Flesh Eating Bacteria?

[rowens86]

My female auratus cichlid has some kind of flesh eating bacteria, ive tried all kinds of meds, changing the water daily but nothing seems to help, it is getting worse everyday, ammonia 0, nitrite 0, nitrate 5-10 (LOTS OF PLANTS), ph 8, hardness, rift lake traces, minerals, have always been in good standings, steady temp at 77 F running for long time now

Its a 55G tank and she was about 6 inches long, she also just released her babies right before all of this. She has always been eating even when holding, and she still is trying to eat.

The problem now is it has got so bad she cant level her self out, she swims head down and only HALF of her body is left. It seems to have slow down, it has almost reached her stomach.

It started at the tail and as 1 day goes by it eats away another half inch or so of flesh.

(visualization) Its almost like hollowed out from the back from microscopic piranha

She has NEVER been in distress, its almost as if she is clueless of what is going on. she still tries to feed and somehow manages. Her color is nice and bright, her back side is open just white flesh, she went from 6 inches to now being only 4 inches, this is like day 4.

The weird thing is her behavior is normal, when i come to the tank she still comes up to feed, she is strong willed, i do not want to see her go she is a tough fish

I'm freaked out by all of this please help if you know what this could be (((

 

[FishStrings]

Make sure you follow the instructions on the medication verbatim. Make sure you remove all carbon filtering components without turning the pumps off as they will filter the biological and chemical components of any medications. The filtering you will be doing will be partial water changes during the illness. I have a green barb right now with the same thing and I have gotten the degeneration to stop. You can also try adding a little stress coat conditioner with aloe to help repair the fins without overdoing it. Any conditioner that doesnt help promote fin repair is almost worthless compared to the ones that do.

 

[WILDER]

She needs isolating and use antibiotics.
I would only use antibiotics in isolation as they wipe the beneifical bacteria out in the filter.

 

[Tolak]

Please list the medications you have used, and the procedure followed. Unfortunately the instructions given with many medications are less than effective when followed "verbatim". Stresscoat and products with aloe are not needed, large frequent water changes are cheaper and more effective.

 

[rowens86]

It has seemed to stop right before her stomach, she is still feeding and still comes to the top when I come to the tank, still very bright colored.

The meds I have used are API General Cure, API Triple Sulfa, Melafix, Pimafix. I use Prime for water conditioner and a tiny squirt of stress coat and Kent African Cichlid as needed by testing water first ( Rift lake traces, Cichlid chemistry, Cichlid buffer )

I have stopped using any meds as the flesh eating has seemed to stopped. Water conditions have been stable throughout. Changing about 15 gallons of water twice a week now.

It almost seems as if her skin is starting to close up around her open backside but she still has to swim face down (vertically)


I'm just going day by day, I don't think her tail will ever grow back as she has lost 2 inches in length.

Any opinions on what the future might be for her?

 

[Tolak]

Keep up on the water changes for at least a couple more weeks, from my experience this is the most important thing for healing fish. Unless the tail had been damaged so severely as to have caused damage to the claudal penduncle the tail will probably grow back, but it may be a while.