Small sick blue tang from Petco- Or "I'm a sucker and spend money on dying fish"

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sandra6500

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Small sick blue tang from Petco- Or "I'm a sucker and spend money on dying fish"

Today I stopped by Petco to pick up dog food. I always walk by their saltwater section "just because". Today I saw a tiny tiny blue tang in one of their equally tiny cross-sectioned tanks. He was getting beat up by a wrasse and looked all sorts of stressed out. Hes skinny and has a bit of damage to one of his fins. There were two more obviously dying fish in the same tank as well as a small dead fish. :-(

I got an employee to come over- she was beyond nice and felt bad but said there wasn't much she could do. Long story short- the little tang came home with me (at a very significant discount). And yes I'm a sucker, and yes I realize its bad to support a business like Petco who has no business having a saltwater section.

He's in my quarantine tank so as to not infect anyone else. I think he MAY have ich. He is small and its hard to tell- if its ich its the very very early stages of it. I'm not sure whats wrong with him really. His entire body looks strange to me. Its too hard to get a pic of it, but essentially he looks "dried out".

Anyone have any ideas? Should I be treating him now or should I wait until I know if anything is actually wrong with him or until I can identify it? I fear that if I wait too long I'll have lost my window of opportunity. I've not had many sick fish as I always buy from good sources and don't introduce many new comers.
 
Is the fish eating. If its one of the really small blue hippos they need to be fed often. When they are tiny I used cyclopeze to feed them. My daughter wanted one of the Tiny Hippos and I would only let her get one if she fed it 3 times a day. Im not sure about treatment as I think this would stress the fish out even more than what it already is. Hope this helps:)
 
It sounds like the fish is malnourished. Since it's a small fish you're going to need small foods. Cyclopeeze is a good start. Get some nori sheets and allow the fish to graze, if it will. Make sure that you maintain the water in your q-tank in pristine condition. If it's the only fish in the tank I'd begin a very slow move towards hyposalinity to treat ich. As long as the fish is eating you've got a chance.

Mike
 
I have done the same thing as you. Sometimes is sucks when they dont make it but then you have one that makes it and you feel like you just saved the world. Good for you and best of luck at getting it back to full health.
 
He came from the Arlington store.

Now that he's not hiding and in full light I can very clearly see the ich. I guess I really should treat him, although maybe I could try some cleaner shrimp? Anyone have any experience with that and ich? Might be a low stress option for this guy since I'm not sure he would live thru much else. I can also try garlic I guess.

Petco fish make me sad. Petsmart at least runs all their water thru a UV Sterilizer. At Petco all the tanks share the water and their fish are dying in batches there.
 
Since you have him in a QT tank you are ahead of the game for getting him better. I know there is a ton of info out there to trating ICH, but I'll post up from the Marine Aquarium Handbook revised edition by Martin A Joe Jr.

Before I get into the treatment though I will second on the nori sheets, cyclopeeze and use of Garlic to help eating.

From the MAH book:

First thing you need to do is make sure it is saltwater ICH or Cryptocaron and not Amyloodinium since they are very very similar. Use google to assist you in this. Amyloodinium will have a more salted or dusted appearance on the fish and crpytocaron will have a more pimple look.

If it is in fact Cryptocaron then the following treatments will help on the road to recovery.

First before you jump to copper realize that copper will not effect the cryptocaron on the fish. Only the free swimming agents in the tank. If it is Amyloodinium copper will help the fish itself.

Step 1: A freshwater bath will cause the current cysts to burst on the fishes skin. If it is crypto then it will not be AS effective because the cysts are deeper and protected by the skin and mucus. Amyloo will be more treatable with this moethod. Remove the fish as soon as expresses stress in the freshwater dip.

Step 2: A Formalin bath. A formalin bath is an hour long (1/2 hour for sensitive fish) every other day for 3 days. While doing this do a light treatment of copper in the QT tank (about .2ppm) that way the fish is still under treatment between baths. Do a water change every 3 days and clean the tank.

Formalin is available at most drug stores and janitorial supply stores. Use 1ml for every gallon of water or 1 teaspoon for every 5 gallons of saltwater in the bath.

Time the 1 hour bath well and remove the fish if signs of distress appear. Formalin is a oxygen reducer so aerate teh bath well during treatment. DO NOT INHALE OR GET FORMALIN ON YOUR SKIN! FORMALIN IS A PRESERVATIVE/POISON!

Alternative 1: Quinacrine treatment. Quinacrine is an anti-malarial drug and you prbably won't have access to it. If you do then post up and I'll write up the treatment.

Alternative 2: Malachrite green treatment. Use 1 or 2 drops per gallon of a 1% solution for treatment. Within 4-5 days teh disease should be gone.

You can in addition slowly raise the temperature of the tank to 85* F for a period of 10 days to assist in killing the parasite.
 
At this point, a freshwater bath would probably stress it so much, as to kill it. I'd not suggest that.

