Kole Blue Eye Tang Circular Gash

[LBlin]

Hi, I have a Kole Blue Eye Tang and it keeps getting odd circular wounds on it's sides. This is the 2nd time the fish has had this happen. The wounds seem to heal up within a few days. Wondering what could be causing this? The fish is eating and appears normal otherwise. We had a Yellow Eye Kole Tang in December that had similar looking marks but hers were usually more straight line vs. circular. The Yellow Eye Tang had looked fine after healing up but died after the 3rd or 4th round of the weird wounds. Any ideas? Thanks!

 

[griss]

What other tank inhabitants do you have?

A short video over a minute long, under white light showing both sides of the fish would be helpful for @leebca and @Dr. Reef to assist you. You can upload the video to YouTube and link it here.

 

[ExitTrauma]

Maybe a skin infection? Don’t they typically start small and extend in a circular fashion? Hard to say from the provided image.

 

[LBlin]

What other tank inhabitants do you have?

A short video over a minute long, under white light showing both sides of the fish would be helpful for @leebca and @Dr. Reef to assist you. You can upload the video to YouTube and link it here.

Maybe a skin infection? Don’t they typically start small and extend in a circular fashion? Hard to say from the provided image.

Hi, thanks for reading this! I appreciate the help. We have a lot of coral, including a big duncan. In addition to the blue eyed kole tang we have 2 clown fish, a starey blenny, an orange spot goby, 1 firefish, a mystery wrasse, 1 cleaner shrimp, a pom pom crab, an emerald crab, a few hermit crabs, 2 zombie snails and one weird shell-less snail thing that must have come in on something else. Our previous yellow eyed kole tang had the same kind of marks and was in our old 16 gallon tank (started in June), she died in December. We upgraded to a 65 gallon tank in January. The blue eyed kole tang had a small mark avove the eye when we bought it but we assumed it was from the net catching him. It didn't take long before additional marks started showing up. This morning brought another small mark above the eye but the mark on the side is already starting to heal. The dammage takes place at night and is usually seen in the morning the next day. The tang seems to like sleeping in the cave area so we wondered if it was something in there getting him while he slept. The cave has a cleaner shrimp that lives in there but we've never seen anything be aggressive. If anything the tang is the most aggressive in the tank. I started dosing melafix 30 ml 1 x daily. We're on day 3 of the recommended 7 day treatment. Thanks again for the help!

Here is the video of the tank:

 

[griss]

Hi, thanks for reading this! I appreciate the help. We have a lot of coral, including a big duncan. In addition to the blue eyed kole tang we have 2 clown fish, a starey blenny, an orange spot goby, 1 firefish, a mystery wrasse, 1 cleaner shrimp, a pom pom crab, an emerald crab, a few hermit crabs, 2 zombie snails and one weird shell-less snail thing that must have come in on something else. Our previous yellow eyed kole tang had the same kind of marks and was in our old 16 gallon tank (started in June), she died in December. We upgraded to a 65 gallon tank in January. The blue eyed kole tang had a small mark avove the eye when we bought it but we assumed it was from the net catching him. It didn't take long before additional marks started showing up. This morning brought another small mark above the eye but the mark on the side is already starting to heal. The dammage takes place at night and is usually seen in the morning the next day. The tang seems to like sleeping in the cave area so we wondered if it was something in there getting him while he slept. The cave has a cleaner shrimp that lives in there but we've never seen anything be aggressive. If anything the tang is the most aggressive in the tank. I started dosing melafix 30 ml 1 x daily. We're on day 3 of the recommended 7 day treatment. Thanks again for the help!

Here is the video of the tank:

Looks like you have the video set to private. I’m not a fish expert (more into corals and inverts).

Where did you get your rock? Was it real live rock out of the ocean? If so, my best guess without being able to see the wounds clearly is maybe a mantis shrimp.

 

[LBlin]

Ugh, sorry! Technology is not my strong suit. This link should be public. We did buy live rock when we set up our first tank and those rocks also transfered to our new tank.

 

[ExitTrauma]

Yeah by the video seen, at least in my opinion, that looks to be a bacterial infection.

Hopefully someone who knows for sure will chime in.

 

[griss]

Ugh, sorry! Technology is not my strong suit. This link should be public. We did buy live rock when we set up our first tank and those rocks also transfered to our new tank.

No worries, tech is not my strong suit either. Hopefully, we can figure this out.