Diagnosis Help

[Lopezag1994]

Need some help figuring out what got my sailfin tang. Day before yesterday it was fine. Eating swimming, doing it’s normal thing. Expanding fin. Happy fish basically. Yesterday it spent its entire day on the sand bed. Barely swimming. No noticeable marks on skin anywhere. I pulled it and put it into a acclimation box hanging on the tank. Within 24 hours dead.
Parameters checked out just fine in the tank with sera test kits. 4 other fish in the tank acting totally fine as of now as well.
these spots only appeared on the fish after death when I check on it this morning.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Those color changes can happen post Mortem. Probably too late, but I always suggest folks give freshly dead fish a FW dip to screen for flukes - that can help resolve issues with the surviving fish.
Did you see any rapid breathing in the fish prior to its death?
Jay

 

[Lopezag1994]

Those color changes can happen post Mortem. Probably too late, but I always suggest folks give freshly dead fish a FW dip to screen for flukes - that can help resolve issues with the surviving fish.
Did you see any rapid breathing in the fish prior to its death?
Jay

I would say it was defiantly slightly increased breathing but he just got more and more lethargic as the day went on. This morning was gone. Didn’t even have time to heat up RO water to dip him. So upset. Hate hurting any animal.

 

[Uncle99]

Keep a close eye on other fish for any unusual behavior, parasites don’t always show themselves clearly.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Be sure to keep a close eye on the respiration rates of the remaining fish. I often do counts on fish before there is a problem, so that I have a baseline to compare it to later on....
Jay

 

[Lopezag1994]

Keep a close eye on other fish for any unusual behavior, parasites don’t always show themselves clearly.

What would be like a standard breathing count? I’m sure it’s different with age, species, etc... but is there a standard breathing rate per second/minute?

 

[Uncle99]

I don’t count them.....to me.....it’s rather easy to see, it’s rapid as if they gasping for oxygen. Sometimes sit on the bottom and just pump, but not really move.

And don’t forget
Lathargic
Glassy eyes
Swimming into powerhead
Not eating
A few or many white dots
A smattering of flour dust, white maybe looks gold.

 

[Lopezag1994]

I don’t count them.....to me.....it’s rather easy to see, it’s rapid as if they gasping for oxygen. Sometimes sit on the bottom and just pump, but not really move.

And don’t forget
Lathargic
Glassy eyes
Swimming into powerhead
Not eating
A few or many white dots
A smattering of flour dust, white maybe looks gold.

Yea no one else is showing any other symptoms fortunately. Nor any dots, slime, etc... Just will keep up good diet and monitor for now I suppose.
Its a frenzy when I feed so, so far everyone else is okay.
just wasn’t sure how “fast” the gills should be beating but after watching some videos today they defiantly don’t seem to be rapid by any means.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

What would be like a standard breathing count? I’m sure it’s different with age, species, etc... but is there a standard breathing rate per second/minute?

Respiration rates vary between species, size of the fish as well as water temperature. That's why getting baseline readings on new fish is so important - if you buy a tang and the next day you count and it is breathing 70 beats per minute, but the following week it has gone to 90, you wouldn't notice that by just casually looking at it, but by know what the count was, you know there was an increase - and now you have advance notice of a impending issue.

I have a section on respiration rates in my upcoming fish disease book, but it includes graphs and tables that I can't paste in here. Here is the introductory text though:

A note on respiration rates
Aquarists are warned throughout this book about rapid breathing in their fish as a symptom of potential problems, yet few know just what “rapid” is. Obviously, fish kept in warmer water or those with gill disease will respire more rapidly. Actively swimming fish respire faster than sedentary ones. Less obvious is that larger fish respire more slowly and, in some cases, high ammonia levels will cause a fish to respire more slowly than normal. While there is some difference between species, (Chinese algae eaters will breathe twice as fast as any other fish their size) most tropical fish of the size kept in smaller aquariums should breathe at a rate of between 70 and 120 gill beats per minute. Relative respiration rate is the most important value – capturing the respiration rate of your fish when they are known to be healthy, gives you a baseline to compare to if you later suspect a problem. Not having this baseline data is an issue for newly acquired fish, so using the information below may serve as a secondary reference.

Fish may exhibit a variety of respiration forms in addition to the actual rate itself:

Mouth open respiration – may be a sign of gill disease or toxic compounds in the water.
Rapid, shallow respiration – may be signs as above, or just a result of high activity level.
Coughing – a result of high levels of particulates in the water, or gill parasites.
Gasping at surface – usually seen in freshwater fish under low oxygen conditions.
Slow, deep respiration – may be normal, or a sign of ammonia toxicity.
Slow, shallow respiration – normal for most fishes.


Jay