emergency: fish dying randomly

[Cael Gallery]

Hi, i have a 6 foot red sea tank which as of 3 days ago had the following fish:
Spanish hogfish
Harlequin tuskfish
Lennardi wrasse
Longfin bannerfish
Floral maori wrasse
Purplemask angelfish
Coral beauty
Marine betta
v-tail grouper

There are 2 diseases that i have in the tank, ich, and the unknown disease i'm talking about here. at first i thought it was flukes, or maybe still is flukes, but this disease is killing fish incredibly quickly all while not leaving any visible trace.
The syptoms are pretty much some missing scales on some fish (happened on the grouper) and a lot of flashing/scratching which seems consistent with flukes. But fish also rapidly develop cloudy eyes and become blind or almost blind and seem to degrade steeply over a couple days. I have tried freshwater dips which only seem to make it worse. The eyesight loss is very rapid. I have reduced the tank to 1.014 over the course of about 15 hours (target 1.012) and this hasn't helped. Today, i found my tuskfish lying on its side breathing heavily in a corner. It's eyes had become cloudy and the fish has been hiding the past two days. I gave it a 4 minute freshwater dip, a couple minutes later it started twitching and then died. I also found my v tail grouper dead in a rock cave with cloudy eyes but as with the tuskfish, zero physically wrong with it. About a week ago i gave the grouper a freshwater bath and what seemed like a bunch of flukes came off. It hasn't eaten since then but up until a few days ago the tusk was. My bannerfish seems to be in slightly rough shape with some cloudy looking skin but swims and eats fine. My spanish hogfish has never even had a single spot of ich and is seemingly unaffected entirely by this disease. My venusta died about a week ago.
I put it in, got harassed by the coral beauty for a few hours. the next day they left eachother alone and it ate well. The next day it hid in a rock cave and the day after it was just dead. Again, nothing visibly wrong with it. My marine betta's tailfin split in 2 parts almost to the base, it then lost it's eyesight. I gave it a freshwater bath and the next morning it's eyes were almost completely opaque and it;s top lip was extended and also opaque white, it died shortly after. I can elaborate but this is already a long post and i would like some opinions. I really don't think these are flukes. Water params are 0 ammonia, o nitrite about 10ppm nitrate. Salinity was 1.021.

Also note i had about 190 volts of stray electricity in the water for a few weeks. Fixed it with a ground probe a bit over a week ago.
Right now, i have the lennardi (which is under the sand somewhere, has always been very healthy and eats well), spanish hogfish, coral beauty (who's eyesight is degrading it seems and it hides a lot), my bannerfish (eats and swimms well but has some whitish spots on the body and slightly tattered fins) and my very healthy and active spansih hogfish

 

[smitten with ocean life]

i cant help you, but im really sorry for your losses!

 

[DrkNMighty]

Sorry for your losses. Lets see if one of the #fishmedic can help you figure out what is going on.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Sorry to see. All mouths are open and points to low oxygen and possible water issue. As for ich, Dont see any pics showing such but fish need to be in quarantine tank with added aeration and treated with Coppersafe or Copper Power at therapeutic level 2.25-2.5 For a FULL 30 days (do not interrupt this 30 day period) monitored by a reliable Copper Test kit such as Hanna Brand- No API brand. Also monitor Ammonia levels while in quarantine with a reliable test kit and add aeration during treatment using an air stone.
The display tank will have to be kept fishless (FALLOW) for 6-8 weeks to assure the existing parasites go through their life cycle without a host fish and die off and with occupants exposed, they too should go into quarantine
A quarantine tank can be as simple as a tank from a second hand store or a starter kit from Walmart which most of the needed essentials. Salinity while safe best at - at least 1.023-1.024 and how are you testing the water parameters?
I suggest taking a water sample to a store that does NOT use Api kits and have them test your ammonia and nitrates and compare readings- then you'll know where your levels truly are at. I suspect you are using API kit which is less than reliable often showing false readings
I see you are in Aussie and if no copperPower, you can use Cupramine but at .45 treatment level

 

[208reef]

Just finished reading your main tank thread.

1. Using sand from a marina and rock straight from the GBR may have exposed you to some parasites not normally seen in our more "artificial" reefs due to the multiple rounds of quarantine stuff bought through the hobby industry goes through. This sand and rock probably should have been quarantined for some time, perhaps with UV sterilizer and other treatments to rid it of parasites.
2. Adding 7 medium to large fish in a brand new tank all within 30 days even in a tank you felt was fully cycled is wayyyyy too much too fast imo.
3. Stray voltage and rapid addition of fish likely stressed the fish out. Increased presence of disease from the marina sand/GBR rock was no match for their immune system.

