Unknown Disease

chilake08

Member
I am relatively new to reefing and this is my first (and unfortunate) bout with disease. Of 4 fish I am down to 1. Here is the progression of what I know:

The tank is maintained at 79 for the majority of the time. The water parameters fluctuate a bit due to it being a 28g nano, but nothing out of the ordinary. I do a 5g water change every two weeks.

March 3rd I started a Tech-M treatment for bryopsis
March 13th I added some Frags from a frag swap. I dipped them before I put them in.
April 4th I noticed that my Yellow Watchman Goby wasn't eating and was breathing hard. Had been hiding in her hole for 1-2 days. I also added a sodalime CO2 scrubber onto my tank to boost pH from 7.6-8.0 to 7.8-8.2
April 9th while purchasing some additional CUC at LFS the Goby died. Confirmed upon finding her body.
April 11th stopped Tech M treatment
April 12th I started a very small bag of GFO
April 18th Noticed the Blenny didn't come out for food (having seen him earlier in the weekend). Found his body later that day.
May 3rd I noticed my Orange Spotted Filefish (trained to eat frozen food) didn't eat out of the water column.
May 4th The Filefish didn't eat at all
May 5th The Filefish died (bout 1 hour ago now)

The only correlating data I have from my tank sensors is a 1-2 degree increase in water temp 1-2 days before the fish died. Due to my AC not cooling down the apt enough (spring fluctuation in temp).

While I didn't see any symptoms on the Goby or Blenny because they hid, I was able to see all the symptoms on the Filefish.
1) Some degree of lethargy
2) Rapid breathing (but not near the surface)
3) Hanging out in low flow area
4) Loss of appetite
5) Distended abdomen

At first I attributed the close deaths of the Goby and Blenny to coincidence, but now with the death of the Filefish i'm afraid there is a communicable disease in my aquarium. I have one fish left, a purple firefish. Currently he seems to be healthy, but with what seems a 2-3 day cycle between the fish showing symptoms and dying, it could be false hope.

Anyone that could help me ID what this is, and how to either prevent it or treat it once I observe it would be GREATLY appreciated.
 
Could you please post the following
How long has the tank been up and running? PO4, Salinity, Nitrates, Amonia, RO water or Tap?
 
PO4, Nitrates, and Ammonia are at or very near 0
Salinity is kept at 1.025 with the occasional 1.026 from evaporation.
Water is lab grade RO/DI water

The tank has been up and running since Nov 09, so about a year and a half.
 
Get the last fish out and into QT....then leave the tank fallow for a while. It's hard to say what's going on, other then a parasite of sorts. Bacterial or fungal infections usually have some tell tale signs in the way of sores or badly damaged fins. While Crypt may have some tell tale white spots, that's not to say it's not there, the same goes for Brook or Od. and some others.
 
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