Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
Forum rules
Read this before posting!!
Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.
1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.
2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.
3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)
4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.
5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.
We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.
While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.
Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
Read this before posting!!
Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.
1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.
2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.
3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)
4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.
5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.
We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.
While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.
Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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sgtmyers88
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Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
Sorry for your loss. That is some nasty stuff. It is the equivalent of Parvo in dogs. That's about as bad as you can get as you already know.
WARNING: Puffers are mischievous little blimps with enchanting powers. You may not be content with having just one.
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Arny
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Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
I was just wondering, if your puffer gets vibro does it affect all the other fish and live rock in the tank?
Do you have to throw everything else away and start again?
Do you have to throw everything else away and start again?
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Pufferpunk
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Mongo, the 4" A modestus
2 T biocellatus
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Also kept:
lorteti
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T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
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Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
I would at the least, sterilize everything.
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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FishFan
- Figure 8 Puffer
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- Location: USA
Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
Sound advice. We're boiling or bleaching everything.Pufferpunk wrote:I would at the least, sterilize everything.
Our fish was in a quarantine tank alone, so if it was vibrio we wouldn't know how it would affect other fish.
Vibrio is an organism that is often present in the fish, but doesn't become a pathogen unless the conditions exist for it to become an infection (e.g. wound, stress, bad water quality). In our case there may have been a wound in the mouth area from glass surfing. The fish was undergoing treatment for Cryptocaryon irritans, a protozoan that causes wounds. We dropped the water salinity to treat the Crypto, which may have added even more stress for the new fish. Striped Burrfish are difficult fish to acclimate to the aquarium, in part because they get very stressed by shipping and often have internal parasites (internal worms, bacteria, flukes, Protozoa, and other microbes) from the wild that can become pathogenic when the fish is stressed.
It is possible for bacteria that enter through a wound such as vibrio (maybe) to only affect one fish. Brooklynella, on the other hand, perhaps less so since it makes it's own wounds.
-R
Last edited by FishFan on Sat Feb 15, 2014 6:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
A = Anne, R =Robert
There has to be a point.
There has to be a point.
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Pufferpunk
- Queen Admin
- Posts: 32775
- Joined: Tue May 31, 2005 11:06 am
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: Filbert, the 12" T lineatus
Punkster, the 4" red T miurus
Mongo, the 4" A modestus
2 T biocellatus
C valentini
C coranata
C papuan
Also kept:
lorteti
DPs
suvattii
burrfish
T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
- Location: Chicago
- Contact:
Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
DO NOT BOIL LIVE ROCK!!!
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showt ... ?t=2253493
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showt ... ?t=2253493
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
-
FishFan
- Figure 8 Puffer
- Posts: 208
- Joined: Wed Dec 19, 2007 4:08 am
- My Puffers: Orbicular Burrfish (Oblio, shown in the avatar), Striped Burrfish
- Location (country): Maine USA
- Location: USA
Re: Sudden illness - white head and heavy slime
Nope, no boiling live rock. Bleach dip followed by an extended soak in fresh water dosed with prime, then air dry.Pufferpunk wrote:DO NOT BOIL LIVE ROCK!!!
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showt ... ?t=2253493
-R
A = Anne, R =Robert
There has to be a point.
There has to be a point.