husbadry dilemma

[monkeydad]

My YT blue damsel has a virus/fungus/infection/parasite.

 

My LFS owner thinks is a virus, a fairly common one, and that the virus has no cure...

 

It is possible that it is something treatable, but without removing the fish and bringing it to someone who can get a sample and look at it under a microscope, identification by visual means seems to me hit-and-miss because so many illnesses look similar, but they have different treatment regimens.

 

Here is the best photo I can muster...

 

I do not have a cycled hospital tank. I do have a 5g tank with hood (light, filter, pump) that I can set up with just my existing tank water.

 

Choices:

I can try several treatment methods over the next month (each unsuccessful attempt is surely going to cause stress for the fish).

I can give it away to a fellow reefer who can take it (unlikely).

I can euthanize the fish.

 

I cannot leave this fish in my tank for obvious reasons. If it is the virus my LFS owner thinks, it has no cure, and is not fatal-usually, if the fish stays totally healthy-but is communicable.

 

I'm leaning on euthanasia.

 

What do you more experienced reefers make of this situation?

[trockafella]

Let nature take its course.. Keep your fish fed and healthy.. I suppose if you want to put it down, then thats the choice you made, otherwise, just leave it be..

[Chad]

It is always a rough desicion...

If you can easily catch it, I would move it to the other tank... even though the 5 gallon you have will need to be run as a sterile system (daily or more frequent water changes). Once removed from the main system, the fish can be kept happy and the condition may clear or not, either way it minimizes the potential of another fish coming down with it.

[extreme_tooth_decay]

If it were me, I would leave it alone until I am positive it is going to die, then speed it on it's journey at that point. I would not try medications.

[zygote2k]

Leave it alone and let nature take its' course. If it's untreatable, what would be the point of QT'ing it and bathing it in chemicals that will only stress it out more or kill it? On another point, it's a $5 fish and you'd spend more than $20 with all the treatments...

[F&Fmgr]

If it's lympho (which it looks like) then it is a virus that is untreatable. I've had luck with scraping the cysts off with a razor blade and then dipping the fish in formagreen to prevent bacterial infections. Angelfish and their cousins are very susceptible to this. IT IS VERY CONTAGIOUS, but if the other fish are healthy, they should not catch the virus. Sometimes it will go away on its own after the virus has run its course, so QTing is a possibility, or you could listen to master of the universe, i mean zyogte...

 

Sean

[L8 2 RISE]

I would leave it alone. I had a CBB with lympho and it cleared up after about 3 weeks of good feeding and stress free environment. If you put a fish in qt with lympho, it's going to get worse.

[monkeydad]

Thanks all.

 

I think it is lympho as well.

 

I'd like to scrape it, but that fish is as fast as the Millinium Falcon, and as maneuverable as an F1 car!

 

I really don't want it to infect the percula that's in there with it....

 

I'll leave it in the main tank, stay on top of params, and feed it well. Just gonna haveta watch and see.

 

Sam, are you sure it will get worse? I was thinking I could take better care of him if he was alone and getting fed etc. etc.

 

...I leave town for six days, I come back, and my tank looks like H-E-double hockey sticks, the water is off, and my damsel has the clap! WTHO??

 

...I did a thorough cleaning and water change before leaving too...

[Origami]

Found this link: http://fishprofiles.com/profiles/diseases/Lymphocystis/100004/

 

It says,

 

Common Names: Lymphocystis, Lympho, Cauliflower Disease

 

Salinity: Marine

 

Description: Lymphocystis normally appears as white or pink-colored masses which appear on the body and fins of fish. They are somewhat rounded in shape, and may join together, forming large clumps. An infected fish can feature just one of these lesions, or it may have large numbers of them. Lymphocystis is sometimes mistaken for a parasitic infection in its early stages, but once the masses have grown it is easily identifiable.

 

Under the electron microscope, the characteristic signs of the disease are the apperance of icosahedral virus particles in the interstices between cells, and the appearance of greatly inflated infected host cells that have undergone enlargement to 300 times normal size (reported and documented visually in Tropical Fish Hobbyist magazine in 1977). It is the enlargement of infected cells that results in the characteristic 'cauliflower' growths appearing upon infected fishes.

 

Symptoms: Spots

 

Treatment: There are no known medications which treat Lymphocystis. The virus will go away on its own (generally within a month) because infected cells do not multiply. If a lesion is interfering with a fish

[F&Fmgr]

youre funny sam

 

Putting a damsel in a 5 gallon won't stress it out or make it worse just because of the move

 

Its unlucky though that the cells are on the body, if they were on the fins it would be alot easier to scrape or cut it off.

 

Funny enough, under a scope it does look like lil brocoli/cauliflower buds, almost like tadpole egg clusters.

 

Best of luck!

 

Sean

[Chris-]

If it is in the least bit of infecting the other fish, I would pull that thing out with a harpoon if I had to.

[L8 2 RISE]

lol, true, it is a damsel, I doubt it will get worse, however I would just leave it. It sounds like your tank just got a little out of wack while you were away and that, in turn, caused stress on the fish. Now that your back and everything's happy again, I'd just pretend everything's normal. Clowns are so hardy that I doubt yours will get infected, ESPECIALLY now that there's nothing stressing it out. In my opinion/experience, if there is no extra stress being induced on the fish in the tank, just pretend everything is normal, keep up the water changes, feed well, etc. and it will get better over time.