Clownfish Question

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Staggs

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Hi Guys,

I'm just trying to figure out what happened with one of my clownfish today, he's didn't make it but I wanted to use this as a learning experience for myself.

Today when I got home I noticed my male ora snowflake laying in the back corner flat on his side. I thought he was dead but upon looking at him closer he was breathing but just heavy. I tapped on the glass where he was at and he started moving around a bit to where I could see both sides of him and the only thing I could see was some white stringy poop.

After a few minutes he went back to the corner laying down. At this point I did a few googles and decided to just do a fresh water dip (probably at this point it was to late and only did harm) so I brought up some ro/di water to temp and I had put in my air stone to aerate it while the water was coming up to temp.

I was able to catch him fairly easily since he was in the corner, but he did start trying to swim around hard after I caught him with my hand. I performed a 3.5 minute freshwater dip and he breathed heavily the entire time.

When I put him back in the tank is when I noticed his other signs, it was almost as if he couldn't maintain buoyancy and was floating to the top with his head up first. I watched him stick around the top of the tank for a few minutes then he started working his way down and eventually got back to the bottom. He went to one of his normal corners (will post pictures of him after he made it back down) but I could tell he was fighting to stay on the bottom.....he eventually found a spot where he kinda propped himself under a rock so he could stay still. Then around 5 - 10min passed and he started moving around again and fighting to stay down until he passed.

Not sure if this gives any signs to what could have been the cause, but last night he was out at feeding time but I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary when I left for work this morning.

Couple of notes:

1. I didn't have my QT running, but was in the process of getting it ready right after the FW dip.
2. The tank he was in has been running around 1.5yr.
3. I haven't added any fish in months.
4. No other fish have disappeared or gone missing and all are eating great.
5. During the fresh water dip, and afterwards I didn't notice any spots or anything fall out of his gills...nothing out of the ordinary for the fish.
6. All tank params were in check as of yesterday

That being said this fish was always kinda weird...would be back in the back of the tank and lay against the glass and looking like he was breathing heavy. I remember after i first got the pair I always thought he was sick because of how he acted.

Thanks for the help in advanced.
 
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Here are the pictures about 5-10 minutes after his FW dip and he made it to the bottom....just iphone pictures not sure that they give any detail at all.

IMG_1491.jpg


IMG_1493.jpg


IMG_1495.jpg
 
Thanks guys! @Humblefish Since September when you wrote the article is there one medication that you'd choose over the other if you saw the white stringy poop? Seems that API's General Cure would be the way to go since it contains both medicines.
 
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Probably should consider treating the other fish in the tank.

Yep, I don't have any metro or focus so I'll stop by the lfs tomorrow at lunch and pick up what they have (or overnight it from amazon if they are out or don't carry it)
 
Thanks guys! @Humblefish Since September when you wrote the article is there one medication that you'd choose over the other if you saw the white stringy poop? Seems that API's General Cure would be the way to go since it contains both medicines.

Either would be fine for intestinal worms. You want to make sure you go ahead and treat everybody by feeding them the medicated food and watch all their poops.
 
Thanks guys! @Humblefish Since September when you wrote the article is there one medication that you'd choose over the other if you saw the white stringy poop? Seems that API's General Cure would be the way to go since it contains both medicines.

The only problem with using GC in food is you don't know how much prazi vs. metro the fish is getting. So, if white stringy poop persists you might want to switch over to just using Metroplex after a week or so.
 
Awwww.. they look like they were a bonded pair.. I hate this.. I'm sorry for your loss
 
Awwww.. they look like they were a bonded pair.. I hate this.. I'm sorry for your loss

Yep they were a bonded pair, always together. I pulled a ORA Black Ice that was in another tank to be her new roommate, they are getting along very well. She was happen to see him right away after i moved him in.

Tomorrow I will be on the 7th day of treating metro, all fish are eating good and I haven't seen any more white poops since my male clown passed. I can see a few of my coral's not to happy but I figured it's just because they ate some food with metro in it or something.. I changed my carbon out for some fresh carbon the first night I treated with metro and I'm running it 23hrs a day. I usually only run carbon about 1-2hrs a day but since I'm treating I went ahead and bumped it up.
 
@Humblefish I treated my tank with 14 days of Metro mixed with food as suggested. I never saw any more white stringy poops until my wife saw one last night on our wrasse. Should I switch over to prazipro and treat with it mixed in food for awhile now or keep using metro for a few more weeks?

Ours if a orange back fairy wrasse, and i know he was eating food throughout the metro feedings. I haven't seen an appetite loss and he's still swims around the tank like normal.
 
@Humblefish I treated my tank with 14 days of Metro mixed with food as suggested. I never saw any more white stringy poops until my wife saw one last night on our wrasse. Should I switch over to prazipro and treat with it mixed in food for awhile now or keep using metro for a few more weeks?

I would do both - prazi soaked food in the AM, metro soaked food in the PM. ;)
 
I would do both - prazi soaked food in the AM, metro soaked food in the PM. ;)

Do you know how much prazi one should use when mixing with focus and food ? I looked at the main thread but didn't see it
 
Do you know how much prazi one should use when mixing with focus and food ? I looked at the main thread but didn't see it

It doesn't take much to kill tapeworms - the one internal parasite prazi treats better than metro.

Just use an eye dropper and make sure all the food is wet with it. And then add 1 scoop of Focus to bind it.
 

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