Need Help Asap

[shawnaus17]

My aunt and I just did a water change on her 55 gallon tank. All the fish look fine expect her mandrine. Its body is white. There are little patches of color but the rest of his body is white. Does anyone know what it is? It isn't ick nor a cotton growth. The only thing that was done different was I put the tap water conditioner in directly into the tank. Thank you for you help

 

[Gisho]

How much was the water change?

Was the mandarin in this condition before, or only after the water change?

What are your other param's, i.e. ammonia, nitritre, nitrate, etc?

Are any other livestock showing signs of stress/disease?

How long has she had the mandarin in her tank?

When you say the tap water conditioner was added directly to the tank, I am assuming that you mean that the change water was not treated/dechlorinated prior to it being added to the tank.

If so, and the volume of the water change was substantial in proportion to the overall tank volume, and/or there was a long delay in adding the dechlorinator or insufficient amount of dechlorinator added, that could be a factor.....

As far as what type of disease/stress symptoms the mandarin is displaying, it could be a lot of things, and without posting a picture, it is difficult to say. Search through www.wetwebmedia.com for "marine fish diseases" and look for a picture or something which similarly describes what you see on your aunt's mandarin.

One tip for future reference; your aunt should invest in a RO/DI unit for making up your change water. Despite removing chlorine and other harmful elements from the tapwater, water conditioner does not remove other harmful things like phosphate, etc. It may cost a bit up front, but it is worth it in the long run.

HTH.

 

[Ryanqk]

its probably in advanced stages of whatever it has and wont pull through, sorry about that, but if only a few patches of color remain its not a good sign, can you post a pic?

 

[shawnaus17]

Well not sure what the deal was... this morning he was back to his original color and moving about like nothing had happen.. sure scared us...

 

[reefD]

not sure if anyone said this but manderines dont get ich or other deseases due to a poisonous slime coat. this is what u may have seen and it is nothing to worry about. they do this every night. very very common 4 manderines. again manderines dont get ich or many normal fish desease due to slime coat! look it up

 

[JmLee]

i think the poison concept is debated. I know how ever that gobies and dragonets do not have scales so there for they have a much thicker slim coat which prevents ich.

 

[shawnaus17]

So what I may have seen is a slime coat not that something was wrong.. He didnt act himself either that was the scary part. He sat there on the highest rock and just stayed for a long time. Maybe you can help me with this.. we did a water change last night as mentioned.. I added a new canister filter to my system last night and my xenia's are not extending like they normally do. The one split a couple of days ago but before I put this filter on she was still extending. I have turned it off a few minutes ago just to see if she will extend. It did feel like the water was warmer than it should of been but the thermonater didnt show it. Any ideas?

 

[Sk8r]

I hate to say it, but you're flirting with a real problem in this tank. Adding any chemical directly to a tank is a bad practice: it should be mixed beforehand, be it buffer, calcium or [shudder] a dechlorinator. The mandarin's protective slime coat reacted to whatever went up against his skin. It probably saved his life.

Sooner or later this practice of tap-water treatment is going to lead to a calamity and you may lose the tank, not just one fish. The reason: tap water is not just water. It has many minerals in it in proportions not the same as seawater. This may range from copper to arsenic, which will increase in concentration with evaporation and water-addition---decrease a little with water changes, but keep building, perpetually, until it may reach lethal levels.

Ro/di water is pure of all minerals---valueless for drinking, give or take hydration itself; but once you add ocean salt mix, it becomes something very close to ocean water, and the minerals in it are all things the fish and corals actually use up over time...things like calcium, and magnesium, etc. You do your mixing, of course, in a bucket with a small auxiliary pump, and use it for water changes, which should be performed at 20 percent a month, or better yet, 10 percent a week. Topoff with unsalted ro/di water should be daily---and best of all to have it delivered by an autotopoff valve and pump, to prevent spikes in salinity: a valve/pump arrangement will add it by the teaspoon, not the half gallon, as needed.

An added point: do you have live rock and sand in this system? If you do, you don't need a cannister filter at all. What you need is a protein skimmer, which will get the protein waste out and prevent a buildup; and the live rock and sand will decompose all other waste to nitrogen gas. Your filter can't do that: stuff in a filter gets to the nitrate stage and stops there, with the result that unless the filter is cleaned obsessively, the nitrate gets back into the tank and leads to ammonia, which is very bad for the tank.

