Blue tang, air stone

[fishfairy]

Anyone have thoughts on what would cause a hippo tang to start hanging out directly above an air stone? Should I be concerned? Every time I peek in he’s near the surface directly above bubbles.

Fish is on 9th day of copper treatment, this is his second round of copper after an Ich/velvet outbreak. His tank mate a Tomini mysteriously passed within 24 hours of removing copper the first time. I received much appreciated advise from this group to start copper over.

He’s eating fine, appears to be breathing fine, ammonia badge shows yellow (good), but he does look stressed as in color isn’t bright and extremely shy. Doing ten percent water changes every 2-3 days. Testing copper (Cupramine) frequently and has been staying consistently around .5 (admittedly I find the test hard to read).

He is extremely timid and hides as soon as I try to get a good look. His color isn’t bright but no visual clues. Only fish in the tank 40breeder now.
Thanks for reading

 

[Fish Think Pink]

Anyone have thoughts on what would cause a hippo tang to start hanging out directly above an air stone? Should I be concerned? Every time I peek in he’s near the surface directly above bubbles.

Fish is on 9th day of copper treatment, this is his second round of copper after an Ich/velvet outbreak. His tank mate a Tomini mysteriously passed within 24 hours of removing copper the first time. I received much appreciated advise from this group to start copper over.

He’s eating fine, appears to be breathing fine, ammonia badge shows yellow (good), but he does look stressed as in color isn’t bright and extremely shy. Doing ten percent water changes every 2-3 days. Testing copper (Cupramine) frequently and has been staying consistently around .5 (admittedly I find the test hard to read).

He is extremely timid and hides as soon as I try to get a good look. His color isn’t bright but no visual clues. Only fish in the tank 40breeder now.
Thanks for reading

ich may be in his gills making it hard to breath so he is trying to get more air. Keep up with your water changes siphoning bottom to try and break the marine ich lifecycle.

I'd suggest adding a neon blue gobie to your QT to act as nurse for your tang. NOTE: goby will catch disease, but copper & time will get thru it also. Weirdly, while neon blue gobies love to clean everyone else (sick or not), annoyingly IME if you have multiple neon blue gobies they never clean each other of ich (or anything else). I consider neon blue goby essential tang "nurse" though they only have 2 year life span so you'll go thru multiples as tangs live much longer. Currently I have two and they pal around, sometimes double teaming cleaning tangs. Neon blue gobies will also try to clean other fish, but mostly my other fish ignore their cleaning attempts. Tonight was funny watching one try over and over to clean a clown - the clown kept moving away. Neon like a puppy on its heels LOL

 

[fishfairy]

Wow that sounds very interesting to watch! I haven’t heard of these before, but looking into it right now. Really appreciate the response, it does seem like something might be in his gills bothering him.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Can you post a short video taken under white light? This may just be a behavior that the fish has picked up, but if it is combined with rapid breathing, it is a pretty clear sign of Amyloodinium (velvet). Any respiration rate above 100 beats per minute would be a sign of stress.

You should not rely on cleaner fish to manage disease, they do show cleaning activity, but they cannot control all parasites, and certainly not ones in the gills. Here is an excerpt from my upcoming disease book:

Biological controls

Many aquarists acquire cleaner wrasses, neon gobies, or cleaner shrimp in the hope that these animals will clear their fish of parasites. This process usually does not work for acute infections and is simply never effective for bacterial or protozoan infections. However, with some large parasites, notably copepods and Neobenedenia, partial control may be seen.

“Who cleans the cleaner” is an issue. During active infections, the cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus) and neon gobies (Elactinus sp.) are susceptible to the very same diseases affecting the rest of the fish in the aquarium. Cleaner wrasses from the Philippines and Indonesia are notoriously delicate in captivity, with 40-day mortality rates typically above 90%. If you wish to experiment with this species as a disease control method, only acquire cleaner wrasses that have been collected off the east coast of Africa—for some reason, these survive much better in captivity. Be aware that some importers and dealers have recognized this and sell all of their cleaner wrasses as “African”, regardless of their actual origin.

