Fish Not Eating - Advice Appreciated

[mark4785]

I have a small 60 litre aquarium which is home to a female Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish (there were two of them yesterday) and a female German Blue Ram. They are both refusing to eat any form of flake or pellet food; they even refuse to eat specialist flake food with high amounts of beef heart and krill which I thought would bring their appetite back. I have been feeding them both blood worm and artemia dipped in multi-vitamins for about 2 weeks now to keep them alive. Other symptoms include rubbing body on objects such as bog wood and yawning.

The 2nd female DNR died from what seemed to be a lack of oxygen getting to the gills. She was swimming face up for 4-5 consecutive days only to be found dead today on the substrate. Yesterday, seeing as the knew death was unavoidable due to the fish no longer being able to swim, I got a skin swab from the fish and tried to look at what was actually irritating the fish through my microscope; I did not see anything moving but I could clearly see what looked like some sort of bodily structure which may have been ripped in two when I took the swab. It did not seem to resemble a gill fluke which is what I thought I was dealing with.

I have treated the tank twice with one of the best anti-fluke treatments on the market called Kusuri Wormer Plus. This has done absolutely nothing to resolve the issue. I've tried tonic salt treatment at levels which should dehydrate parasites with no positive result. I am now treating the aquarium with Waterlife Sterazin, something I left to last since it apparently destroys the filter bacteria which helps stabilise the nitrogen cycle. I have yet to see any improvements after using this product.

So as you can imagine, I am wondering what on earth could be in the aquarium that completely obliterates a fishes appetite for 2 weeks straight and infests the gills? Any help with this question would be appreciated!

Note: The female GBR was previously based in a larger aquarium with a male GBR which severely stressed her out. She lost her appetite, colours, started to rub on objects and was actually bitten on the nose (this healed up after I treated it). This rubbing and loss of appetite has continued in the tank i've described above which houses the Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish. The DNR seemingly is now mimicing the rubbing and no appetite behaviour. I'd like to add that there is no excess slime coat on either of the fish if this helps with diagnosis.


Water Stats:

Total Ammonia: 0 ppm
Nitrite: 0 ppm
Nitrate: 10 ppm
PH: 7.4



Mark.

 

[G H Nelson]

Hi Mark
This is what I would do...... turn off your filter remove the fish into another Tub/tank....make sure its clean I would wash with bleach first and rinse thoroughly.Use a sponge filter to achieve some aeration and a heater.
Clean your filter in dechlorinated tap water.
Gravel clean the substrate and clean the glass.

Remove all the water or as much as possible from the aquarium.
Replenish the tank with tap water switch the heater on....do not add dechlorinator at this point leave for 30/45 mins.
This is to kill any nasties in your tank.Wait until the tank reaches the correct temperature.
Add the dechlorinator next.Switch the filter on.

Now the idea is to transfer as little water as possible from the holding tank into the main tank.
Do 1 fish at a time,put the fish into a smaller vessel adding some water from main tank little by little.
Discarding the excess.
This is to get the fish acclimatised to a much cleaner environment.

I wouldn't add anymore medicines.
I would do another large water change 2 days later.
The above process may help to improve your fishes health and appetite.
Good luck
hoggie

 

[mark4785]

Hi, thanks for the advice.

I have followed some of your advice, however I deviated a little.

I completely emptied the main aquarium and transferred the fishes to a quarantine tank. I have decided to treat that quarantine tank with 0.4% concentration of salt and a methyline blue treatment. To this point, I have not seen any rubbing or yawning, however the appetite is still non-existent towards flake/pellet food (they will have no problems consuming blood worm and similar foods).

As for the main tank, I filled it up with dechlorinated tap water and added protozin and I am gradually increasing the salt concentration to 0.4%. A DNR only recently died in there from what I believe was a gill parasite. I am keeping this aquarium empty for at least 5 days before returning the fish, that's presuming protozin hasn't killed all of the filter bacteria.

The reason I deviated from your advice is due to the female GBR showing the yawning/rubbing behaviour in a different 100% healthy, cycled planted aquarium after being stressed by a male GBR. So rather than the tank in which the death of a DNR occurred being the cause, I think the female GBR transferred the parasite from the planted aquarium.

 

[mark4785]

The rubbing/flicking and yawning has stopped but GBR is still very listless and quite pale. Still not eating any flake food.

 

[mark4785]

I have published a YT video to show the symptoms and signs of disease on both a Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish and German Blue Ram at the following URL: .

I'd appreciate it if someone could make a diagnosis. I have no clue what to make of the behaviour/symptoms. Some advice from an external website suggests I should humanely put down all of the fish has they are suffering from irreversible gill damage induced by gill flukes.