Read through the Stickies, on Lee's Marine Discussion forum, about Ich, it's treatment and cures. Also, read the stickies on fish nutrition and feeding.

Since it's in QT, I'd highly recommend you drop the salinity, slowly, to treat with hyposalinity. The above mentioned stickies will explain the proper way to do this. Read them carefully and follow them to the T. Also, get it eating as much algae as you can. Dried algae sheets will be your best bet, right now.

Don't try garlic. It doesn't work and actually causes internal organ damage.

Don't use cleaner shrimp, as they also do not work. That's another myth. The Ich parasite is deep in the tissue of the fish. For shrimp to get at it, they'd have to DIG into the fish's tissue. The white spots you're seeing are NOT the parasite, but are the scabs/wounds left over, from the parasite, burrowing into the fish flesh. Cleaner shrimp will clean the dead skin and wounded area, but will not get to the parasite, itself.

As harsh as this is going to sound, I'd recommend we do NOT buy fish, from places like this, in hopes of "rescuing" it. Granted, you got a discount. However, now that store will just replace it with others, that will soon die, as well. Eventually, if the stores lose enough money, in their own tanks, they'll start to feel it, where it counts. The more fish are purchased, to "rescue," the more the store continues to make money. Again, I know this sounds harsh, and I apologize for that, but it's the only way to "condemn" these types of stores, for their behavior.
 
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Sid,

I would have to disagree about the freshwater bath at this point. If he has survived up til now and is eating again then a 30 sec freshwater bath to break open the cysts isn't going to kill him.

I agree that the hypo-salinity is an effective method but will it be quick enough to not only rid the fish but also the tank of parasites before he becomes too weak?

Also we still don't have confirmation on what parasitic illness this is, only that he has white spots.


And you know that this is just meant as a discussion, I recognize you know far more than me so it is all IMO.
 
Oh you're absolutely right, this is a great discussion.

On the FW Dip. I'm only speaking from my own experience, trying it a couple of times. Both times, it stressed the fish so bad that they died. Both times, these fish were eating and appeared active, but had massive Ich infestations.

If you do try a FW dip, it's critical to match pH and temperature, of your saltwater. Using baking soda, to match pH, works well.
 
So what are your thoughts of using the formalin baths and copper in the tank. Obviously this would mean the tank was a treatment tank not necessarily a QT as it could no longer be used for inverts after the introduction of copper.

Also gradually raising the temperature has been brought up in this thread. While I agree with this I also have some reservations. Namely that raising the temp doesn't kill the parasite but only increases the metabolism and thus shortens the life cycle. This includes reproduction. SO while you may be killing them buy shortening the life span you are also speeding up hatching, hosting and dying.

My concern with raising the heat also includes the fish. To prevent any stress you would have to do this VERY GRADUALLY. Like fish larvae gradually. Also unless I'm mistaken the increased heat also lowers the dissolved oxygen.
 
Copper treatment would be a valid treatment, in a QT tank, as long as it's very closely tested, which can be a bit difficult.

The use of increased heat, IMO, is another myth, brought about from the FW side of the hobby. While raising the water temperature does work, with FW Ich, it's been shown to not have the same effect, with SW Ich. Also, as you mentioned, it will increase the stress, to the fish, by lowering the water's ability to absorb oxygen.
 
I have to agree about the heat overall. I think there is a valid argument to be had for it increasing the metabolic cycle of the parasite but only to about 80-81 degrees. I only base this off of my recent reading into fish larvae. If your temp is lower 76-77 then your fish won't pass through meta at the proper time because you slowed the natural metabolism. I would argue that the same could be similar for a parasite.

HOWEVER, like I mentioned above you have to properly ID the illness before treatment can be diagnosed. Saying my fish has ICH is like saying I have a rash...
 
I agree on the rash part- I think I have it identified correctly but I'm not 100%. I pulled out my DSLR today and got some pics. Maybe this is helpful to you guys. If you click on the links you'll be able to see them larger (I hope).













 
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Ya know, I can't really see any signs of Ich, though that doesn't mean it's not there. Any chance of taking pictures that are more in focus, even if they aren't as close. If you get a real clear photo, you can crop it, or zoom in on it, to get a better look. It does appear to be pretty thin. Is it eating? Offer it lots of algae.

Also, if you don't mind, I'm going to move this thread to Lee's Marine Fish Discussion forum, for the best advice, from Lee. He'll give you the best advice, but rarely ventures out of that forum.
 
From looking at your pic's I can maybe see a couple of spots on this fish. If it was me personaly I wouldnt do any treatments at all and see what happens. As long as this fish is eating and doing all the healthy things fish do, I would just leave it in quarantine for 6-8weeks. This is just MHO thou
 
To answer all the questions-

He is a GREAT eater but won't touch any of the algae sheets. He seems pretty unstressed at this point. He does itch/rub against the rocks a lot.
 
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