Pinch belly purple tang

Jax5on · Mar 5, 2017

Hi i am new to all of this so hopefully i did everything correctly. Ive recently bought a purple tang locally through craigslist. The previous owner said that the purple tang was with him for 2 years and that he wanted to get out of the hobby which is why he was selling.

Long story short..tang is eating actively both frozen and pellet food. The problem is it looks to have a pinched belly right about in the middle bottom of its body. Ive read not to worry when the area right behind his head/gill close to the fin is nice and fat. Can anyone give me any expert advice on this? Ive tried to attach a picture so hopefully you can zoom in and see what i am trying to say. Thanks in advance!

Humblefish · Mar 5, 2017

Have you seen any stringy white poo come out of him? That would be an indicator of intestinal worms: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/internal-parasites-intestinal-worms.267419/

Jax5on · Mar 5, 2017

Uhm every time i look at the tank all i see is the load from the blue tang . I cant really tell if it came from the purple tang. Lets say if it does, how can i get the purple tang to be better without taking it out from the main tank? I dont have a hospital tank/qt. Is there a certain liquid i can dip the food with to medicate the purple tang without hurting other fish/corals?

Humblefish · Mar 5, 2017

Jax5on said:
Is there a certain liquid i can dip the food with to medicate the purple tang without hurting other fish/corals?

If the PT has intestinal worms, you could treat for that right in the DT by soaking his food with Seachem Metroplex. In order to food soak, you should also use a binder (ex. Seachem Focus) to prevent the medication from leaching out. Binding also makes the treatment reef safe.