powdered doughnut disease!?!

[Dark~Euphoria]

Ok, so recently my girlfriend pointed out that my engineer goby looked like a "powdered doughnut." I know I shoulda qt'd but the black cap basslet I bought introduced some sort of disease into my tank which has so far killed it, and 2 threadfin cardinalfish.

My maroon clown (tank bred) and engineer goby are the only remaining fish that are still alive, the engineer goby looks a little better this past week, but still has ample whitish spots, spongy growth looking things on it... the maroon clown just has spots, not so many "growthy" looking things like the engineer goby.

what could this be, ich? It looks a lot worse than most ich , like whitish spongy stuff hanging off of the fish...

anyone know what it is, or how to get rid of it?

Thanks, Adam

 

[TerryB]

Sounds like it could be amlyoodinium if it looks like a fine biege or white powder on the fish. Mucus or strings hanging from the fish could be brooklynella. My guess is amyloodinium since all the fish seem to be infected. You will need to treat them all in quarantine, not in the display tank. Tough to beat at this point since it has been going on a while. Chloroquine phosphate gives the quickest relief and is the best bet at this point. Traditional treatment is copper. I would ONLY trust Cupramine and definately only use the half dose on the first day as instructed. Then test the level twice daily with a compatible copper test kit.

Terry B

 

[jnc914]

+1 on the velvet like Terry B advised. If you are actually seeing the powdery dots/film on the fish, that usually means it is pretty far along. You really have about a 50/50 chance of the fish surviving even if you dose with medication at this point, maybe even less. I went through this a couple months back. Wiped out my entire tank within 2.5 weeks even after starting cupramine. Good Luck, velvet is very nasty.

 

[limitdown]

Velvet is so much more deadly than ich, and it can kill really quickly. I lost $1,000+ of fish within 2wks to velvet all because I didn't QT a stinking little domino damsel.

Velvet attacks very aggressively so you also need to attack it very aggressively. Don't waste time trying to do hypo or use other medications, go directly with Cupramine in a QT immediately.

 

[Dark~Euphoria]

well, saying it does kill all my fish, will it remain in my system for any length of time?
Also, if my fish somehow fight it off by themselves, will it still be in their system or in the water?

Thanks, Adam

 

[jnc914]

Your fish won't fight it off, at least from your description of how your fish look now. And yes, it wil remain in your system, and can actually last longer than ich even without a fish host. When velvet killed off my tank, I emptied it completely, cleaned everything, let it sit dry for 2 months and then started over with new RODI water and rock. Dont know if you want to go to that extreme, but at least I have piece of mind. Everything I get now goes into QT for 6 weeks, I can't afford to lose anymore fish.

 

[Dark~Euphoria]

Well the only 2 fifsh left are a tank bred maroon clown and a engineer goby (mabe)
the engineer looks bad but the clown looks 100% free of any dots etc... looks perfectly heathly... mabe it has an immunity to the disease...

 

[jnc914]

My false Percula survived the velvet outbreak that killed off the rest of the fish. Clowns are tough little fish. Maybe they do have a natural immunity to velvet.