1 fish dead, 1 with white scaly spot, 1 with missing fins....I NEED HELP

Fresh-Water-Girl · 02-15-2008, 01:34 PM

not happy am I. One of my nice male guppies was found today stuck to filter intake, fins eaten otherwise looked fine. My elephant nose fish has a white scaly spot right in front of his mouth on the nose. Lastly my betta male is missing almost completly his rear fins top middle and bottom.

I have a bully. But he must be a closet one cause I don't see any aggresion durring the day! My

The fish that look fine are:

2 cory cats- 2 1/2" long
3 opal Gourmins- 1-2" in size (they fight but only each other and seems to be just play)
I have between 8-10 feeder type guppies (they all chase the one notable female I have, seem to nip her but she has no damage!) only attack eachother if they can't find her, but still seems almost like play.
1 Butterfly fish

Who I have seen be aggresive

My elephant fish durring bloodworm feedings and if someone goes in his cave..lol.
My Betta who puffs up to anyone near him.
The gourmins on occasion will use their tenticles to slap other fish also nipping them then running. (to me seems they just want to play)

My thought is the white scaly spot on the elephant nose is unrealated to the Guppy death and Bettas fin fatality.

Those two cause they involve fins being eaten i believe to be a case of middle of the night while they sleep bullying. I don't know maybe the scaly spot could also be a bad nip.

What do you all think?

I'm going to re-home the Betta, just to be sure he doesn't end up like the Guppy.

I'm concerned for my ele nose though, he has been tank mates with the cories and feeder guppies for a long time, everything else is fairly new

45 Gal, ph 7.4(a little high) did 10% water change with no effect on ph. amon 0ppm (perfect), genral hardness (perfect), nitrate .25 mg/l (not perfect but not too high) strong double filter, 72-74 degree water, feeding once daily at night, 1 frozen bloodworm serving, small pinch of flakes and 3 pellets of shrimp.

Thank You

Tommy Gun · 02-15-2008, 11:57 PM

Hello Fresh-Water-Girl; welcome to the forum! I am sorry to hear about your troubles though.

Quote:

I have a bully. But he must be a closet one cause I don't see any aggresion durring the day!

Believe it or not, that is actually pretty common...even when all of the fish in an tank happen to be very active during the daylight hours, once the lights are off, sometime a figurative werewolf comes out of hiding.

In your case though, I wonder if your elephant nose is the nocturnal bully. From what I understand, these fish are pretty docile once settled in, but they may not respect smaller tankmates as much as we would like them too.

Out of curiousity, have you ever noticed your fish suddenly swim away from your elephant nose for no apparent reason? I have never kept one or even seen one in person actually, but I hear/read that they do have the ability to create electricity and am wondering if that is only for use on a sensory level, or defensive type level.

Quote:

My thought is the white scaly spot on the elephant nose is unrealated to the Guppy death and Bettas fin fatality.

If you look real close, does that spot look a little bit hairy at all? If so, it might be a bacterial infection (which looks like a fungus but sounds to be limited to the mouth area of a fish) and could become a big problem someday soon. Obviously I am just taking a sort of wild guess here so I wouldn't jump the gun too quckly (no pun intended).

Quote:

ph 7.4(a little high)

7.4 is well within an acceptable range for almost any freshwater fish so unless it is changing frequently or rapidly, you probably do not need to worry about pH.

Quote:

72-74 degree water

IMHO, you might want to bump that water temp up a little bit if you can. Even though 72 - 74 is on the low range of a tropical temp by some accounts, I believe most, if not all of your fish will do very well in the upper 70's. If you haven't already, you might want to make sure that the water temp isn't dropping too much at night.

Personally, I do feel like you might be pushing some limits with compatability and I would agree if your gut is telling you this has something to do with a bully. Other than finding a way to seperate the fish from each other in to make an attempt at isolating the aggressor by trial and error, you might want to keep a closer eye on the elephant nose a couple hours after the lights go out....or keep your lights off for a day so you can observe them without losing too much sleep (although ambient light may prove to be too much for Dr. Jeckle and/or Mr. Hyde)

Fresh-Water-Girl · 02-16-2008, 01:57 PM

UPDATE

I have done 33% water changes yesterday and today added 1 rounded tbls of salt per 5 gallons. I got the nitrite lvl back down to 0. Ph seems steady at 7.4 (so If you say thats fine I'm not going to fuss over that). Ammonia lvl is also at 0.

