Gourami has damaged looking fin with white fluff??

Gomisan

Gomisan

Man in a hat
Feb 9, 2006
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Adelaide, South Australia
www.ufo-x.com
This is my first experience with a sick fish, so please bear with me.

My Dwarf Gourami has gradually changed his behaviour i nthe past week, he's less active and is spending alot of time just sitting in one spot. This is a marked difference to his behaviour over the past 2 months.

Today i was taking a closer look and I noticed his tail seems a bit frayed and damaged, and there is a line of white fluffy material across it, almost like it's being eaten away by something.

The other fish in the tank seem fine.

I'd appreciate any advice on what this may be, and how it may be treated. I'm going to give the tank a barrage of tests for those of you who love numbers, but with all the other fish acting as usual (Neon & Serpae tetras, clown loach) it doesn't seem likely it's a water problem.
 
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hmm sounds liek fungus, finrot, or possible bacterial infection.

I have had some luck with Pimafix which isnt a very strong medication to remove stuff like what you are describing.

Is your fish Flashing?
 
well thats the good thing about Pimafix, it's not very stong so i just add it to my community tank as I don't have a hospital tank either...many people here will probably tell you don't bother with it but it has worked for me several times when I caught problems early.

But wait till someone else answers cause it may not be the best idea...
 
I had a betta with similar symptoms about a week ago. Frayed fins, grey fuzzy patch(fungus) and bright red on the tips of his fins. I have been treating with Jungle Fungus Eliminator. I started treating Monday and the fungus was cleared by Wednesday and the bright red was gone by Thursday.

It was not caused by a water quality issue, as I just moved him into a 10g divided tank the week before, that I moved 2 others out of. Tank is tested regularly and all numbers were good, as well as 50% water change twice a week.

Since I thought it might be bacterial, I treated in that tank. The other side houses platy fry.

Whatever you do, good luck!
 
It sounds like fin rot. I have had some fin rot problems recently after adding serpaes to my tank. My cories dorsal fins started disappearing. I think they got a bit of fin rot after one (or more) of the serpaes indulged in some fin nipping. Maybe your serpaes are up to no good.

I treated the fin rot with tri-sulfa and once the fins stopped disappearing I stopped with the tri-sulfa and started using tea tree oil (active ingredient in melafix) to help heal the fins. Also I did a couple of big gravel cleans and large (50%) water changes daily even though my water parameters tested o.k. I notice you're from Australia - I don't think they sell some of the commonly mentioned antibiotics (eg Maracyn) in Australia - at least I haven't been able to find them.

Anyway, so far my cories fins seem to be growing back.
 
Well I've gone and done it. Bought another tank. I knew it would happen eventually, just a shame it's a fish being sick that prompted it.

Still, this way I had a valid excuse and managed to get it by my girlfriend, who probably would have freaked if I'd added another tank under any other circumstances. And I actually got a bigger tank .. but shhhh don't tell her, I said it was just different proportions, but same 'size' *wink wink*

Anyway, the Gourami has been moved into the hospital tank. I've seeded the filter and gravel from the original tank, so hopefully I'll avoid a nasty cycle while trying to get him better.

The product I ended up buying is called Fungus-Ade. I asked about the others suggested here, and was advised this might work quicker, and hence he can stop being medicated quicker.

I guess all thats left now is to see how he does. I don't suppose anyone can tell me if fish fins grow back?

This is his current state:

125085404_fb41f0eb9b.jpg


and this is what he USED to look like:

100019606_558b99520f.jpg
 
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I can't see the tail on the first pic -- is the tail still whole? Otherwise the fish does not look too bad -- I would stick to something mild and see how it goes.

When my bala's got fin and tail rot they lost about 80% of all their fins and could not swim properly (head stands, flips, rolls). It took a week of two antibiotics to kill it off, they are fine now, full fins back. I used Maricyn and Maricyn-two combined (there are two kinds of bacteria -- hard to say what you have at any given time).

I just dumped it into my 65g tank assuming others would come down with it if I was not careful -- everything survived except my bio-wheel -- took about 4 days to re-cycle -- so you might try it in a separate tank first and of nobody else comes down with it you are in luck.
 
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