Please help my poor goby

[zachary]

I think my 10" goby has a bacterial infection. He had some whitish pea sized spots for a while that no one on this BB had any answers for. Then in a period of no more than 48 hours his tail and fin were almost completely desimated. His glands are swollen and he is laboring to breath. I went to the LFS today and read all the medication available. I almost bought Maricyn 2, but decided instead to buy ampicillex because it seemed to match the symptoms better. I just put the first dose in the QT. Do I have any hope? What should I do about the rest of the tank? Should I do something else? Also, the newest tankmate is a firefish that lost a bit of his tail the second night here, but I had attributed that to either my blue damsel or my tomato clown that were hounding it. Thanks for any help.

 

[fmarini]

Hi:
from the description it could very well be a bacterial infection, but it could also be a few other things. Where are the fish's glands?
When you say the fins were desimated you mean they were dissolved or were ragged and torn? were the fin rays white, or clear, were there any fin rays left?
So as far as meds, SW maracyin II is a good broad spectrum med, also nitrofurzan is a good water soluble general med as well. I assume ampicilex is some sort of ampicillin, can you read what else is in this mixture and what is the recommended dose.
as far as what to do next? what do the other fish in the tank look like and are acting? (beside the ragged tail of the firefish)
i look forward to your response
frank

 

[zachary]

Thanks for the response. The goby is normally black with yellow wavy vertical stripes. He looks like an eel. The glands I'm talking about are behind the jaw line. Now the glands are back to normal. His top fin, running his length, is ragged and torn. It gets worse the closer to his tail.
Since being in the qt he has gotten very chalky. His skin has white chalky areas, also getting worse towards his tail. Thankfully, he is acting more normal now though. His movement is back to normal (before his back three or four inches seemed paralyzed), his breathing is normal and he is eating again.
As far as the other fish, the firefish is unchanged, no worse. My tomato clown has a small white spot on his left dorsal fin that I'm keeping an eye on and I noticed a tiny piece of my royal gramma's tail is missing.
My nitrate level jumped up to 25 and I'm doing water changes for that. The phosphate level rose to .5 . All other parameters are normal.
Please any advice would be appreciated. I'm very relieved and less worried about the goby, but don't know how long to keep him in the qt. How do I know if there is something wrong in the tank? What should I do? Sorry for the length. Thanks!

 

[zachary]

Frank, there were a couple of your questions I didn't answer. The Ampicillex is a wide spectrum anti-fungal/anti-bacterial. It's dosage is 2 capsules(250mg each) every other day for three treatments. Which is what I did. As far as it's mixture, it says "250mg capsules of water soluble Ampicillin Trihydrate Activity".
Also, all the fish are acting normal except a blue damsel that yesterday was swimming back and forth in 5 inch lengths. At first I thought I was going crazy, but parts of its scales turned white. Then is swam back and forth until they went back to normal. Then it happened again, and a third time. Since then, it has been normal. I really didn't imagine it. Thanks