I'm not sure what all you can do at this point, but if I was in your situation I would probably move the fish that still have a chance into quarantine tank at 1.21-1.023, 76-78 F, and only rock/sand from an LFS where you can treat them for the ich and other parasites. I'm not an expert on the medications, so I will leave that to someone else.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Sorry to see. All mouths are open and points to low oxygen and possible water issue. As for ich, Dont see any pics showing such but fish need to be in quarantine tank with added aeration and treated with Coppersafe or Copper Power at therapeutic level 2.25-2.5 For a FULL 30 days (do not interrupt this 30 day period) monitored by a reliable Copper Test kit such as Hanna Brand- No API brand. Also monitor Ammonia levels while in quarantine with a reliable test kit and add aeration during treatment using an air stone.
The display tank will have to be kept fishless (FALLOW) for 6-8 weeks to assure the existing parasites go through their life cycle without a host fish and die off and with occupants exposed, they too should go into quarantine
A quarantine tank can be as simple as a tank from a second hand store or a starter kit from Walmart which most of the needed essentials.

The groupers mouth was open because i held it open for the picture. How could there be low oxygen? Both the return nozzles on my tank are disturbing the water surface quite heavily, and there's also 2 powerheads and a skimmer. Unfortunately QT for ich isn't really an option for me. I live off grid and our battery can't really hold enough power for another tank, nor do i have the time in the day to worry about ammonia and stuff like that in the QT. The ich really isn't what i'm worried about, all the fish had some spots for a couple days and then fought it off, hence the lack of pictures of the ich. i also have an oversized UV sterilizer coming this week.

 

[vetteguy53081]

The groupers mouth was open because i held it open for the picture. How could there be low oxygen? Both the return nozzles on my tank are disturbing the water surface quite heavily, and there's also 2 powerheads and a skimmer. Unfortunately QT for ich isn't really an option for me. I live off grid and our battery can't really hold enough power for another tank, nor do i have the time in the day to worry about ammonia and stuff like that in the QT. The ich really isn't what i'm worried about, all the fish had some spots for a couple days and then fought it off, hence the lack of pictures of the ich. i also have an oversized UV sterilizer coming this week.

Powerhead nozzles aimed at surface gives surface agitation and not necessarily oxygen. Air stone would provide added oxygen and if you Do have false readings, your ammonia level may be higher than you realize. Ich does not just fall off and go away but rather drop off and reproduce and come back in numbers

 

[Cael Gallery]

Just finished reading your main tank thread.

1. Using sand from a marina and rock straight from the GBR may have exposed you to some parasites not normally seen in our more "artificial" reefs due to the multiple rounds of quarantine stuff bought through the hobby industry goes through. This sand and rock probably should have been quarantined for some time, perhaps with UV sterilizer and other treatments to rid it of parasites.
2. Adding 7 medium to large fish in a brand new tank all within 30 days even in a tank you felt was fully cycled is wayyyyy too much too fast imo.
3. Stray voltage and rapid addition of fish likely stressed the fish out. Increased presence of disease from the marina sand/GBR rock was no match for their immune system.

I'm not sure what all you can do at this point, but if I was in your situation I would probably move the fish that still have a chance into quarantine tank at 1.21-1.023, 76-78 F, and only rock/sand from an LFS where you can treat them for the ich and other parasites. I'm not an expert on the medications, so I will leave that to someone else.

1: I see your point, but i used the same sand (even more of it) and the same rock in my 65 gallon (which as you know recently broke) and all of my fish in there did wonderfully up until their demise, including a whitecheek tang.
2: The cycle took 4 days with 2 fish, ammonia never went past about 0.5ppm and once it was cycled (keep in mind i added plenty of established media and rock) there was never any ammonia again.
3: The voltage definitely stressed them out. But once i fixed it (to the point where my fingers weren't getting zapped anymore) they all seemed instantly happier.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Powerhead nozzles aimed at surface gives surface agitation and not necessarily oxygen. Air stone would provide added oxygen and if you Do have false readings, your ammonia level may be higher than you realize.

I don't think i have false readings. I have been using a red sea test kit and nothing about the fish has indicated that there is ammonia present. Surely a skimmer would do the same thing as an airstone in that case?

