Hole in head

[Synirr]

I'm very worried about my oscar... he's getting little pits on his head and it looks exactly like HIH to me. How does one treat this disease?? I seriously doubt water quality could be the problem, since I do weekly 25% water changes and the tank is appropriately filtered, if not overfiltered. The water readings are perfect. He's 8" and sharing an 80 gallon with a 5" midas hybrid (and yes, surprisingly, they get along fine.) He's my favourite fish and I hate to see him ill... what can I do for him?
I found a website which said carbon dust may contribute to the development of HIH in some fish, and since I just added carbon to my filter a few weeks ago, this seems like it may be the case. I'd definitely like to hear some more opinions, though. Help!!

 

[Tolak]

Metronidazole is the med of choice for HITH, or heximita. I have metro on hand as angels are prone to hex, they do the no eat thing.

Check out my reply in this post, it will save me a lot of typing http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=91106&hl=

I crank the temp pretty high for angels, I don't know what the maximum is for oscars. Being new world cichlids I'll bet they can take a mid 80's temp no problem.

http/www.fishyfarmacy.com/products2.html Has the best prices on metro, good folks to deal with.

Tolak

 

[Toadfish]

Another good option is actually a general pond fix it all called Melafix, it helps deal with parasites which is what HIH is, small parasites digging through the head of your oscar. Oh, and definatly raise the temp to mid 80's oscars can easily handle it. Good luck, if he's strong he'll pull through.

 

[juanveldez]

my first question is this and it is going to seem a bit rediculus but are your sure that it is HITH, SA cichlids such as oscars, GTs, and others have a ring of sensory pits around their head. and as they grow larger so do the pits, I remember when I first noticed them in my GT female and I thought the same thing. with proper diet, and good water quality I would doubt that he has HITH.

 

[Synirr]

my first question is this and it is going to seem a bit rediculus but are your sure that it is HITH, SA cichlids such as oscars, GTs, and others have a ring of sensory pits around their head. and as they grow larger so do the pits, I remember when I first noticed them in my GT female and I thought the same thing. with proper diet, and good water quality I would doubt that he has HITH.

Yes, I'm sure... He has always had visible pits but within the last week they've gotten deeper than they should be. I have no idea why this is happening to him though... his main diet is Hikari cichlid gold pellets, and he gets lots of variety like vegetables, nightcrawlers, crickets, ghost shrimp, etc.

Thanks for the advice guys, I'm starting to feel better about this (I was really stressing out yesterday, he's my baby you know! ) I'll try Melafix first since I have that on hand, and if I don't see improvement I'll order some Metronidazole. I did a 40% waterchange today just incase, and I'm thinking of replacing the carbon in my filter with gravel... bacteria will grow just as well on that, don't you think?

Edit: This may be a silly question, but once this is under control, do the pits stay deep or do they heal up? Just wondering

 

[xXMrBonesXx]

the oscar i just got wasnt well from teh start but i fixed him up and when all was going well i noticed a pit so i did a big w/c and it wasn't visible a couple days later, i'm relatively new to cichlids though so

 

[juanveldez]

yes the filters don't need to have carbon in them. I don't use it and if I do its because I have 2 tanks that have cheap filters on them that have those nice little neat packets( which also means I havn't gotten around to replacing them) but for the most part I use AC110s on my tanks. I wuld do at least a 40 % every 2-4 days for sure. there is no cure for HITH and at the most you can only hope to slow it down or to stop it but nothing will ever heal it.

 

[Synirr]

yes the filters don't need to have carbon in them. I don't use it and if I do its because I have 2 tanks that have cheap filters on them that have those nice little neat packets( which also means I havn't gotten around to replacing them) but for the most part I use AC110s on my tanks. I wuld do at least a 40 % every 2-4 days for sure. there is no cure for HITH and at the most you can only hope to slow it down or to stop it but nothing will ever heal it.

Yeah, I don't normally use carbon in my filters either but it's what came with the canister I bought for this tank and I figured it couldn't hurt to use it... just thought I'd replace it with gravel so the bacteria have something to grow on. It's a shame it won't heal up, but oh well... it's not too bad at all right now, and I love my oscar no matter what... it just means he'll be a tad bit uglier

If it gets much worse I would consider consulting a veterinarian about it (I care about this fish enough to dump some money on that) do you think a vet would have anything better to treat it with? Say a perscription?

 

[juanveldez]

there isn't really any need to call in a vet. like I said through getting rid of the carbon, and doing large water changes every couple days it should slow it down if not stop it.