Help needed

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Wed Aug 16, 2006 9:13 pm

Any one have any ideas what may be going wrong with my fish? Tank is 125 with 40 gallon sump with cheato. Around 120 lbs. sand and I would be scared to guess how much rock. Only 4 fish in there. See attached pic of Atlantic Blue Tang, this fish and my puple tang look like maybe some ich but also looks like loosing some scales or something weird. Also on my small clown fish shows some signs of it but not the larger one. All corals look the same, all inverts including BTA look good. Will check the water next but looking for suggestions on what is going on. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Jeff

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Wed Aug 16, 2006 9:14 pm

Sorry for the shoddy pic but I dont have the best camera but you can see around its head what I am talking about.

reefman8471 · Post by **reefman8471** » Wed Aug 16, 2006 9:39 pm

It looks like it might be HLLE...Head and Lateral Line Erosion. I would definitely check your water quality. It can be caused by any number of stressors from improper diet to being in too small a tank. What are you feeding your tangs? Made and changes to your tank recently? Done anything differently? Any of these things could be the cause. It runs along the pores of the fishes head and lateral line. Essential of nervous system disorder.

James

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Wed Aug 16, 2006 10:14 pm

Test results are in:
Ammonia- 0ppm
Nitrite- 0ppm
ph- 8.2
Nitrate- I lost the color chart but looking at the color and memory I would guess less than 20. As I said, no problems with coral or inverts, starfish, anemone, shrimp etc.
Calcium- 420
Alk- 3.2
dkh- 9.0

All look ok to me. I feed Formula 2 pellets, Bio-Pure pellets, mysis shrimp and algea sheets under the mag float for the tangs. Like posted, 125 gallon tank, only 4 fish with the largest being 3-4" at most. I bought a long nose butterfly about 2-3 weeks ago but he cashed out last week. No changes to the tank, top off water manually every 2 days at most, usually daily.

Thanks for the reply James. Any and all suggestions are welcomed.

Jeff

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Wed Aug 16, 2006 10:44 pm

Forgot to post salinity at 1.0255, checked with refractometer.

GeoGriffin · Post by **GeoGriffin** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 6:14 am

Have you checked for stray voltage? Do you have a grounding probe? I dont know if that could cause this.

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 7:53 am

No I haven't and no I dont. Everything I have read kind of points that way though. I will have one today or Friday at latest.

Amphiprion · Post by **Amphiprion** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 10:29 am

Unfortunately, there are no definite causes for marine HLLE. It has even been documented in the wild (which leads me to suspect a pathogen). Things such as carbon dust (do you use carbon?), Hexamita sp. (a protozoan), improper/poor diet, improper/poor environment, stray voltage, continuous stress (ad infinitum), have been implicated. My suggestion is to cover as many bases as possible in trying to reverse or halt the condition. As far as diet goes, the Atlantic blue tangs eat a good combination of fleshy (macro) and filamentous algae, as well as some detritus and cyanobacteria. I have observed them eating true plants, like turtle grasses, in the wild. Also, always rinse any carbon well to get rid of dust. Try to reduce the amount of appliances in the tank or try the grounding probe (though some argue that this completes a circuit through the water causing more problems). Also, make sure the fish get along well.

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 11:36 am

There was a few squirmishes between the two tangs at first but none that I have witnessed in probably six months. Havent used carbon at all in this tank. I will try all the other suggestions and see. Could I pull some of the cheato from the fuge to feed him? Would he eat it?

Amphiprion · Post by **Amphiprion** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 12:04 pm

I would resist the urge to use the chaetomorpha. It has soaked up the nutrients from your tank--feeding it will release at least some of those back into your tank. Also, it is rather noxious, with most fish rejecting it. I would try different kinds of dried seaweeds, maybe find some other live macros (I am sure at least someone has some of these) such as Dictyota, Caulerpa (sparingly), etc. as well as filamentous types, such as Derbesia, etc. What do you usually feed and how often do you feed using it?

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 2:04 pm

Feed algea sheets, bio-blend or bio-pure pellets, I forget which it is, frozen mysis. I have some formula 2 pellets I have fed a few times also. I think thats all. I feed usually every other day switching between pellets and mysis.

Amphiprion · Post by **Amphiprion** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 2:10 pm

Hmm. Maybe try to broaden the diet even more. While in many other fish I suspect a pathogen, I think it is a dietary issue in many of the Atlantic tangs. They eat a fairly broad amount of stuff, including algae, cyanobacteria, detritus, plants, and the animals associated with those things (but mostly algae, by far). Like I said, try finding some live and different macroalgae in hopes that that may at least stop the problem.

Kart Racer · Post by **Kart Racer** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 5:14 pm

Something else I just noticed that my BTA has split, but I don't know if it happened before, during or after this with my fish.

reefman8471 · Post by **reefman8471** » Thu Aug 17, 2006 10:53 pm

Try gracilaria among the live algaes.

James