The other day my Oscar became very sick within a matter of hours. At first it looked like fin rot, with the classic signs of tattered fins. However, by the next day both his gills and entire body became tattered. I've seen fin rot before and I know that only the fins become ripped. Was this just a bad case of fin rot that affected his entire body or something else? Either way i treated him in my hospital tank and he's as good as new again. anybody with a good knowledge of fish diseases let me know what you think. thanks
Ill Oscar
- Thread starter buckmasta
- Start date
Wow! I've had the same thing happen to my oscars, and I've tried looking it up to no avail. Usually I'll recieve a half dozen tiger oscars (I work in a LFS), place them in their tank, feed them, then go home for the night. Within 24hrs (ie the next day when I got to work) the poor oscars look like they've been fighting in the worst way, although I don't suspect that has happened because I've never had aggression issues with multiple oscars introduced to their environment at the same time.
The body looks like it is shedding its mucus membrane (all blushish with stuff hanging off of it), the fins are all tattered, they're clamped and hugging the bottom, have very little interest in food, and are shy. I know it couldn't have been anything in the system because the other fish (jack dempsies, sevrums, convics, blood parrots, plecos, silver dollars and other assorted SA cichlids), were not sick at the time the oscars were introduced. And amazingly enough, none of them got sick with what the oscars had.
So I removed the oscars from the thirty gallon unit and put all six in the ten gallon unit (yes I know this is small for six 4" oscars, but I didn't want to treat 30 gallons or keep them in the system and risk infecting the other fish). Then I proceeded to treat them with one cup of aquarium salt (Aquarium Pharmacutical stuff) every day until the disease cleared up and they started to eat. Unfortunately I lost three of the fish, I guess the disease progressed too fast for them. The other three cleared up in about two weeks, and one of them went on to become the largest oscar I ever had in the store, reaching 10" before I sold him.
These were normal pigmented tiger oscars. Nothing else was in their tank with them to have caused the damage unless they did it to each other, which again, I really don't think was very likely within 24hrs after shipping. I think it may have been a transport-stress related outbreak, being that it was winter, and shipping fish in the winter, especially tropical ones, is not the best thing in the world for the fishes. The best I could glean from my research was that it may have been a bacterial infection of their mucus membrane. Salt helped to clear up the infection, since I unfortunately didn't have any chemical medications on hand. I had a black moor goldfish at home break out with something similar (little blueish spots and a cloudy mucus membrane), and treated him with Maracide, which cleared it up in seven days, so I wonder if Maracide would've helped the oscars.
Since then, I have had no incidents with this disease on oscars, or any other fish in the store. Keep us posted with how well your fish recovers.
~~Colesea
The body looks like it is shedding its mucus membrane (all blushish with stuff hanging off of it), the fins are all tattered, they're clamped and hugging the bottom, have very little interest in food, and are shy. I know it couldn't have been anything in the system because the other fish (jack dempsies, sevrums, convics, blood parrots, plecos, silver dollars and other assorted SA cichlids), were not sick at the time the oscars were introduced. And amazingly enough, none of them got sick with what the oscars had.
So I removed the oscars from the thirty gallon unit and put all six in the ten gallon unit (yes I know this is small for six 4" oscars, but I didn't want to treat 30 gallons or keep them in the system and risk infecting the other fish). Then I proceeded to treat them with one cup of aquarium salt (Aquarium Pharmacutical stuff) every day until the disease cleared up and they started to eat. Unfortunately I lost three of the fish, I guess the disease progressed too fast for them. The other three cleared up in about two weeks, and one of them went on to become the largest oscar I ever had in the store, reaching 10" before I sold him.
