Please Help! Yellow Wathman Goby Jaw Deteriorated

[NewbReefer3451]

Hi all,

I recently (7 days ago) added a yellow Watchman Goby to my tank with a larger tiger Pistol Shrimp. They immediately paired up and are good buddies. I noticed that the goby had an unusually white lower jaw when I first added him, but thought nothing of it. Three days ago my fiancé and i noticed he had some stuff hanging from his mouth (looked like mucus and sand, but hard to tell because it was covered in sand). I figured he just took in to much sand and was trying to spit it up.

well, today I was just looking at him and noticed his lower jaw has a massive hole in it and looks like the lower jaw bones are split. He seems to be eating fine and acting normal, but I have no idea what to do or if he has some sort of disease. I also contemplated the idea that he could have gotten nipped by one of the emerald crabs or hermits since he is very small. Any advice or identification is greatly appreciated.

Sorry about the picture quality, best i could get. I’m going to try and get better pictures tomorrow and make my kessil spectrum lighting more clear (white lightening) or try using flash.

The hole you see in the picture is not his mouth open. It is where his lower jaw use to be and the part right under his upper lip are what i think to be the jaw bones of what use to be his lower lip split in two. If you zoom in to the first picture you can see the split and what I’m talking about, almost like it’s deteriorating away. Poor little guy. Could a disease cause this? Or more likely a fight with the crabs?

Tank (4 months old) parameters:

Temp: 78.5-79.2

Alk: 9.1

Calcium: 465

Mag: 1395

phosphate: 0.02

salinity: 1.026

pH: 8.1

Nitrate: <5

Nitrite: 0.1

Ammonia: 0



Two juvenile Percula clowns

1 yellow Watchman Goby

tiger pistol shrimp

1 fire shrimp

1 cleaner shrimp

handful of hermits

3 emerald crabs

handful of mixed snails

mixed lps/sps corals

 

[ca1ore]

Cannot really see in the pictures. Based on your description I’d guess some kind of bacterial infection has destroyed the jaw tissues. Not water quality; probably not a tank mate. I’ve had mouth/jaw deterioration in pyramid butterfly fish caused by gram negative infections. Treat them early enough, and most recovered. Depends how bad the progressed damage is.

 

[KrisReef]

If he's feeding normal and eating he might not need any special attention to survive? I hope he lives a long time in your tank.

 

[NewbReefer3451]

Thank you! I will continue to monitor and plan on going to my LFS tomorrow to ask about treatment for a potential bacterial infection. I’d hate to move him to QT for treatment and stress him out more if he seems to be doing well and acting normal.

 

[NabberNate]

I'm having what appears to be a similar problem but mine can't swallow and keeps his mouth open.

Any ideas what I can do if anything?

 

[zheka757]

Old thread but i didnt see anyone answering it. I also have something similar on my Dimond goby, bottom lip is basically gone, it donsent look like it's effecting the fish in anyway. It still eating and continuing sifting through sand. I didn't knotice it at first becousr this fish was hiding when i got it couple month ago.

 

[KrisReef]

Seems like the lower jaw is overrated?

I wonder what causes this issue?