 

[208reef]

1: I see your point, but i used the same sand (even more of it) and the same rock in my 65 gallon (which as you know recently broke) and all of my fish in there did wonderfully up until their demise, including a whitecheek tang.
2: The cycle took 4 days with 2 fish, ammonia never went past about 0.5ppm and once it was cycled (keep in mind i added plenty of established media and rock) there was never any ammonia again.
3: The voltage definitely stressed them out. But once i fixed it (to the point where my fingers weren't getting zapped anymore) they all seemed instantly happier.

Interesting. Are you making up your own saltwater or using saltwater from the ocean?

Have you tried using a different ammonia/nitrite test kit to verify the one you have is accurate? The reason I ask is that cloudy eyes can be from ammonia/nitrite poisoning.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Interesting. Are you making up your own saltwater or using saltwater from the ocean?

Have you tried using a different ammonia/nitrite test kit to verify the one you have is accurate? The reason I ask is that cloudy eyes can be from ammonia/nitrite poisoning.

No i haven't tried that. The saltwater is made with artifical salt and rainwater.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Here’s a video from just now. I can see the hogfish js scratching a bit. Could be flukes hence the lowered salinity. But as i said i have never heard of flukes causing blindness and killing some fish super fast and some fish being unaffected.

 

[208reef]

The cloudy eyes and rapid death makes me think some kind of poisoning. Either by ammonia/nitrite or something else. Is there any chance your rain water was contaminated? Any spraying of pesticides or other air contaminants? Anything used in the house that could have gotten into the tank? Air fresheners? Scented candles? Any kids that could have accidently dumped anything in the tank?

 

[Cael Gallery]

The cloudy eyes and rapid death makes me think some kind of poisoning. Either by ammonia/nitrite or something else. Is there any chance your rain water was contaminated? Any spraying of pesticides or other air contaminants? Anything used in the house that could have gotten into the tank? Air fresheners? Scented candles? Any kids that could have accidently dumped anything in the tank?

The tank is in a large shed seperate from my house. We actually raise insects to sell in the same building, so we are very careful not to use any sort of pesticides or chemicals. The surrounding property is also not sprayed. My 4 year old nephew is here but he definitely can’t reach the display and he hasn’t figured out how to open the sump cabinets, besides he is well behaved. I just testested for ammonia and it came out as zero.

 

[Cael Gallery]

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hi, i have a 6 foot red sea tank which as of 3 days ago had the following fish:
Spanish hogfish
Harlequin tuskfish
Lennardi wrasse
Longfin bannerfish
Floral maori wrasse
Purplemask angelfish
Coral beauty
Marine betta
v-tail grouper

There are 2 diseases that i have in the tank, ich, and the unknown disease i'm talking about here. at first i thought it was flukes, or maybe still is flukes, but this disease is killing fish incredibly quickly all while not leaving any visible trace.
The syptoms are pretty much some missing scales on some fish (happened on the grouper) and a lot of flashing/scratching which seems consistent with flukes. But fish also rapidly develop cloudy eyes and become blind or almost blind and seem to degrade steeply over a couple days. I have tried freshwater dips which only seem to make it worse. The eyesight loss is very rapid. I have reduced the tank to 1.014 over the course of about 15 hours (target 1.012) and this hasn't helped. Today, i found my tuskfish lying on its side breathing heavily in a corner. It's eyes had become cloudy and the fish has been hiding the past two days. I gave it a 4 minute freshwater dip, a couple minutes later it started twitching and then died. I also found my v tail grouper dead in a rock cave with cloudy eyes but as with the tuskfish, zero physically wrong with it. About a week ago i gave the grouper a freshwater bath and what seemed like a bunch of flukes came off. It hasn't eaten since then but up until a few days ago the tusk was. My bannerfish seems to be in slightly rough shape with some cloudy looking skin but swims and eats fine. My spanish hogfish has never even had a single spot of ich and is seemingly unaffected entirely by this disease. My venusta died about a week ago.
I put it in, got harassed by the coral beauty for a few hours. the next day they left eachother alone and it ate well. The next day it hid in a rock cave and the day after it was just dead. Again, nothing visibly wrong with it. My marine betta's tailfin split in 2 parts almost to the base, it then lost it's eyesight. I gave it a freshwater bath and the next morning it's eyes were almost completely opaque and it;s top lip was extended and also opaque white, it died shortly after. I can elaborate but this is already a long post and i would like some opinions. I really don't think these are flukes. Water params are 0 ammonia, o nitrite about 10ppm nitrate. Salinity was 1.021.

