Cotton mouth or barbel damage - cory

[dmaccy]

See photo of corydoras below. Is this cotton mouth or just a damaged barbel?

 

[dmaccy]

Might be useful to share this too maybe? This incident was in my tank last week

Water change - immediate problems

Hi Just completed a water change as I do every week. But within 5 minutes of the ater change several fish were behaving erratically. Five of our seven emperor tetras were swimming eraticly like they had swim bladder disease and two of our four corydoras were doing their surface dive seemingly...

www.fishforums.net

 

[CassCats]

Oh yeah thats infection of his barbels, not good either.

They need sand, for this reason, its too easy to damage their mouths on rough gravel trying to dig out the food and gravel is easy to trap waste unlike sand so with bottom dwellers like cories it usually ends up this way.

I would also check your ammonia,nitrites, nitrates, and your GH.

Do daily water changes to keep it as clean as possible and change out your gravel for sand asap.

 

[dmaccy]

Would you dose with anything to treat the infection?

 

[CassCats]

Would you dose with anything to treat the infection?

If you have access to antibiotics, I'd look into getting one. Not melafix or pimafix they wont do anything.

 

[Essjay]

As you are in England, you can only get antibiotics with a vet's prescription. The best we can get are eSHa 2000 or Myxazin by Waterlife, though neither are as strong as antibiotics.

 

[Colin_T]

How long has it been like that?

Mouth fungus (Columnaris) is a fast growing bacterial infection that normally spreads over a fish's mouth and face within 24-48 hours. The fish usually dies within that time.

It doesn't look like Columnaris but it doesn't look like a damaged barbel either.

Can you post some more pictures from the side view?

 

[dmaccy]

Thanks all

I'm guessing from your replies the interpet anti fungus would be useless?

I noticed yesterday lunchtime ish, so approx 24 hours since I first saw it.

Photo of the cory below. Note this is on the sandy section of the tank (approx one third) where they spend most of their time. For info (if it helps) it is still eating fine and moving around, perhaps a little less zealously than before but nothing that would alarm me on its own

 

[Colin_T]

It has excess mucous on its nose but it doesn't look like Columnaris. I'm guessing it has inflammation and a sore nose/ mouth.

Add a bit of salt and see how it progresses over the next few days. Use 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres. If there's no improvement after 48 hours, then double that dose so there's 2 heaped tablespoons of salt for every 20 litres of tank water.

If the white area spreads or gets worse in the next 24-48 hours, or it goes red, then post more pictures and start looking for anti-biotics.

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The Interpet anti-fungus treatment is unlikely to do anything for this.