Dying firefish

[i have crabs]

My fire fish has a large abrasion on it and its breathing is very labored. It can barely swim, and is mostly lying around now. It looks like it will die before the end of the night. Can anyone tell if this is a disease, or looks like something attacked it? I have had this fish for over a year now, and this has developed since last night. As of now, the fish is still alive, barely. Any advice?

[charris18]

looks like mine when it was attacked

[i have crabs]

Attacked by what? And did it survive? I only have a pep shrimp, cleaner shrimp and various hermits/snails. And of course a yellow clown goby and red head goby.

[paul21]

looks like some parasite

[manuel]

sorry i'm not really sure what it could be, This is just really a bump.

 

Prehaps it was a coral sweeper?

 

got anything in your tank that might cause that?

 

anyway best of luck, hope it all works out ok.

[Six]

not a parasite. if it were, you could tell it was b/c you'd see a head and eyes at that size. it looks like a abrasion with a possible start of an infection (the red color of the flesh).

 

considering its been in the aquarium for so long, and the fish's stomach is nice and plump, it's probably not going to secumb to disease very easily. what did the area start out looking like? kinda redish looking but an "under the skin" type of red color? if so, it might be an internal infection of some sort. honestly, i doubt it.

 

if you've added any rock via live rock or coral attached to rock you're suseptable to getting hitchhiker crabs or shrimp. mantis, pistol, gorrilla crabs are just a few. even if you added the rock a few months ago, a small crab coming in on it could have grown enough out of your view within your tank to start causing some problems now.

 

the sometimes great thing about SW and reefs is that you can buy something and get something cool for free. sometimes the cool stuff isn't compatable with wjhat you've got. i'd say that this is the case.

 

take a flashlight and look into the nooks and crannys at night to see if you see any crabs or a shrimp's head. (tho they are hard to see). sometimes adding a trap or placing a small portion of meaty food, like mussel or shrimp, in the tank at night will get the 'bad guy' out and into the open if he does indeed exist.

 

keep the fish healthy with good water quality and foods and it'll heal on it's own. one of my fish got a nip out of it's tail and a week later it's almost fully regenerated. a fish in captivity that long should do fine with TLC.

 

GL

6

[i have crabs]

Well unfortunately, the fish did not survive. It is hard to believe that it could have been a hitchhiker, since I have not added any new live rock within the past year. I should have seen something by now, right?

 

Six,

I couldn't tell you what the sore looked like when it started. Sunday, my fire fish was out and fine, no wounds. Monday it hid all day, I didn't see it. Then Tuesday is when I saw the fish breathing hard floating upside down.

 

To me, it looks like something injured it, but for the life of me I cant figure out what. It's fins have never had any rips, and you can see from the pic that the fins look torn and tattered. I watch my tank all the time at night with a red light, and I have never seen anything that looks like it could do this. This tank has been up for almost two years, and very little has been added to it (except corals) so I am not sure why I wouldn't have seen some type of aggression before now. I am gonna keep an eye out, but if anyone else might know what happened, don't hesitate to give your two cents.

[Six]

Hitch hikers can come on even small coral frags. maybe it was a sting from a coral, although firefish and most fish in general are smart enough not to touch the ones that have a strong enough sting to inflict that much damage.

 

Sorry man, I'm suprised the fish died. it looked like it was in poor shape, but not that bad. i guess i mean ive seen worse problems that of which the fish pulled through.

 

if you've got the stomach for it, doing a necropsy might give a little insight.

 

the only other thing besides aggression from whatever it could have been would be an internal problem. usually those only manifest themselves when the fish is newly aquired.

 

sorry for your loss.

 

6

[Regal Tang]

sorry about your fish...my best guess was a hitchiker...my Royal Gramma (new fish) was doing good for 2 days... (eating crazy)...i dont see him for 2 days...then i see him with a broken airblatter...so he couldnt control his swimming!!! hahah!!! poor guy..now i hate royal grammas....

 

 

oh yea btw...a sapphire damsel half its size bit off 1/3-1/2 his tail!

[CGNano]

It seems to me, that you got a hitchhiker of some sort on your rock that got it while it was asleep.