I believe the issues I had were with the tank not being cycled properly. Elephant nose fish are very sensitive to water quality (the white spot was apparently a scab cause it fell off showing a pink sore).

I moved the tank last friday only saving 20 gallons of the 45 that goes into my 55 gallon tank. I also fully replaced the filters and washed all the gravel and decor (likely getting rid of some of the good bacteria)<---oops. I also even changed the filter again yesterday another oops but it had my bettas and guppies fins stuck in it and I was thinking I had an infection or something going on.

I have moved the Betta back to his own tank (not an easy catch in a 55 gallon) with tap water and a bowl buddy fizz tab last night. He's doing o.k but has little fins left. Do they grow back?

Now one of my loaches a cory cat. My fat tank cleaner is looking a little pale white kinda almost in arears. I googled that and it is a water quality indicator so I'm hoping he'll get better soon.

I plan on getting some bacteria from the LFS called "cycle" adding that and hoping for the best. I will continue the daily small water changes at 5-10 gallons instead of the 15 gallons I have been doing. Boy are those buckets heavy! Does anyone know where you can buy a straight to faucet hose for a faucet with no screwable end (mine is an tall arched type)?

I also bought a 10 gallon tank, heater, filter for a hospitol tank/ new fish tank. I'm cycling that now and plan to put a goldfish in sometime in the near future to help the bacteria growth. Should I add some of the water from the main tank now that the nitrite is down? That would keep me from having to acclimate new fish or sick fish from one to the other right?

Thanks for the help!

Pinkrblu · 02-16-2008, 02:43 PM

Regarding the betta's fins growing back, if he doesn't succumb to some sort of secondary infection, you might be pleasantly surprised. My betta lost most of his fins and when they grew back they were three times as long and beautiful. Regeneration is a great thing.

Fresh-Water-Girl · 02-16-2008, 08:17 PM

Yet another update with pictures!

O.k water test 6 hours after 33% change still good! yay!

I took some pictures of the elephant nose's sore and the brown cory cat, a few other just genral pictures.

Let me know what you think

Fresh-Water-Girl · 02-17-2008, 01:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tommy Gun

Hello Fresh-Water-Girl; welcome to the forum! I am sorry to hear about your troubles though.

Hi and Thanks!

Believe it or not, that is actually pretty common...even when all of the fish in an tank happen to be very active during the daylight hours, once the lights are off, sometime a figurative werewolf comes out of hiding.

In your case though, I wonder if your elephant nose is the nocturnal bully. From what I understand, these fish are pretty docile once settled in, but they may not respect smaller tankmates as much as we would like them too.

Out of curiousity, have you ever noticed your fish suddenly swim away from your elephant nose for no apparent reason? I have never kept one or even seen one in person actually, but I hear/read that they do have the ability to create electricity and am wondering if that is only for use on a sensory level, or defensive type level.

You are right on. I just got done watching the tank 3 hours after lights off. That elephant nose won't let anyone sleep. He is darting around attacking anything that moves! I think he will be leaving in the morning! Anyone near Rochester, NY you can have him!

If you look real close, does that spot look a little bit hairy at all? If so, it might be a bacterial infection (which looks like a fungus but sounds to be limited to the mouth area of a fish) and could become a big problem someday soon. Obviously I am just taking a sort of wild guess here so I wouldn't jump the gun too quckly (no pun intended).

I think the spot was from water quality or maybe even banging into gravel or glass hunting my other fish!

7.4 is well within an acceptable range for almost any freshwater fish so unless it is changing frequently or rapidly, you probably do not need to worry about pH.

Not going to. Thanks

IMHO, you might want to bump that water temp up a little bit if you can. Even though 72 - 74 is on the low range of a tropical temp by some accounts, I believe most, if not all of your fish will do very well in the upper 70's. If you haven't already, you might want to make sure that the water temp isn't dropping too much at night.

Got it set at 78-80 now.

Personally, I do feel like you might be pushing some limits with compatability and I would agree if your gut is telling you this has something to do with a bully. Other than finding a way to seperate the fish from each other in to make an attempt at isolating the aggressor by trial and error, you might want to keep a closer eye on the elephant nose a couple hours after the lights go out....or keep your lights off for a day so you can observe them without losing too much sleep (although ambient light may prove to be too much for Dr. Jeckle and/or Mr. Hyde)

Most of them other then the few more guppies I bought and the 3 gouramis came stocked in the tank and supposedly did well together! Obviously not the case.

Thanks a lot.