The Hawaiian cleaner wrasse (Labroides phthirophagus) is simply not suited for life in captivity, and should not be acquired.

Both cleaner wrasse and neon gobies, in the absence of any ectoparasites on their tankmates, will feed on other fish’s skin mucus, fins and scales. With properly quarantined host fish, lacking parasites, this means that these cleaner fish are more prone to this behavior, which in turn, causes the host to be driven to distraction, possibly turning on the cleaners and attacking them. In public aquariums; cleaner wrasse have been known to begin picking at eyes or fins of some fishes and cause severe damage.


Jay

 

[Fish Think Pink]

Can you post a short video taken under white light? This may just be a behavior that the fish has picked up, but if it is combined with rapid breathing, it is a pretty clear sign of Amyloodinium (velvet). Any respiration rate above 100 beats per minute would be a sign of stress.

You should not rely on cleaner fish to manage disease, they do show cleaning activity, but they cannot control all parasites, and certainly not ones in the gills. Here is an excerpt from my upcoming disease book:

Biological controls

Many aquarists acquire cleaner wrasses, neon gobies, or cleaner shrimp in the hope that these animals will clear their fish of parasites. This process usually does not work for acute infections and is simply never effective for bacterial or protozoan infections. However, with some large parasites, notably copepods and Neobenedenia, partial control may be seen.

“Who cleans the cleaner” is an issue. During active infections, the cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus) and neon gobies (Elactinus sp.) are susceptible to the very same diseases affecting the rest of the fish in the aquarium. Cleaner wrasses from the Philippines and Indonesia are notoriously delicate in captivity, with 40-day mortality rates typically above 90%. If you wish to experiment with this species as a disease control method, only acquire cleaner wrasses that have been collected off the east coast of Africa—for some reason, these survive much better in captivity. Be aware that some importers and dealers have recognized this and sell all of their cleaner wrasses as “African”, regardless of their actual origin.

The Hawaiian cleaner wrasse (Labroides phthirophagus) is simply not suited for life in captivity, and should not be acquired.

Both cleaner wrasse and neon gobies, in the absence of any ectoparasites on their tankmates, will feed on other fish’s skin mucus, fins and scales. With properly quarantined host fish, lacking parasites, this means that these cleaner fish are more prone to this behavior, which in turn, causes the host to be driven to distraction, possibly turning on the cleaners and attacking them. In public aquariums; cleaner wrasse have been known to begin picking at eyes or fins of some fishes and cause severe damage.


Jay

my neon blue gobies eat Reef Frenzy and any other foods I feed small enough to fit in their mouths. I do feed my tank 2x day because I also have small runty clown. Never had a problem 'turning' on other fish, above but good info. They seem more widely recommended these days for nano tanks due to small size of neon blue gobies. I would have thought they'd get lost in my 180g and never see again, but they enjoy hanging out in front - they may be the most interactive and least shy of all my fish. +20 years ago advice was get tangs, have at least 1 neon blue gobie to help keep healthy. For me, this has worked great. Also agree that wrasse and shrimp despite having 'cleaner' in name are also poor cleaners relative to neon blue gobie. I have a 6 line wrasse that 1x witnessed "cleaning" my yellow tang white spot near tail, but not sure my wrasse comprehends its cleaner nature. That may have been more reaction my yellow spends hours trying to get any/everyone in tank to clean and for cleaning tang kept shoving body into wrasse (not agressively) - loves a mani/pedi! My 2 skunk cleaner shrimp clean infrequently.

He is already medicating water; blue gobie was just suggestion in addition and not intended as replacement to medication

 

[fishfairy]

Can you post a short video taken under white light? This may just be a behavior that the fish has picked up, but if it is combined with rapid breathing, it is a pretty clear sign of Amyloodinium (velvet). Any respiration rate above 100 beats per minute would be a sign of stress.