Also note i had about 190 volts of stray electricity in the water for a few weeks. Fixed it with a ground probe a bit over a week ago.
Right now, i have the lennardi (which is under the sand somewhere, has always been very healthy and eats well), spanish hogfish, coral beauty (who's eyesight is degrading it seems and it hides a lot), my bannerfish (eats and swimms well but has some whitish spots on the body and slightly tattered fins) and my very healthy and active spansih hogfish

That does sound like Neobenedenia flukes is one of the issues. Here is an excerpt that I wrote up about this issue in a book I have been working on:

Neobenedenia melleni (eye flukes)​

These are relatively large (up to 8 mm), egg-laying worms that live on the skin or eyes of marine fishes.



Symptoms

Neobenedenia infections peak slowly; there may be no symptoms for weeks after you acquire a fish. Eventually, as the flukes multiply and grow in size, they begin to cause symptoms of disease.



The first obvious symptom may be slightly cloudy eyes, caused by the transparent fluke feeding on the eye tissue and eliciting a tissue reaction. This gives this worm the common name of “eye fluke,” although it is unknown whether these worms actually prefer to feed on eye tissue, or whether that is just where they first become apparent.



As the infection becomes more serious, the fish will “flash,” their skin color will become dull, their fins may become tattered, and they just generally get a “scruffy” look to them. Rapid breathing due to stress, possible secondary infection, and then death follow if treatment is not begun.



Diagnosis

The best means of diagnosis is to give the fish a five-minute freshwater dip. Not only does this knock back the infection by killing the adult parasites, but even a casual look at the bottom of the dip container afterwards will help to positively identify this disease. The worms turn whitish and fall to the bottom. Many aquarists mistake these for scales that were dislodged from the fish. However, looking at these “scales” under a dissecting microscope, or even a hand lens, will soon show them for what they are—dead worms.



Sometimes a fish’s history can help diagnosis at least the potential for this disease. Angelfishes and butterflyfishes are especially prone to Neobenedenia infections, so any of these fish that have been housed at an import facility that doesn’t prophylactically treat for trematodes stand a very good chance of being infected.



Angelfish, Pomacanthus sp. ++
Barrimundi, Lates sp. ++
Batfish, Platax sp. +++
Butterflyfish, Chaetodon sp. ++
Cichlid, Tilapia sp. +++ (when housed in seawater)
Invertebrates 0 (but may carry eggs)
Jacks, Caraganidae +++
Lionfish, Pterois sp. +
Lookdowns, Selene sp. +++
Pyramid butterflyfish, Hemitaurichthys sp. +++
Grouper family, Serranidae ++
Garden eel, Taenioconger sp. +
Remora, Echeneis sp. +
Sharks and rays, Elasmobranchs 0
Surgeonfish, Acanthurus sp. ++
Spadefish, Chaetodipterus faber +++

Aquarium hosts for Neobenedenia sp. 0=not infected, + = sometimes infected, ++=commonly infected, +++=very commonly infected (From Bullard et-al 2000 and personal obs.)
Treatment

Many people suggest using a freshwater dip as a treatment for all incoming fish. The two drawbacks to this are 1) the dips are not 100% effective (and do not harm the fluke eggs) and 2) newly acquired fish often do not stand up well to the added stress of a freshwater dip when they first arrive.

Neobenedenia eggs can take 14 (or longer?) to hatch as motile larvae called oncomiracidium. Additionally, the eggs have sticky tendrils that attach them securely to all manner of objects in an aquarium. There is some merit to the idea of keeping a treatment tank free of substrate and siphoning the bottom regularly in order to remove some of these unhatched eggs. There have been reports that Lysmata cleaner shrimp feed on these eggs, rendering them non-viable. However, it is unlikely that in a normal aquarium, with many other food choices, that cleaner shrimp will markedly reduce their numbers.

Any successful treatment for these worms must be undertaken in stages. The first treatment kills off the adult worms (but this won’t kill the eggs), and the subsequent treatments kill off the juvenile worms after they have all hatched but before any of them have matured and begun to lay eggs of their own. Due to variables in timing, it is virtually impossible to accomplish this in only two treatments.

Whole-tank formalin baths at 166 ppm for one hour will eliminate the adult flukes from an aquarium but not the eggs. Because this type of treatment has no residual effect, the treatment may need to be repeated every two weeks for two or three more times. Experience in public aquarium exhibits has shown that this method rarely clears a tank completely of this pest.

A better alternative is a Praziquantel treatment at 4 ppm, followed by a 50% water change after 48 hours, then a second treatment 9 to 10 days later, followed by another 50% water change 48 hours later.

