Clowns look sick

[Slammedtoys]

hey, new to the forum and new to saltwater. I have already made my intro etc. I have an issue trying to diagnose a clown that I have in a QT tank. At first I thought he had Ich but as time progresses it seems like his issues evolve. Not sure how to treat him. He is in a 10gal tank with a female clown who has beat him up pretty good but they were tank mates in my DT so I don't want to remove them since hey both needed to be QT for ich. Any thoughts of what's going on with this fish ?

 

[melypr1985]

I know how hard it is to photograph fish, but can you try to get a clearer picture? It's pretty hard to see what's going on with him. In the mean time what symptoms is he displaying? Heavy breathing, flashing, scratching, swimming into the flow of a powerhead, being reclusive, skin pealing off, a dusty or dirty appearance?

 

[Slammedtoys]

Yes, sorry. Ok so he appears to be breathing heavy. He likes to stay around the power head but I believe that to be due to the other clown. If he moves away from his area the other clown a attacks him. He does eat when I feed him as long as the other clown allows him to.

 

[Slammedtoys]

Also all of his tail fins are now gone. I think the clown did that to him.

 

[nelson69]

Set up a hospital tank!!! Separate them he is sick looks like clown fish disease!!

 

[nelson69]

The female is going to kill him separate them!!

 

[melypr1985]

He could very well have ick, though I dont see any real signs of that right now. He almost looks like he has brook, but I'm leaning more towards a secondary infection causing the fins to erode away. How long has he been sick? I'm assuming you saw spots at some point and that made you think ick right? Where they like salt sprinkles or fine sugar? Were there too many to count or just a few? Here are some comparison pictures to help you out with the difference in each side-by-side.

Ick

Brooke

Velvet

 

[Humblefish]

The first thing you need to do is separate those two clowns. It sounds like you may have two females. Or the bully is just beating up on the weaker one.

Also, you may have brook, but I am not 100% certain of that. Look at the pics Meredith provided, and also Google images of "Brooklynella" for comparison purposes.

 

[domination2580]

The first thing you need to do is separate those two clowns. It sounds like you may have two females. Or the bully is just beating up on the weaker one.

Also, you may have brook, but I am not 100% certain of that. Look at the pics Meredith provided, and also Google images of "Brooklynella" for comparison purposes.

I guess im the slow one today. I was going to say it might be brook but also to seperate the clowns like humblefish said. Melypr and humblefish beat me to it lol

 

[Slammedtoys]

Ok. I'll separate them. Not sure how I am going to do it since they are both in my sick tank now.

 

[melypr1985]

Ok. I'll separate them. Not sure how I am going to do it since they are both in my sick tank now.

Eggcrate works wonders.... assuming they are both big enough not to swim through the squares.

I'll be honest. I completely skipped over the aggressive clowns part. I was too focused on the sick one

 

[Slammedtoys]

Oh. Incredible idea. Where would one get the egg crate ?

 

[melypr1985]

Oh. Incredible idea. Where would one get the egg crate ?

Home depot sells it. It comes in handy in the reefing world.... barriers are just one use. You can make frag racks, fish traps... all kinds of things. They call it lighting defuser and can be found in long sheets in the lighting department. Not all of them sell it it seems, because the one by me doesn't, but I've found it at others. It's cheap too.

 

[Humblefish]

You can even make a fish trap out of eggcrate :

 

[Slammedtoys]

Hahahah that's awesome!!!!! Thanks so much for the help. I got them separated finally

 

[michellejy]

I completely defer to the opinions of humblefish and Meredith when it comes to identifying diseases, but since I had a clown die of brook a few months ago, I wanted to add on to what was already said.

The first sign I noticed was swimming oddly. She wasn't in her usual spot, and her swimming pattern was just "off." I'd had her for over 7 years so I was pretty familiar with what was her normal way of swimming.

The second symptom didn't show up until probably a few days to a week later. Her breathing was more rapid.

She lost her appetite a day or two later. She chased food for the first day. After that, she just watched it go by.

I noticed a damaged fin about a day or so after that and thought she had hurt herself on a rock in the tank.

Her color completely faded out on the last day. It didn't look like an obvious film on her as it does in the picture above. It looked like she was just losing all of her color. By the time the color loss hit and I *finally* realized what was wrong, I couldn't find the medication she needed. She died within a few hours of the color change.