You should not rely on cleaner fish to manage disease, they do show cleaning activity, but they cannot control all parasites, and certainly not ones in the gills. Here is an excerpt from my upcoming disease book:

Biological controls

Many aquarists acquire cleaner wrasses, neon gobies, or cleaner shrimp in the hope that these animals will clear their fish of parasites. This process usually does not work for acute infections and is simply never effective for bacterial or protozoan infections. However, with some large parasites, notably copepods and Neobenedenia, partial control may be seen.

“Who cleans the cleaner” is an issue. During active infections, the cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus) and neon gobies (Elactinus sp.) are susceptible to the very same diseases affecting the rest of the fish in the aquarium. Cleaner wrasses from the Philippines and Indonesia are notoriously delicate in captivity, with 40-day mortality rates typically above 90%. If you wish to experiment with this species as a disease control method, only acquire cleaner wrasses that have been collected off the east coast of Africa—for some reason, these survive much better in captivity. Be aware that some importers and dealers have recognized this and sell all of their cleaner wrasses as “African”, regardless of their actual origin.

The Hawaiian cleaner wrasse (Labroides phthirophagus) is simply not suited for life in captivity, and should not be acquired.

Both cleaner wrasse and neon gobies, in the absence of any ectoparasites on their tankmates, will feed on other fish’s skin mucus, fins and scales. With properly quarantined host fish, lacking parasites, this means that these cleaner fish are more prone to this behavior, which in turn, causes the host to be driven to distraction, possibly turning on the cleaners and attacking them. In public aquariums; cleaner wrasse have been known to begin picking at eyes or fins of some fishes and cause severe damage.


Jay

Hey Jay thank you for the response. Trying to get a video of this guy but swims away as soon as he sees me. Heavy breathing today for sure and I noticed his belly has almost a white film to it today but no ‘spots’ that would look like Ich or velvet. Retested Cupramine it’s still at .5 and tank is still showing no ammonia. Not sure what is going on now. I have kanaplex and prazipro on hand but without knowing what he has going on I don’t know what to do for him. Still swimming around and eating fine. But still resting above the air stone and fast breathing.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Hey Jay thank you for the response. Trying to get a video of this guy but swims away as soon as he sees me. Heavy breathing today for sure and I noticed his belly has almost a white film to it today but no ‘spots’ that would look like Ich or velvet. Retested Cupramine it’s still at .5 and tank is still showing no ammonia. Not sure what is going on now. I have kanaplex and prazipro on hand but without knowing what he has going on I don’t know what to do for him. Still swimming around and eating fine. But still resting above the air stone and fast breathing.

Place your phone on video mode and walk away. It knows youre there and will hide until you leave. Run video for a couple of minutes

 

[vetteguy53081]

I too do not rely on fish to clean other fish of parasites hence the purpose of QT and medications for such diseases. I have a 7 year cleaner wrasse and when i had a surprise outbreak " I WISH IT WAS A SUPER CLEANER WRASSE AND GOT EVERY DOT BUT THAT WAS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN"
I you have 6 fish and one has ick, they all likely have inherited the same and no cleaner shrimp or fish will be able to manage this.

 

[fishfairy]

I too do not rely on fish to clean other fish of parasites hence the purpose of QT and medications for such diseases. I have a 7 year cleaner wrasse and when i had a surprise outbreak " I WISH IT WAS A SUPER CLEANER WRASSE AND GOT EVERY DOT BUT THAT WAS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN"
I you have 6 fish and one has ick, they all likely have inherited the same and no cleaner shrimp or fish will be able to manage this.

Hi, thanks for the tip on taking the video, was able to snag one leaving the camera going and hidden! I am hoping to completely get rid of Ich for good, which is why I am treating with copper. I looked into the cleaner fish after someone mentioned it and doesn’t sound like it would be for me. I am keeping my display fallow at the moment, I previously QT’d but only observation, I think this is how Ich made it into my tank but honestly not 100% sure when or where is came from.

 

[fishfairy]