Sick Discus

[chambo]

Hi,
Having some big problems with my 7 discus.
I work away from home and my other half has been caring for the fish in my absence.

Have had the these fish for almost 3 years.

-I have 2 Blue based fish, both have developed what looks like Cataracks ?
on their eyes. I saw this happen over night in 1 fish alone.

-My fish use to chase food alround the tank to eat it. now they the majority will only take food from the top of the tank and will not chase the food nor eat of the bottom of the tank as they use to. Several fish are really skinny. When I saw how skinny I thought worms. How ever there is only 2 skinny fish and all fish are displaying the same behavior.

How can I treat them?

Water peremiters seem the same as always:

PH 5.5
Ammonia 0

[ILLUSN]

Clouding eyes is usually a water quality issue, hows your nitrate/nitrite.

best treatment is to do a massive water change and a filter clean, if you have substrate do a VERY deep gravel vac if the fish arnt chasing food there most likely a heap of it festering away in the substrate.

once your all clean you could try treating for worms, you'll need to treat with both levimenisole and prazi.

to help the eye's clear up you can try some protozin,i find it works better with salt at 1tsp/40L.

[chambo]

Thanks for the reply.

Tank is a bear bottom tank. Have been smashing tthe water changes out (tank water). Will give the protozin a try and keep up the regular changes. Will give the filter a good clean out also.

Any thing else I can do?

[chambo]

Also, did a nitrate test last night. result was clear.
Thinking about it now, i will do a retest tonight.

[chambo]

IS METHELENE BLUE THE SAME AS PROTOZINE? THATS ALL LOCAL SHOP HAS :(

[chambo]

Also, did a nitrate test last night. result was clear.
Thinking about it now, i will do a retest tonight.


UPDATE:

Water Temp: 28c
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0
Ammonia: 0 - was 0.1 last night prior to WC

Cleaned the Canister filter out
Gave the whole tank a quick scrub down
Changed 50% water
Added Salt

[BobbyBruce]

Hi Chambo,

Please describe your canister cleaning process.

How long ago was your previous clean out?

How were your filter pads (describe old, new, amount of material stuck in there, etc)?

Regards,

Bob

[chambo]

Hi Bob,
Canister filter is a 4 tray 1500L item. I have 1 other the same on a 3 ft tank.

Media consits of,
Coarse black sponge
ceremic noodles
Bio sponge
White sponge on top

All sponge is OEM replacements.
Thinking my previous clean out was 1 month ago.
Shamefully the filter was pretty grot as it had sucked up all the uneaten food from the period of when the fish became ill.
I have a 5000Ltr water tank from which I draw upon for my water changes. My tank water is very consistent and I have never needed to treat the water over the last 3 years before adding.

Where i live it is hard to get low demand specialist items relating to fish, Thus the question regarding Methyl Blue.

After looking at the condition of the canister filter. i now think this may have been the major contributing factor to the illness??

[ILLUSN]

Guarantee the dirty filter caused your problems keep up the water changes 0.1 ammonia is bad it means your filter is re-cycling if you can't get protozin then leave it out. While your filter recovers you'll have to do multiple small feeds atleast twice a day amd vac out any uneaten food after each feed ( give them 5 min max)

You'll also have to do daily water changes for the next few weeks or till you get measurable nitrate and 0 ammonia between changes

[boxters]

cloudy eyes is usually a heavy bacterial problem. If the level of infection is high i would probably be more aggressive with treatment and use either formalin or potasium permanganate or a combination of both. This will kill all the bacteria and give the fish a chance to recover.

[BobbyBruce]

Hi Chambo,

What process did you use to clean your filter media? I am concerned about your ammonia readings.

Regards,

Bob