Pyramid butterflyfish injury

[Qasimja]

this butterfly was put through QT and placed into my DT one of my square anthias started picking on it a few weeks ago for some reason he took a nip out of his tail a few times and i figured it would work itself out now a few days ago he must have chased him into the rocks because his mouth looks to be injured ive seen him attempt to eat and he gets some but i dunno how much is this an injury that can heal itself? ive attempted to catch him unsuccessfully

 

[Qasimja]

whats funny is the anthias doesnt bother the other butterfly only him

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

This is coincidental; another person here had a pyramid with the same injury, and last year, I had one on QT with the exact same problem. The weird thing is that I don't recall ever seeing another butterflyfish with that issue. At first, I attributed it to an injury, but in thinking about it more, wouldn't both the upper and lower jaw be injured? Our fish couldn't feed properly, so we euthanized it. The others in the QT group were all fine.

As a side note; pyramids are one of the top fish to get Neobenedenia flukes. Did you happen to do a diagnostic dip on this fish before moving it to the DT? Normal QT treatments typically don't cure Neo, only control it.

Jay Hemdal

 

[Qasimja]

i freshwater dip all my fish now because my last batch of fish in may all died from a mysterious disease within 4 days of being in QT so i treat more proactively from now on i also give them 2 rounds of prazi in my QT tank i always have it sitting at 1.0ppm copper power then slowly ramp it up to 2.0 over 5-7 days

Yea i would think his jaw would also be damaged being injured from diving into the rocks but that was the only thing i could think that could have happened to him

 

[Viking_Reefing]

They are prone to mouth damage unfortunately. If it’s eating it should work itself out over time.