New dwarf angel has red sore on head

[blazemore]

I've had this eibli angel for about a week now. A few days after it entered the tank, I noticed its forehead was starting to peel a little. I didn't think anything of it at first, because I had a flame angel do the same but eventually recovered with no problems in a couple days. Unfortunately, it's getting worse and worse. It looks like an open sore now on his head. I've removed him from the main tank and placed him in a 10 gallon quarantine. I have also started treatment with maracyn-two to kill bacteria in case it becomes infected if this isn't already caused by bacteria.

Is there anything else I can do to possibly remedy this, or does it just need to take its course?

Thanks.

 

[leebca]

You've taken proper steps so far. You must turn to helping your fish by providing the best foods with the right additives. See this:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=785228

 

[blazemore]

RIP.

He was dead the next morning.. his entire face was red. I have no idea what it was that caused it.

 

[ericsnook5]

when animals die like this so suddenly--but with obvious lesions I think it would be beneficial to find a veterinarian to help you submit the body for a post-mortem. This seems to me to be a wise way to determine the cause of what is going on or what happened so that you can try to prevent it in the future and prevent history from repeating itself.

If you do decide to do this in the future I would remove the dead fish from the tank as soon as possible and place in a ziplock baggie in the refrigerator (NOT the freezer) until you can contact a veterinarian to help you. Even better, establish a relationship with a veterinarian prior to an event like this and call them if/when something like this happens. Essentially the vet will either place the fish in formalin to preserve the tissues or will perform a necropsy (autopsy) and place selected tissues in formalin--depending on the size of the fish and the disease process.

This will allow you to at least determine whether there might a husbandry problem or an infectious problem so you can try to fix the problem in your tank and prevent a repeat ocurrence. It's a great way to turn a sad death into something that will benefit your knowledge in the future as well as the lives of the fish of your tank.
Eric

 

[Rondelet]

Eric makes an excellent suggestion - one that I would second.

However, I have found that when I've done this (sampled dead fish for bacteriology), getting clean isolates from uclers is extremely difficult. Also, when you do, their resistance profiles can be quite extensive - in that they are resistant to a lot of different antibiotics. I suspect this is due to overuse of antibiotics by shippers in the distribution chain.

My guess is that it was a bacterial infection. FWIW, I agree with Lee in that I think you did as much as you could under the circumstances.