Moo's GBTA, QT/Tx Adventure

[Amoo]

Picked this up off of DD last week. From all my reading these guys are resilient as all get out and typically do okay during shipping. Well unfortunately I didn't get so lucky.

When I got the package and was looking inside the bag you could see what looked to be tissue floating in the bag. He is pretty bleached and appears to have some damaged tentacles that he can't inflate. I gave him a thorough inspection and couldn't find any visible cuts anywhere and all of this tissue just appears to have sloughed off of him in shipping.

My clowns arrived in good shape and went into the fully cycled QT I have. Luckily I planned ahead and had a second full QT/Tx setup dry and ready to go. Yesterday I made up about 15 gallons of water in anticipation of everybody's arrival. I checked at work today and we didn't have any cipro so I ordered some which will be in tomorrow.

Funny enough he looks better in the pictures then he does IRL, but you can get a good idea of how many tentacles he is having trouble with from the photos. So far he is grasping the bottom of the tank he is in and his mouth is closed solid. I tried a coffee mug in there and he showed no interest in staying on it, so I took it out. If he's looking better tomorrow and I hold off on Cipro, I may give him a rock and see if he'll attach to that.

Keeping our fingers crossed.

 

[taylor t]

Looks like it got chewed by a powerhead, but you say it came that way. Wonder what happened. BTA like to have their foot under a rock or inside a crevice, and then extend out to get light. They make a kind of "J" shape with their foot, attaching to the underside of a rock and extending out and up, forming a "J" with their body. Not like a mag that likes to move to higher ground on a flat surface, BTA likes to hide the foot. If you try a mug, I would put it on the side, so the BTA can climb inside, and come out of the mug with a little of an arc. If you try a rock, that may be better, and you can easily move the whole thing to the DT when ready.

You are right, they are pretty strong nems, and yours I would expect to recover with a little TLC. I'm not sure I would treat that guy, it doesn't really look so bad to me. If it was a harder species, I would treat, but a BTA I'm not sure I would jump the gun treating, yet. Good water quality, flow, temp, and lights, I would expect it to recover with time. Keep the flow and heater separate from that nem with light diffuser, BTA is notorious for wandering in a tank.

If it came that way out of the bag, you may want to think about sending DD a pic of it, that really looks like powerhead damage to me. Not bag melt from shipping, but one can't be sure. I'd be surprised if they tried to pull one off like that though. Best of luck in recovery.

 

[Amoo]

Thanks for the tips taylor, there is netting covering the side of the tank with the PH, Heater and Airstone so the Nem can't get through. I'm like you, I would be surprised if DD tried to pull a fast one and lean more towards this guy just having a tough time shipping.

So this guy actually hates lights out. Twice last night I tried to turn his light off and both times within 15 minutes he was floating around the tank. Finally I left just the blues on their lowest setting possible. He's been in the same spot all night so that's a good sign. When I woke up this morning his mouth appeared a little puffed out as you can see in the first picture. I turned the lights out for about an hour. I took the second picture right after turning the blues onto their lowest setting. I'm going to try lights on and off every few hours to keep him stimulated and go from there.

The camera is again picking up color he's not showing IRL.

 

[Amoo]

Ok time for an update. Here's a few photos of our progress. The day after the last shot he looked like this:

I figured I was screwed. All I could do at that point was wait it out. I turned off the lights for the night and went to sleep. When I woke up the next day he was opened up and acting like nothing ever happened. The only odd thing is he was keeping his tentacles over his mouth so I couldn't actually see how his mouth looked.

Over the next couple of days he would close up completely like the picture above, minus the gunk coming out, then open as the lights come on. Today he finally gave me a good shot of his mouth and it looks like this:

Used Photoshop to Autocontrast colors to make middle more defined, he isn't this bright green, but the disc, body and mouth colors are close to accurate.



I have to admit I'm pretty lost as to what's going on here and could use some advice. Clearly this can't be normal, but at the same time he is not acting sick/abnormal. I dropped a few NLS Thera+ pellets on him the other day and they no longer exist in the tank so I can only assume he ate them.

So what should I do here? I'm tempted to take a rubber glove and see if I can gently dislodge whatever that is, but I have no idea if/how it's attached...etc. Any help at this point would be appreciated. I do have cipro on hand, but have not treated him yet as he hasn't shown a need for it since the first few rough days.

 

[OrionN]

I think he just poop some left over food and zoos. He looks a lot better. I think he will be fine. You can use your finger or a stick and lightly disturbed the mass. it will just come off and you can suck it away. I often do this with my long pipette.