Need serious help - dwarf eel

[LukFox]

I know, I know. I should wait longer for a response as I've already posted this in the disease forum - but it's been so long now and I'm seriously worried as I have no idea how serious it is and how fast I need to act, so here's a repost...
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When feeding her this morning, I noticed these four wart-like bumps on her face. One seems to have exploded or something to that effect (it was already like that when I saw it). She ate readily and seems to be acting normal, but what is this? I've never seen anything like this before, and I didnt find anything very close to it using the search :/ . Any help is much appreciated as I'm pretty worried at this point. Her face looks absolutely terrible.. An ID on these bumps and treatment guidelines would be incredibly appreciated.

 

[marrone]

It's possible that there is an parasite under the skin and one work it's way out. It could also be a lesion that got infected. You may want to move it into a quaratine tank and see how it looks in a day or two and then start o take with an anti-biotic.

 

[Zoa]

crosspost to wetwebmedia or other forums to get whatever input possible. hope she recovers....

 

[LukFox]

Could it be a bad coral sting? She's in there with frogspawns, hammers, and her favorite cave is right under a patch of zoas. Also, the bumb right below the one that "opened" is now "opened" as well... Could be blistering of some sort from a coral sting?

 

[marrone]

Eel have a pretty thick slime coating and I would think that Frogspawn, Hammers wouldn't bother it and zoas wouldn't be a problem at all. It's very possible it's some type of legion that it got for rubbing against a rock and it got infected. I would take the eel out of the tank and place it in a QT tank and treat it with an anti-biotic so the open wound doesn't turn into a bad infection. Another possibility is it could be a tumor just under the skin. In that case it needs to be removed and then treated with anti-biotic.

This is a pretty common eel, that people keep in reef tanks, with a lot of corals that sting and I would think then it would be a common problem with a lot of them getting it but you don't see many posts about it.

 

[LukFox]

Could it have gotten an infected like this overnight? She was fine just the night before.

Here's a progress photo from today - there's less red in the open wounds and you can also see the newly opened bump.

 

[marrone]

Anything is possible in a reef tank with all different corals and inverts. It's possible that it's just a cut, from a rock, then got infected and now the infection is breaking though the skin.

Anyway the eel does look better today than yesterday. So it's possible the remaining ones will also break open and hopefully the wounds will heal over and all the will happen is the eel was have some scares on it's head. Since it's still eating I would soak it food with vitaimins, which should help it build up it's immune system. If it does get worst I would take it out and place it in a QT and treat it there.

 

[LukFox]

By vitamins, would soaking her food in selcon work? I have that, so I could go ahead and use that now.

 

[marrone]

That should be good, just let it soak in really good say for like 1-2 hours.