Help, Tang is blind? I think...

[lady sartain]

Achilles tang has been doing just fine, battling a mild case of ich but he was eating like crazy so we haven't been too worried. last night we noticed he was swimming around the top of the tank and wasn't eating. Tonight when he swims to the bottom among the rock and corals he is bumping into everything and doesn't seem to avoid our hands when we go in the tank. Could he be blind? Is this something associated with ich or is this something else? He has now been moved to a much smaller hospital tank until we can figure out what is going on and get him treated.

 

[lady sartain]

Any suggestions???????

 

[soojpudge]

Try sending Brandon a pm on it.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

Kristie, Sorry, I just saw this.... Ummm, it could be a few things. First being secondary infection from the Ich or something unrelated. Second could be he is "fine" and you just think he is blind.

But, I need more to go on then just, "He can not see". Are his eyes clouded?!? How is his breathing?!? How bad is "a little Ich"?!? Any other fish showing any signs of anything?!? Is he swimming like he is injured?!? Can you shoot some GOOD pictures?!? Oh ya, what and how often have you been feeing him?!? Has he been eating?!?

 

[stacy22]

 

[jason sartain]

Brandon,Kristie's in the shower so I'm responding.
Here is a OK picture of him this morning,the reason we think he can't see good is that he ran into our large hammer last night and broke it off the rock I had it mounted to.
His eye's don't look that cloudy,his breathing seems normal,no other fish are showing any signs of ich,and he's been eating like a pig!
We've been feeding purple seaweed from Little fishies,and sushi seaweed from Publix,he's also been eating micro algea from my fuge like grape clurpa(spelling).
He started acting worse two day's ago after I dosed the tank to raise my MAG level a little,(Seachem advantage magnesium-25g and I dripped it in a automatic doser)
He stopped eating and started swiwwing around at the top of the tank in a circle.
I've got him in a 30 gal QT(which worries me by itself),with the heater raised to 81 degrees.
Is their a non-copper based med I can use on him?
Anything else you can suggest?

Xyzpdq0121;259505 wrote: Kristie, Sorry, I just saw this.... Ummm, it could be a few things. First being secondary infection from the Ich or something unrelated. Second could be he is "fine" and you just think he is blind.

But, I need more to go on then just, "He can not see". Are his eyes clouded?!? How is his breathing?!? How bad is "a little Ich"?!? Any other fish showing any signs of anything?!? Is he swimming like he is injured?!? Can you shoot some GOOD pictures?!? Oh ya, what and how often have you been feeing him?!? Has he been eating?!?

 

[xyzpdq0121]

There is a non-copper base med that you can use for the Ich, but it most likely won't solve your newest problem.

Pop some (A SMALL AMOUNT) of his favorite food in the QT and see if he goes after it. You need to know if he is blind or just playing blind.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

The problem is temp blindness can be caused by many things. I am not one to treat a fish unless I know that there is an illness. Your likely suspects are diet (Which does not sound like the case), Bacterial (could be a common source), Viral (Most likely not), and Fungal (not much is known about fungal infections since they are confused with bacterial). If you were to treat, you could go with a combo approach and do some Paragard by seachem. It should knock a hole in most anything. Problem with Paragard is that it takes a combo approach to the cure and you run the risk of not getting enough of what you need because you are trying to keep from ODing on the stuff you do not need.

How long have you had this guy?!?

I wish Panda was up... He is better at bacterial things then I am. I am the parasite person.


If the blindness is not temp, there is not much you can do. They do not know how to train dog faced puffers to be seeing eye dogs yet!

 

[jason sartain]

Sorry about the picture not coming through.
His eye does look a little cloudy!
I have some micro algae in there and he's not eating.
What should I use for him if I have to use copper?
I've also read that Hypo-salinity will help as well,like 1.017-1.020??
We've had him about 5-6 weeks now.
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[xyzpdq0121]

Well cloudy eyes are another symptom but not really an illness... You have a larger problem going on. Good news is it most likely is not time to run him to the ER.

I think you are getting your Ich cures and blindness cures mixed up. Copper will do nothing really for the eyes. Hype will not do anything for it either. Now, for the Ich, that is a different story. The Ich might be part of the problem, but you have more then one thing most likely going on here...


Here is what I want you to do (Or atleast my advice). Leave him alone for right now. Keep the lights in the QT off. Just let him chill for the morning. In the afternoon or early evening, take a look at him and let me know if there is any change via PM (or PM and a post here). There is not much you can do anyways and many times it can clear on its own. More problems come from trying to do something/anything or doing the wrong thing.

 

[jason sartain]

OK brandon,thanks.
I read online that Ich could cause temporary cloudy eye's or even temporary blindness?!?
So that's way I'm asking my buds here.
I'll post this afternoon about his condition.

 

[lady sartain]

I found list last night when I was googling Ich and symptoms. http://atj.net.au/marineaquaria/marineich.html">http://atj.net.au/marineaquaria/marineich.html</a>

Check out the [I]The Signs of Marine "Ich"</em>

This is why I thought ich could be the cause of his blindness.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

Depends on what your defination of "Cause" is... Temp blindness, like I said, is a symptom of many different things. In the case of Ich, the weakend immune system from the ich causes the fish not to be able to fight off normal bacteria and stuff that it does on a daily basis. As such, these things gain a foothold. So it is not really a cause and effect thing from one illness, but more often a cause and cause thing from two or more things. Unless an Ich cyst is sitting on his eye, making him unable to see, then the Ich is not "causing" the blindness.

Like I said, the Ich needs to be treated, and that might be the root of all this, but we got more to do in the mean time. Right now it is a wait and see thing. I know that drives you crazy! . Give him a few hours to have some quiet time and lets evaluate him. You can still check on him every so often if you are at home, but I would recommend on starting treatment when he can be evaluated a bit more.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

I've also read that Hypo-salinity will help as well,like 1.017-1.020??

FYI: Hypo is more in the range of 1.009-1.010.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

BTW: If what I am seeing in that Pic is Ich and not just stuff floating in the waer, Ya, you have a major outbreak. QT is where you WANT him right now (and soon to be everything else!)

 

[steve]

Hypo being less than 1.009...

 

[xyzpdq0121]

Steve;259540 wrote: Hypo being less than 1.009...

I would not go LESS then 1.009!

 

[jmaneyapanda]

One of the most common causes for blindness in otherwise healthy fish, IMHO, is oxygen deprivation. Do you usually run your tank at 81 degeres? Did you have the ciculation/pumps off recently? Could any toxins have gotten into the water?

 

[xyzpdq0121]

jmaneyapanda;259549 wrote: One of the most common causes for blindness in otherwise healthy fish, IMHO, is oxygen deprivation. Do you usually run your tank at 81 degeres? Did you have the ciculation/pumps off recently? Could any toxins have gotten into the water?

I THINK he just put him in the QT, but I could be wrong... That is the way I read it, but then again, I have not been to bed yet! I could be reading a lot of things wrong!

 

[lady sartain]

We put him in QT last night. Pumps haven't been off so I don't think oxygen is the issue. Jason and I both had to go to work so he's home alone in the dark QT. We will be stopping by the LFS to get some ich meds this afternoon on the way home. Of course we plan to treat him in the QT. Should we treat the DT with something other than copper? No other fish are showing any signs. I've seen several meds that claim to be coral and inverterbrate safe.