At the aquarium I was the curator at, we noticed that multiple Praziquantel treatments on the same system, over months to years, required higher and higher doses, combined with increased frequency of the treatments in order to maintain effectiveness. Eventually, the praziquantel was simply no longer effective. One supposition was that the target parasites were building an immunity to the drug. That seemed unlikely as genetic change in multi-cellular organisms typically takes longer to happen (as opposed to drug-resistant bacteria that can develop resistance in short order). We wondered then, what could render Praziquantel so ineffective on repeat doses?


Subsequent research indicates that bacterial degradation of the Praziquantel (Thomas et-al, 2016) is the process at work. Their study concluded that while Praziquantel is stable for over two weeks in sterile marine aquarium water, when dosed in working systems, it degrades below detectable limits in just nine days. A subsequent dose on the same system showed a reduction in Praziquantel in less than 48 hours. The presence or absence of fish in the system did not affect this rate of degradation. The natural bacterial population of the aquarium actually works to eliminate Praziquantel from the water.



Barrett L. Christie, a public aquarium curator, has researched a variety of treatment methods and has struck upon one that is highly effective. The treatment is relatively simple; in a quarantine system, the fish are exposed to hyposalinity (low salinity) for 30 days. Exactly how low of a salinity is the variable that needs to be controlled. Some species of fish do not tolerate lower salinities, yet if the salinity is not reduced enough, the parasite population is only reduced, not eradicated. Barrett has hit upon a workable value of 17 parts per thousand, a bit less than half the salinity of normal seawater (this equates to a specific gravity of around 1.013). Using a target of 16 ppt for 35 days is better, as it ensures that any errors in salinity measurement or timing won’t affect the treatment. Obviously, most invertebrates cannot be present during this sort of treatment. Sharks and some rays cannot tolerate it either. Assuming the fish are healthy in all other respects, you begin this treatment by lowering the salinity to the target value over 24 to 48 hours. During the low salinity treatment, water quality must be monitored closely, especially pH. Be aware that some other diseases, notably Uronema and Amyloodinium thrive at lower salinities. Luckily, another common scourge, marine ich, Cryptocaryon irritans, is also inhibited by low salinity. After 35 days, the salinity is gradually raised back to normal. It is imperative to perform this change back to normal seawater very slowly. While marine fish tolerate a drop in salinity very well, their kidneys have more difficulty adjusting as the salinity is raised. Never return fish to normal salinity faster than 72 hours, and don’t make large changes at one time.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Thanks Jay. That write up is very helpful. Can formalin or praziquantel be added directly to the display? I wonder, as you mentioned that bacteria consume it.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Thanks Jay. That write up is very helpful. Can formalin or praziquantel be added directly to the display? I wonder, as you mentioned that bacteria consume it.

Formalin cannot be used in a DT at a strong enough dose to control flukes. Praziquantel can be dosed, even in reef tanks, but it can take 3 to 5 doses at 2.2 ppm, 8 days apart, but even then the life cycle may not be broken. Even a single remaining egg can start the infection back up.
Hyposalinity with no invertebrates present is the surest control method.

 

[Cael Gallery]

Formalin cannot be used in a DT at a strong enough dose to control flukes. Praziquantel can be dosed, even in reef tanks, but it can take 3 to 5 doses at 2.2 ppm, 8 days apart, but even then the life cycle may not be broken. Even a single remaining egg can start the infection back up.
Hyposalinity with no invertebrates present is the surest control method.

alright i'll just continue with the hyposalinity. Will the eyes of the fish return to normal once the flukes die?

 

[Cael Gallery]

The coral beauty is dead. The bannerfish is still active and eating and looks roughly the same or maybe a tiny bit better than yesterday. The hogfish is hiding in a crevice breathing fast and it looks like it's slime coat is peeling off especially towards the tail. It's eyes don't look cloudy but it won't eat or swim around. The salinity is 1.013 measured with a hanna checker. I still just don't get it, if these are flukes why are my fish degrading so fast even through hyposalinity? I know the hypo is killing worms because there are a lot of dead feather dusters floating around the tank. I am so worried about the hogfish, that is my absolute favourite fish and now only the 3rd fish left in the tank, and they are so rarely available in australia. I have also dosed dr tims first defence since last night and turned the skimmer back on this morning. There is a bubbler running and both return outles (which are very strong on red sea tanks) are at the water surface creating a lot of bubbles. Though i still don't think there is an oxygen issue at all.