These were normal pigmented tiger oscars. Nothing else was in their tank with them to have caused the damage unless they did it to each other, which again, I really don't think was very likely within 24hrs after shipping. I think it may have been a transport-stress related outbreak, being that it was winter, and shipping fish in the winter, especially tropical ones, is not the best thing in the world for the fishes. The best I could glean from my research was that it may have been a bacterial infection of their mucus membrane. Salt helped to clear up the infection, since I unfortunately didn't have any chemical medications on hand. I had a black moor goldfish at home break out with something similar (little blueish spots and a cloudy mucus membrane), and treated him with Maracide, which cleared it up in seven days, so I wonder if Maracide would've helped the oscars.
Since then, I have had no incidents with this disease on oscars, or any other fish in the store. Keep us posted with how well your fish recovers.
~~Colesea
Thanks for the info colesea. The simptoms you describe are exactly what happened to my Albino tiger. He was inthe tank with another oscar, and out of nowhere he came down with the infection. So like I said I put him in my hospital tank, treated him with maracyde and he looked great within 3 days. But get this, I put him back into the large tank, go to the store to run some errands, and by the time i get back he's back to near death condition. What in the world is going on? I didn't know a disease could act that quickly...unless the other oscar is picking on him when I'm not around...but this really doesn't look like outside physical damage, it looks bacterial. Maybe I should try seperating the two and see how it goes?
Yeah, wow, that is strange. ??? I would definately keep them seperate for now because it seems like whatever that albino is sick with is in your tank system itself. Some factor of stress could be making the albino more subsceptible.
Something else also occured to me as well. You said you had a pleco in your tank. Is he feeding well, eating a processed or fresh diet (algae waffer, cucumber, lettuc etc)? What type of pleco is it? I remember reading that certain species of plecos are more carnivorous than others. Also, that a large pleco not getting enough to eat would like to munch on the skin and membranes of tankmates. I've actually witnessed this, with a common spotted pleco sucking the sides of a fish once, but I'd only seen it once, and he was a good 4" pleco in a tank he'd basically eaten out of house and home. Could your pleco be deciding to make munch of your albino? The tiger oscar could be able to fend the pleco off, but the albino may be the submissive, least dominate fish, and thus get plecoized.
That still doesn't explain my oscars at work, or my goldfish, since neither of them had pleco tankmates at the time. But definately quaritine and treat your albino, and I would seriously consider doing a complete strip cleaning on your main tank (housing your other two fish elsewhere for the time being). If a complete cleaning doesn't sound feasible, definately at least treat the main tank with Maracide or some other chemical medication for two weeks just as a preventative before you re-introduce your albino to it.
Also, if the fish cleared up just three days after treatment, he still could've had some residual effect. Most fish diseases incubate a good two to three weeks before hitting a second time. So without carrying a treatment to completion (at least seven to 14 days) you may not get all the buggers.
Good luck and keep us posted.
~~Colesea
Something else also occured to me as well. You said you had a pleco in your tank. Is he feeding well, eating a processed or fresh diet (algae waffer, cucumber, lettuc etc)? What type of pleco is it? I remember reading that certain species of plecos are more carnivorous than others. Also, that a large pleco not getting enough to eat would like to munch on the skin and membranes of tankmates. I've actually witnessed this, with a common spotted pleco sucking the sides of a fish once, but I'd only seen it once, and he was a good 4" pleco in a tank he'd basically eaten out of house and home. Could your pleco be deciding to make munch of your albino? The tiger oscar could be able to fend the pleco off, but the albino may be the submissive, least dominate fish, and thus get plecoized.
That still doesn't explain my oscars at work, or my goldfish, since neither of them had pleco tankmates at the time. But definately quaritine and treat your albino, and I would seriously consider doing a complete strip cleaning on your main tank (housing your other two fish elsewhere for the time being). If a complete cleaning doesn't sound feasible, definately at least treat the main tank with Maracide or some other chemical medication for two weeks just as a preventative before you re-introduce your albino to it.
Also, if the fish cleared up just three days after treatment, he still could've had some residual effect. Most fish diseases incubate a good two to three weeks before hitting a second time. So without carrying a treatment to completion (at least seven to 14 days) you may not get all the buggers.
Good luck and keep us posted.
~~Colesea