Tapajos Geo Fin Issue

[DThompson]

Yesterday I was feeding my tank like I normally would and noticed 1 of my Geo's tail is almost completely gone. I'm not sure how it happened but would like the community input on what they think happened and what I should do about it. 1st picture was last night, 2nd picture was this morning.

• Tank is around 360g with a 90g sump
• Tank mates: 2 stingrays, 1 flagtail - by far the biggest fish in the tank, probably 10" long, 6 other tapajos (7 total including this one), 4 silver dollars, 1 datnoid (only 4 inches big, about the same size as the geo)
• Water parameters: Ammonia = 0, Nitrite = 0, Nitrate fluctuates between 30-40ppm, PH runs between 7.9 and 8.0, ORP runs around 320, temp always between 79-80F. I do weekly 40-50% water changes but can't seem to get nitrates down. I just got a sulfur denitrator that I want to hook up soon and I am upgrading my sump soon.
• After further inspection of the rest of the tank mates, it looks like the datnoid may have cloudy eyes, so I started a 1/2 dose of Melafix to help that.
• There has been fin nipping for a while between the geo's and the flag tail. Not sure if thats due to high nitrates or not enough hiding places in the tank.
• The geo with the half tail is the smallest one in the tank, I bought them all together at the same time about 15 months ago. I thought this one was just a female because it was smaller and didn't have as much color but now I'm thinking it's a runt and gets picked on constantly. But it still eats and none of the other fish have signs of disease (besides the datnoid cloudy eye).

My questions to the group:

• Which other fish do you think caused this? I originally suspected the other geo's but after seeing the datnoid's cloudy eye I wonder if it might be him? Every time I feed, the flagtail pushes the rest of the fish away because he's the biggest but I don't think a flagtail could do this with his sucker mouth.
• How do I heal this fish? I have a 40g quarantine tank, but that's filled with shrimp and 15 small clown loaches right now. I dosed melafix in the tank to try and help the datnoid. Not sure if that would help the tail fin of the geo also.

 

[PhishMon84]

i feel like that's the rays work.

 

[tlindsey]

i feel like that's the rays work.

+1

 

[DThompson]

Really? I didn't expect them because they never show signs of aggression towards the other fish. The rays are still less than a year old, about 10" diameter, smaller than the flagtail.

Think I should bump up the feeding so the rays don't eat the Geos and/or add more hiding places for the Geos?

 

[PhishMon84]

You likely are missing the rays nighttime hunting- they’ll eat cichlids. Hides are always a good thing for fish, I try to have several options for each fish more if they are prone to hiding

 

[ryansmith83]

There is a video online somewhere of a ray with a massive convict cichlid hybrid pinned to the glass and it’s desperately trying to work the convict toward its mouth. It wouldn’t surprise me if they eventually get rid of your geos.

 

[DThompson]

Dang... Guess I'll get some more structure to hide in and hope for the best. The other 6 Geos are bigger and totally healthy. I'll update this thread if it starts happening to other fish.

 

[DThompson]

It's been 6 days now since I initially noticed the tail issue on the Geo. I dosed Melafix for 4 days and I put a large piece of driftwood on the sand in the middle of the tank to kind of split the tank some so fish/rays can hide more. It looks like the Geo's tail is starting to heal now.

 

[tlindsey]

It's been 6 days now since I initially noticed the tail issue on the Geo. I dosed Melafix for 4 days and I put a large piece of driftwood on the sand in the middle of the tank to kind of split the tank some so fish/rays can hide more. It looks like the Geo's tail is starting to heal now.
View attachment 1492594View attachment 1492593

Great update.

 

[DThompson]

It's been 15 days since the incident and I've very surprised how quickly the Geo's tail has healed so far. It looks like it has most of the skin/tissue back already, but I'm sure it will take a while to get the cartilage to grow back, if they ever does. All I've done so far is dosed Melafix for 4 days (1/2 dose because I didn't put the fish in a smaller tank to quarantine and it would be cheaper to just buy a new fish if I was to dose the tank at full dosage), added more structure on the bottom of the tank to hide around, and started feeding right before lights turn off around 8pm to keep the rays from trying to eat the Geos.

The Datonoid was doing good after I started dosing Melafix but stopped eating 2 days ago and is looking lethargic. I pulled him out and put him in the quarantine tank and I'm dosing him with Melafix again. This time full dose for a week. I'm guessing he is getting cloudy eye from high nitrates so I need to get my sulfur denitrator set up ASAP.