Need help with Clarkii Clownfish, look strange and act strange?

Scotzmen

New member
So i have a pair of Clarkii Clownfish. I actually have a few problems. They are about 2 to 2.5 inches long, have grown a wee bit since i bought them about 4 months or a tad more ago. They used to be a shining yellow, but seem to be going a kind of dirty black on their yellow bellies and some of their fins. Exceptions being the tail and their side fins. as if they were rolling in dirt. I'm not sure if this is bad, or they are changing color as they mature? One started changing about a day before the other. One is more submissive to the other, as i can easily tell them apart. It will roll onto it's side and shake. Any help or ideas here?

They also do this strange thin were they will swim towards the glass, or bubbles or even the plastic plants in their tank, get real close or touch them, then shoot away at great speed. In a kind of circle. They never do it to the rocks though. They sometimes like to do it to the sand. It's not ich as far as I'm aware, no white spots or anything along that line. Is it just clown fish being clowns and playing around or linked to the third question?

Thirdly, they seem to be starting to get red marks or patches, i've had a look and it looks a lot like a internal bacterial Infection. It looks a lot like this:
http://www.chucksaddiction.com/disease.html
Scroll down to internal bacterial infections and the 2nd picture.

Obviously you'll want my tank parameters. When i set up my tank, i had it cycling for 8 weeks prior to adding my clarkii.

Heres my tank parameters so far.
Salinity is 1.026
P.h is about 8.0

Ammonia is 0
No2 is 0
No3 is at 20 MG/l

General Hardiness is 180+ Mg/l
Carbonate hardness is about 14 or 15 DKH
Calcium is pretty high at 520 mg/l +
Temperature usually sits at 26 to 27

I don't have anything to test the Alkalinity, Magnesium, or Phosphate which I'll correct tomorrow.

Tank is 50 litres, a bit small yes, i know. All i have in their is a heater, filter and a air pump to put oxygen in their. Got coral sand for the bottom, live rock with a few aquarium plastic plants. I do 10% water changes every Sunday, along with testing the water before change. I Feed them brine shrimp with Marine tucker. It's a mix of algae and stuff. If specifics are needed i can get them. I don't have anything besides that. No coral, or anemones, i'd love both of them, but i'd need extra equipment for them.

I have a sunk cleaner shrimp which i added a few days ago. The Clarkii LOVE to get cleaned by him, they won't leave him alone some of the time, and he'll run away. He seems fine hanging upside down on the plastic plants.

Any help offered i am glad to receive, and pretty grateful too. They are my first ever fish, and i know that marine are especially hard to keep, but i dived into it anyway, as i had an experienced marine keeper to help me out

I have a FLS close by, and i know the guy pretty well, he actually helped me out with it all as it was my first ever fish experience :P He knows his stuff, he has a 20,000 NZD display tank loaded with coral, clowns, angel fish, shrimp, hermit crabs. All the fish from finding nemo and more. Also has a cleaner wrasse. He will usually give me discounts and will always be happy to help me whenever my fish are ill or acting strange. He helped me cure them of ich after their first week i got them.
 
Can't seem to edit my post?
Anyway update.

My Clarks seem to have holes appearing in their fins now, only just noticed them. Unfortunately, i think it is clown fish disease.

About 2 or 3 weeks ago, i got a percula clown fish, and i put it in the tank with my clowns, i made sure he had lots of places to hide, whilst i checked over his tank and heated it up. I kept an eye on him for a good while, just hiding, and swimming in the space i had him in. I started to notice white spots, which i thought was ich developing, due to stress etc. So i moved him to his tank a few hours later, and his spots disappeared, but had some weird fungi replacing it, and his fins became tattered breathing heavily. So i gave him a 1 minute dip in just water heated to the same temperature as his tank. Put him back in, he looked fine aside from his fins. He was eating at all. So day 2 i had him, he wasn't interested in any food, he still swam away if i got close to the tank. Went out for an hour to pick up some supplies and ask my mate at the store about it. Told me to keep an eye on him. Came back and he was dead on the bottom. With white stringy poo still stuck to him?

Now I'm guessing my Clarks now have it. Symptoms are cloudy yellow skin going black, tattered fins and blood patchs. Like when you catch you skin in something and it looks like blood rises to the skin. They also seem to have tiny white spots developing on their heads. They are now rubbing on rock too. They are breathing fine, they go nuts when they eat, and swim pretty actively too, no mucus as far as i can see. Any help would be amazing right now, as i know how fast this can kill, and i don't have a clue what too do about it?
 
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Can we get some pictures of what it looks like? I am sure someone will key in instantly once they see it.
 
1st picture you can see the red dots on the lower end of the tail, and also starting to appear on the white bands too. His dorsal fir used to be shining yellow,but is now turning black, and so are most of his fins.

The red spots are slowly turning to blisters by the looks of it, as if the skin is peeling og, it's very small though.
 
Don't you hate those people who have problems and say "I fixed it!' And never give you how they did it? I hate those people too.

Anyway, update. For the record, if anyone finds this thread, because they are having the same problems as me. It was clown fish disease.

They weren't eating two days ago, and i've done 2 Formalin dips. The first was a weak solution of 4.5 mls at 5% aqueous. For an hour long.

The next day i did a 20 minute bath with 7.5 ml. Both dips were at the same PH level, same temperature and aireated too. I also filled my tank with furan 2, in hopes to stem their skin from hemorrhaging and splitting into open sores and to help take away the bloody, red patches, so that the formalin wouldn't kill them because they had open wounds.

They are eating, one being extremely picky about which bits it ate. But it ate and kept it down, thankfully. I'm relieved, but not out of the water yet. I'll be doing more baths at the same concentration every second day, and keeping the furan 2 going too.

Will give updates the day after every bath.

The fish have changed their overall behavior. Less rubbing, less shaking and weird movements. They seem to use the Skunk cleaner shrimp less, which is either they finally figured out he's not their to clean them 24/7, or that they are getting cleaner and healthier. They now seem to play a lot, and follow each other around the tank. Swimming side by side, in a tank full of yellow water :)
 
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