eye on other fish and look for rapid breathing, these can be the first signs of ich and potentially the most dangerous since ich has an uncanny ability to root in the gills.

 

[FMA4ME]

Thanks Danny. While I have heard of that, I don't think I've ever experienced that. The full looking belly has me concerned. I also realize I forgot to mention a kind of slimy poop I saw out of the small one. It was once a few days ago. It's late night here or I'd post water parameters. I do soo many water changes, I'd hate to think it's my water. I went out to the lfs today, asked 10 different people and got 10 different answers.

 

[FMA4ME]

Did you lower temps after seeing improvement? Ich will generally take 7-10 days to die off depending on how established it was, and that's at 89F. If his constitution wasn't as strong as the others he would be the first to show symptoms, and that isn't necessarily going to show as white spots on the body immediately. This would be my first guess, and that the ich colony was heavily reduced. Treatment would be the same thing as listed, 10 days of 86+ temps and good water changes. High aeration is important, but imagine an air pump and ac 110 would be sufficient in this regard. Fish will feed more voraciously, which means more water changes if you are going for growth. If ich is not the case I would try to offer him some highly desirable foods, such as blood worms. I would keep an eye on other fish and look for rapid breathing, these can be the first signs of ich and potentially the most dangerous since ich has an uncanny ability to root in the gills.

Thanks Woef, yes I did lower the temperature afterwards. I only went up to 84/85 from 82. The only 2 fish that started to show ich were the 2 new ones introduced. The 3 I'm concerned with are from the original 7. Everyone else seems to be doing great. I do offer frozen bw every other day, with no interest.

 

[FMA4ME]

Everyone else is doing so much better, I'm wondering if I should pull the questionable 3 and qt them. I know in a lot of instances it's only a matter of time until the others show sickness.

 

[Woefulrelic]

I'd wait for further input from someone more knowledgeable than myself. I'm not sure you can totally kill ich through salt use alone, I was under the impression that it only slows the growth. If that were the case you would need to heat treat or use meds like methylene blue but meds are best avoided in my opinion. If the fish is bloated it could be constipation or internal bacteria, although constipation usually leads to swim bladder issues pretty quickly. Unfortunately I'm not as informed as I'd like to be and can't offer much help, but I wish you the best of luck. Hopefully aquanero will pop in and make my responses look peasant-esque. I wouldn't pull them, it is very stressful and from the symptoms it seems like treating the tank might be better.

 

[FMA4ME]

Thanks Woef One of the lfs guys thought it could be constipation from eating a dry flake or pellet and it expanding. It's kinda hard for me to consider this because when it comes to dry food. they don't eat it until it reaches the bottom of the tank, then they blow it around another 5 minutes till it's eaten 5 minutes later. I too usually
like to avoid meds if possible, that's why all I had in my medicine cabinet was salt and melafix which I've had work well for other things. Another lfs guy advised doing a 30% water change with really warm rodi water, he said 90 degrees. I've never even heard of that before and have no idea what that would do, but the funny thing is, he knew exactly my fishs symptoms before I mentioned them.

 

[Woefulrelic]

I want to rule out constipation because with salt in the system and a week of no improvement in addition to no swim bladder issues. My view is a bit skewed however, because discus are a species I haven't tackled and have a notoriously finicky health reputation. Discus usually enjoy higher temps from the research I've read, and with a low ph being desirable warm rodi could improve water quality in a few ways. It's a decent idea; what it solves in particular, I'm not sure. I'm not sure where to go about getting rodi, and heating it is another headache so I'm not sure.