I hate to be negative, here, but you do seem to care very much, and the ro/di system most of all would make things much safer for your tank.

 

[shawnaus17]

I have about 90 lbs of live rock and the bottom is sand.. I set this tank up about a month ago.. by the way this is the aunt lol.. I have read tons of things and bought a canister which I had read and a refugium ofcourse I didnt read it from here and after reading alot tonight I realize that the refugium I bought probably isnt big enough to do squat.. I purchased a 24 inch.. in the canister it has four media bays I just used the floss and the carbon only but sounds like I may have wasted that money. This is for a 55 gallon tank. Oh and the refugium does have a protein skimmer in it.. I went to put it together yesterday and one of the peices that goes from the power head into the refugium had broke in shipping and I couldnt not find anything at the local hardware store where the treads would match up.. anyways any advcie that you could give a beginner would be great .. and not to worry about adding the tap water into the tank again..

 

[Sk8r]

THank goodness for that! You seem to have a nice system. I'd say using the carbon occasionally is not going to be a problem. I limit one batch to 7 days use. The floss I limit to 24 hours, then remove. What some people do with cannisters, however, is to fill them with rock rubble---you might ask online about that practice and how it works for people.
A 24 inch refugium [which is mostly for producing pods] would be quite large. Are you sure that's not the sump? Sumps often have protein skimmers in them. You should have a return pump in the sump, which in my 52g is a Mag 9.5. There is a screw-on fitting onto which main force has jammed a hose that goes back up to the main tank's outflow---the hose up there has a plastic hose clamp that you put on with a pair of pliers. Water gets into the sump in the first place by a standpipe arrangement that dumps water down by gravity. Then it goes into the skimmer chamber---I have an Urchin skimmer, an in-sump brand, which sucks up water from a little pump and spits it out the side....into the same chamber as the topoff float and the heater.

Getting pretty late here, but this forum goes all night as the world turns, and I'm sure everyone here would be delighted to help get you running in good shape. You're going to need:
test instrument for salinity [refractometer is best], test strips for ammonia/nitrate; test kits [Salifert is good] for alkalinity and calcium levels, if you're going to have corals in this tank. Otherwise you can get by without the last two.

Try to provide the most description you can about your equipment, brand names, size, etc., and people will explain what's useful and what's going to work for you, and how to get it all working at optimum. I wonder if you dont' have a combo refugium/sump: some do.

Welcome aboard!

 

[shawnaus17]

Its not a sump, it a hang on the back 24 inch refugium, it has a odyssea power head 1200 my main reason was for the mandrian. Putting rubble in the canister sounds like a good idea too.. I wondered how that carbon would do when I had a saltwater tank years ago I didnt use any carbon at all. I have all the test kits amonia, nitrate, nitrite, ph, phosphate, calcium. all were in the correct range.. ph was a little low 7.8 the rest were on the money. If anyone reads this tha can maybe tell me how they use the rubble in the canister any advice would be very appreciated. I have a Odyssea CFS4 canister four media baskets and filters 350 gph. Thanks to everyone for their replies...

 

[dermer]

im not sure if it will make it any way in a tank that is only a month old mandrins need lots of pod to live i have been down the same road and learned the hard way good luck

 

[chrismunn]

:lol: take a look at this fish every night just a few hours after lights out. youll notice that it turns white naturally, and that there is no problem with the fish at all. how long have you had the fish and nobody has noticed this?:lol:

 

[chrismunn]

ok, well considering the conditions under which it turned white, maybe there is a problem?

 

[shawnaus17]

Ok when I say that the tank is a month old it is true however.. my nephew went to college and I got his live rock and sand and water and corals... so basically it is new but the sand and all had been in his tank for a year and when he brought everything over he even brought his water for the exception of maybe 15 gallons. Havent noticed it turn white, he isnt one that has been out that much. I had two bigger gobies in the tank both sand sifters, both around 4 inches long and did see the one get after the goby so they were taken to a pet store yesterday. That night was the first night that those two had been out of the tank, maybe thats why he was out and I got to see his true night colors.