Sick Coral Beauty Angel

[Tsling07]

My Coral Beauty Angel always has a long string of poop when he goes to the bathroom. It sticks to him for several minutes and is a couple inches long. He has also developed a light spot on his side. Does he have internal parasites? What would be the best way to treat him? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[beth]

Nor real problem with this. However, I see a sizable scar on his side. What is that from?

 

[Tsling07]

I'm not sure what caused it. It is gone now. Thanks for the reply.

 

[beth]

Is there a lot of vegetation in the diet? That could account for the long poop.

 

[Tsling07]

I feed them seaweed at least three times a week. I put Selcon and garlic drops on it as well.

 

[Tsling07]

He is the only fish that has the long poop and I read that can mean he has internal parasites. That was my concern.

 

[beth]

It could be a result of constipation. Try adding a bit more vegetable options to diet. As I suggested in the other topic, he may also benefit from marine algae food. On the other hand, if the fish is getting a lot of vegetable in the diet, you can get the same result. What are you feeding?

You can't add meds to the water column in the display tank to treat for internal parasites. The fish looks pretty healthy so at this point I would not be concerned with that.

 

[Tsling07]

I feed my fish brine shrimp, mysis shrimp, bloodworms, frozen Angel food, flakes, granules and sheets of seaweed. I put Garlic Extreme and Selcon on them every time. I feed them twice a day. This seems to be a pretty good recipe for keeping them healthy. I have not lost any fish in quite a while. I've been in the hobby for about 25 years. Forums like this and reviews on Amazon have been extremely helpful. The only place I could turn to in the beginning was books and they were very limited.

 

[beth]

Unfortunately, I left the hobby about a decade ago when I moved and current life situation is not conducive to reefkeeping. However, I still visit here and help out at least with fish diseases.

Bloodworms are a freshwater food. I wouldn't use it. They could even be a source of parasites. Brine shrimp has next no nutritional value. Fish seem to love it, but they are an empty nutritional source. Maybe as a treat now and then.

 

[Tsling07]

I know brine shrimp aren't ideal but I have some finicky eaters. My Flame Angel will only eat blood worms, brine shrimp and seaweed. He refuses to eat flakes, granules or mysis shrimp. My two clowns won't eat mysis shrimp, flakes or granules either. I also feed them krill. My Powder Brown Tang is the most voracious eater that I have and he'll eat anything I put in the tank. They are amazing fish! He is the first one that I've had. I've had Achilles Tangs, Powder Blue Tangs, Yellow Tangs and Blue Tangs. I've been in the hobby for 27 years but I did take a break for a couple of years when my tank crashed a few years ago. I lost about $1,000 worth of fish.

 

[beth]

Try some other frozen foods. I would not used dried food as a primary source of food. It you really want to impress the fish, make your own meaty foods by gathering up some bits of raw seafood from the grocer, chop in food processor, roll into flat 1" high sqare, ziplock it, freeze, and then cut off a potion every feeding. Drop in deadicated cup with a tad of seawater, let set for a couple mins then offer in tank. Your fish won't spend too much more time on bloodworms and brine. Nutrition and quality water is major to healthy fish. Homemade is actually not expensive, and not hard to prep either.

 

[Tsling07]

I will give it a try. As I said, I use a mixture of frozen and dry foods and add the supplements. I also feed them sheets of marine seaweed three or four times a week. I feed my dwarf lionfish live fish a couple times a week as well. My tank has a lot of live rock and coralline algae for the fish as well. They are constantly picking at the rocks.