White dots jumping on Powder Blue Tang

[dragonfisher33]

I had a powder blue tang that i have been QT-ing for the last 2 weeks. It's skinny (where you can see its spine) but nonetheless somewhat active. it does eat but will spit out/eat/spit out/eat whatever it's interested. Yesterday I moved it from one tank to another tank (10gal cycled with sponge filter from an existing tank with ammonia/nitrite/nitrate=0). Unfortunately, it passed away some time after the move (<24hrs). When i grab the fish out of the tank I noticed that there are dots on the fish's dead body and seems to move/jump around. Anyone know what this is?

 

[HotRocks]

I don't know about the moving around part. (Maybe they appear to move in the light?)

We're you treating this fish in any way? It appears to be covered in velvet.

 

[dragonfisher33]

@HotRocks , thanks for the attention. definitely things are moving. i saw these things swim around when i emerged the body in freshwater. if you can pay close attention to when video at ~18 sec and in the marked area, you will see white dots moving and my had was pretty steady.

 

[Big G]

I'm leaning some sort of parasitic pods. Get a scrape and put it under a microscope to get a proper ID. Yikes!

 

[dragonfisher33]

i was doing hypo at this moment. no copper yet.

 

[dragonfisher33]

does marine velvet jump around?

 

[Big G]

does marine velvet jump around?

The Velvet parasite is too small to see with the naked eye. The white spot you see, from Velvet, is the mucous buildup at the insertion point.

 

[HotRocks]

I do see the movement now. I watched it full screen. That's wild

You would not see velvet move like that. Velvet is microscopic, and the "white spots" are irritated skin where the parasite made entry.

@Humblefish

 

[Gareth elliott]

The only parasitic copepod ive encountered is anchor worm which ive never seen in those numbers on one fish, as well as having specialized equipment for attachment which i dont see in the video but they could be larvae not an expert on their reproduction.

Another possibility is the tang was already dying from another cause and some microfauna started to feed on it. Like you see with dying land animals and maggots, inference not experience driven.

If it is a parasitic pod i dont think hypo would help. Their freshwater cousins show very limited effect to a salt bath ime.

Have had good luck with Cyromazine in treating if there are other fish present in the qt.

 

[Humblefish]

You sure its not just regular copepods crawling around on the dead body?? Some type of monogenean infestation would be my other guess.

I would drop the body in freshwater to see if anything comes off.

 

[Maritimer]

I'm with Humblefish on this one ... Ordinary copepods, who've smelled the odor of flesh beginning to decay, and have come a-creepin' to the sound of that dinner-bell.

~Bruce

 

[dragonfisher33]

@Maritimer @Humblefish

thank you for the inputs. what boggles my mind is that the QT tank was a new tank that i just set up and i used the sponge filter from a recently torn down QT tank treated with copper. if these are copepods, i'm surprised that they lived through the copper treatment.

also @Humblefish when i submersed the body in fresh rodi water, i did notice these "white dots" swam out.