Hi,
I have a sick Cory catfish named Feldman. He's currently in a small hospital tank:
Tank Size: .5 gallon
Temperature: 80 F
Water Change: Using turkey baster to clean the bottom. Approx. 25%/day
Medicin: 2 drops daily of Mardel Maroxy for True Fungal Infections of fish and eggs
Tank Mates: Thankfully none. None of my other fish/frogs are sick
Noteworthy items: 4 days ago we noticed that Feldman had what appeared to be a fungus-covered food pellet stuck above his right gill. Sometimes a piece of uneaten food would get stuck in a plant and develop a similar looking "cotton hairy" look to it.
I tried to remove it gently with a cotton and quickly realized that it was firmly attached to him and that it wasn't food! I noticed that he was bleeding slightly on the back side of the growth.
We quickly removed him from the community tank (description below) and put him into a new hospital tank. We've been treating his little tank daily for 4 days and he appears to be getting a little worse. The medicine says not to use it for more than 5 days - so I'm really not sure what to do next.
Feldman's breathing seems regular and his mouth and eyes look good. He doesn't seem to be in too bad of spirits, other than that he's not really eating his food.
The uneaten food quickly becomes "cotton hairy" in the hospital tank so I'm concerned that this Maroxy stuff isn't doing anything at all. There's no date listed on the bottle, but I bought it at a superstore, so it shouldn't be very old.
The community tank has undergone some changes in the last month:
- Added two (2) cory catfish about 3 weeks ago.
- One of our three live plants started turning brown and falling apart
- One of our three live plants started developing what looked like brown dirt on it.
- Our third live plant looked fine and was the same species as the one that started looking "dirty"
- The two "sick" plants started falling apart and there were times when the gravel was partly covered in dead plant debri.
- We developed a small snail problem that I've kept somewhat in check by manually removing the eggs from the glass and plants.
Community Tank Details:
Tank Size: 20 gallon
Temperature: 80 F
Water Change: 10% water change weekly using syphon hose to clean the gravel
Medicin: 20ML on day 1/3/5 of Merdel Marycyn Plus Antibacteria (I've treated twice since the disease was detected)
Tank Mates: 1 Male Betta (had them for 9 months),2 African Dwarf Frogs (3 months), 3 live plants (2 months) and about 50 small snails that hitchhiked on the plants.
I removed all of the plants right after the disease was discovered because the debri (and possible diseases) made the tank too hard to keep healthy.
Thankfully none of the other fish appear to be sick. Here are the pictures of poor Feldman:
I really hope he doesn't become my first fish casualty. Please help him if you can!!!
I have a sick Cory catfish named Feldman. He's currently in a small hospital tank:
Tank Size: .5 gallon
Temperature: 80 F
Water Change: Using turkey baster to clean the bottom. Approx. 25%/day
Medicin: 2 drops daily of Mardel Maroxy for True Fungal Infections of fish and eggs
Tank Mates: Thankfully none. None of my other fish/frogs are sick
Noteworthy items: 4 days ago we noticed that Feldman had what appeared to be a fungus-covered food pellet stuck above his right gill. Sometimes a piece of uneaten food would get stuck in a plant and develop a similar looking "cotton hairy" look to it.
I tried to remove it gently with a cotton and quickly realized that it was firmly attached to him and that it wasn't food! I noticed that he was bleeding slightly on the back side of the growth.
We quickly removed him from the community tank (description below) and put him into a new hospital tank. We've been treating his little tank daily for 4 days and he appears to be getting a little worse. The medicine says not to use it for more than 5 days - so I'm really not sure what to do next.
Feldman's breathing seems regular and his mouth and eyes look good. He doesn't seem to be in too bad of spirits, other than that he's not really eating his food.
The uneaten food quickly becomes "cotton hairy" in the hospital tank so I'm concerned that this Maroxy stuff isn't doing anything at all. There's no date listed on the bottle, but I bought it at a superstore, so it shouldn't be very old.
The community tank has undergone some changes in the last month:
- Added two (2) cory catfish about 3 weeks ago.
- One of our three live plants started turning brown and falling apart
- One of our three live plants started developing what looked like brown dirt on it.
- Our third live plant looked fine and was the same species as the one that started looking "dirty"
- The two "sick" plants started falling apart and there were times when the gravel was partly covered in dead plant debri.
- We developed a small snail problem that I've kept somewhat in check by manually removing the eggs from the glass and plants.
Community Tank Details:
Tank Size: 20 gallon
Temperature: 80 F
Water Change: 10% water change weekly using syphon hose to clean the gravel
Medicin: 20ML on day 1/3/5 of Merdel Marycyn Plus Antibacteria (I've treated twice since the disease was detected)
Tank Mates: 1 Male Betta (had them for 9 months),2 African Dwarf Frogs (3 months), 3 live plants (2 months) and about 50 small snails that hitchhiked on the plants.
I removed all of the plants right after the disease was discovered because the debri (and possible diseases) made the tank too hard to keep healthy.
Thankfully none of the other fish appear to be sick. Here are the pictures of poor Feldman:


I really hope he doesn't become my first fish casualty. Please help him if you can!!!
