Clown Disease? Need some help...

[NonCometL]

My B/W ocellaris clown has something going on. I can't quite identify it. This started about 3 weeks ago, after a water change. My DH didn't test the water following the change, so the salinity dropped to about 10.10 (refractometer). When I got up the next a.m. and identified the problem, as well as a power jet that had been knocked down and had sprayed sand all over the tank (charming..), the clown (one of a pair) was having some trouble swimming. We corrected the salinity problem and watched the fish for a couple hours. He did not improve. On closer observation, he had what appeared to be bruising over his head, was swimming sideways and floating around. I removed him to the QT tank for even closer observation, believed he had somehow been injured by the barrage of sand and possibly had bruised his head (yes, I was thinking brain injury...). That's where he has been for about 3 weeks now, during which time this black/gray pigmentation has extended to cover fully the entire top of the fish. You can't notice it on the black portions, but you can on the white. This does not look like speckling, as you'd expect with black ich. Its more of a uniform black shading across the entire top of the fish. His swimming has remained weak and erratic, but he does eat (albeit quite slowly and takes some time...) and goes through periods of laying on his side, floating/swimming upside down, etc. Since I can't figure out what he has, I have no idea what to treat with. I will note that I threw some metronidazole in the QT tank shortly after this began and it seemed to improve him, and again a few days ago when it look (again) like the fish was about to expire, and again, it seemed to improve him. Not sure if I should treat him generally for black ich, in case I just don't know what the heck I'm looking at (never seen it, but doesn't look like ANY of the pics I've seen) and I can't find one single other thing I think it could be. I've had this fish for a few months and it has had no issues up until now, and the other half of the pair remains fine. They reside in a 180 g tank along with 4 other fish, a cleaner crew and an LTA. The only change in the tank was the addition of a very small BTA (about 1 1/2 inch). If anyone has any thoughts on this, I'd appreciate hearing them....

Thanks

 

[Aquaman_68]

can u post a pic? hille is a possible area ..(with the swimming not good it is probably not a good thing) have u tested the ammonia level in the tank after the sandstorm?

 

[NonCometL]

Hopefully that works. The fish isn't as black/dark today in the affected areas as he is some days - the intensity of the blackness seems to vary from day to day. Assuming you can see these pics, they are oriented in the direction the fish was swimming, so you can see what I mean about his mobility.... As for HLLE, I don't know that much about it, but kind of thought that it only affected the appearance of the fish and not so much the behavior?

 

[NonCometL]

http://s1167.photobucket.com/albums...26/noncometl/?action=view&current=166edit.jpg

Try this direct link... Can't seem to figure out the upload....

 

[Ford625]

This is just a thought but did the powerhead fall onto the fish?

 

[NonCometL]

This is just a thought but did the powerhead fall onto the fish?

Could have happened - the one that fell is right where the clowns usually hang out, which was why I initially thought he had bruised his head... Then the black discoloration started spreading and now it kind of waxes and wanes, and is worse at some times than others. The fish swims upside down and sideways and in circles... He definitely "ain't right" and this has been going on for weeks now... Figured he'd go one way or the other sooner than this... Day before yesterday my Naso tang got stuck on a powerhead too... He's a good sized fish, so am not sure exactly how that happened, but it left him with a big circular swelling/wound on his side... Would like to put him in the QT tank for some antibiotic treatment, but since it's inhabited currently by this potentially infectious clown, I don't dare...

 

[NonCometL]

BTW, in terms of treating for ich, I was reading up on formalin. Where I work (vet's office) we have biopsy jars with 10% formalin - is this the same as you'd use to treat? I've read that you'd use 37% formalin to treat at 0.6 ml per gallon, so I imagine that you'd have to adjust dose to account for the different at a multiplication factor of 3.7, so 2.2 ml per gallon. Thoughts?