Benggai Cardinal white spot on eyes

Allenh427 · Sep 5, 2022

Hey gang. Recently I noticed my cardinal has a hazey white spot in the middle of each eye, symmetrical on both sides. I googled around and some images show the same thing on other benggai cardinals but it's rare.
I also saw another related post for another fish and people said it might be eyes flukes. Can you confirm and give a recommendation for treatment if it is?

Jay Hemdal · Sep 5, 2022

It could be cataracts, or one of two types of eye flukes.

Did the spots grow over time, or just show up suddenly?

The two types of eye flukes are internal or external (Neobenedenia). From what I can see, this looks internal. It really isn't possible to tell internal eye flukes from cataracts, because the eye flukes cause cataracts.

Jay

Allenh427 · Sep 5, 2022

To my knowledge, I just noticed them one day so I'm estimating the answer to your question is that they just showed up one day.

Jay Hemdal · Sep 5, 2022

Allenh427 said:
To my knowledge, I just noticed them one day so I'm estimating the answer to your question is that they just showed up one day.

That does tend to rule out natural cataracts, as those develop over time.
Are the fish still able to see their food?

You could try dosing the tank with Prazipro 2x, 8 days apart with extra aeration. That will hopefully kill any eye flukes (but the cataract damage is already done and probably won't go away).

Jay

Allenh427 · Sep 5, 2022

Yeah he/she can see food easily. Oddly enough it spits the food back out, it's not happy with anything. I've even tried adding garlic guard to the food and that's still not good enough.

I'll order some prazi pro, thanks!

Grey L · Sep 7, 2022

If it is a clear disc-shaped object on the eye, you can try soaking fresh water for 3 minutes, but be sure to add an oxygen pump.

Allenh427 · Sep 22, 2022

Adding 5 more pictures. I put him in a quarantine tank with prazi at full dose for about a week and a half now. No difference.

Jay Hemdal · Sep 22, 2022

Those are cataracts. As I mentioned, if they were caused by internal eye flukes, getting rid of the flukes probably won't resolve the scarring that caused the cataracts. If the fish is still able to see its food, that may be the best you can expect to see.

Jay