Newbie With Sick Fish

[RedNails]

Thanks for being here everyone.  Your information is much appreciated.
 
I have a sick fish (don't know name).  The fish is kinda angel-fish looking, but not.  It has two long "whiskers" coming out its underside.  Color silver.  To get to the sick issue: he has a large lump/bump on the leftisde of face above the eye.  It looks angry, like he has been scratching it.  In the left face photo you can see the redness, up close it looks like an open sore.  The front face photo shows the height and length of it.  The last photo up shot shows, again the height of the bump for perspective.
 
The tank was half drained and cleaned 6-7 days ago.  He has had this for about 2 weeks.  However, the bump grew pretty fast.  At first I just thought he had run into the ship. Now he has started losing the skin around it.  He has no change in appetite, activity level, or breathing.  He acts fine, just has the bump.  He lives in 55g tank with 4 tiger barbs.  The barbs show no sign of bumps, lumps, or white spots.  They are fine.
 
The water test done before cleaning showed: water too soft, alkalinity too high, and pH too high.  I am working on this.  I am also giving ick medicine right now because it is all I have.
 
So here are my questions:
 
What can I do immediately?
Is this thing treatable? (pls say it is) If so, what do I need to do?  If not, is he suffering?
If it is treatable and is treated, will the skin repair itself?
How can I prevent this from happening again?
Last, what kind of fish is he?


 
 

 

[This Old Spouse]

Firstly, please describe your tank in more detail: size, substrate, filtration, plants live or fake and other decorations.
 
Do you have a liquid water testing kit?
 
Also please describe your regular cleaning schedule, feeding schedule (and what you feed them).
 
Do you have lights in the tank, and how long are they on?
 
If you could take a couple photos of this fish from a little further back so we could see all of it, that would help.
 
My first thought is that with so few tiger barbs, they might be attacking this one. Barbs do best in much larger groups. I upped my numbers to 14 and that's pretty much when the aggressive behavior stopped.

 

[attibones]

Stop the ich medication. You don't want to expose your fish to medicines if the medicine doesn't treat your symptoms. Do a 25% water change with warm, clean water. Can you isolate the fish to a smaller aquarium? Treating is easiest in smaller tanks.

This does sort of look like a scrape wound. I would try adding a small amount of aquarium salt to promote healing, and see if that does any good. If I am correct, then it should heal over time. It may just need time to heal. I've never seen this before, though.

Also, this sort of looks like a gourami or some sort of cichlid, but it is hard to tell. Can you provide a photo of the whole fish's body?

 

[RedNails]

Here are 3 full body pictures.  I am answering all the questions now. 

 

[This Old Spouse]

It's a gourami of some kind, I think pearl.
 
I agree with attibones ... stop the ich medication. Ich appears as little white dots all over, kind of looking like grains of sand. This isn't ich.

 

[RedNails]

attibones

Stop the ich medication.  Will do.
Do a 25% water change with warm, clean water.  Will do.
Can you isolate the fish to a smaller aquarium?  Yes.
I would try adding a small amount of aquarium salt to
promote healing …  Will do.
 
This Old Spouse

Firstly, please describe your tank in more detail:
 
Size:  55g
Substrate:  don’t know what this is
Filtration:  Whisper® external, double carbon filter system.  Aeration is through an underground platform.
Plants live or fake: fake, all real ones died
Other decorations:  large-ish boat, river rocks, gravel over sand
Do you have a liquid water testing kit?  No, it is a strip.
Also please describe your regular cleaning schedule:  25% water change every Sunday, includes cleaning accessories, cleaning/changing filters
 
Feeding schedule (and what you feed them):  brine shrimp once a week (Sat AM), TetraMin® tropical flakes every day except shrimp day, feed flakes twice a day, morning (7AM) and night (8-9PM).

Do you have lights in the tank, and how long are they on?  Yes, have lights.  On from 7AM to 8PM daily.
 
I had no ideas barbs are aggressive.  Good to know. Thank you.


 


I am going to eat dinner, will check back.

 

[attibones]

I agree that this is probably a pearl gourami. Once you get it into its own tank for treatment, you may be able to see some results. The barbs could be irritating the fish further.

Also, substrate is the bottom of your tank. Is it gravel, sand, dirt, whatever?

Most barbs are fairly nippy, but cherry barbs are pretty peaceful (however active) fish.

 

[RedNails]

Substrate is gravel over sand

 

[This Old Spouse]

Substrate is what you have on the bottom, i.e. gravel or sand.
 
Lights should be on only 5-6 hours a day. Then again, since you don't have any live plants this is less important.
 
Invest in a liquid test kit such as API or Nutrafin or Salifert. Strips are notoriously unreliable and can give false readings. Should something else go wrong in your tank we'll ask you what your water parameters are, and this is the only way to get accurate measurements.
 
Tiger barbs are really only aggressive if they're in smaller numbers, such as yours. The larger the shoal, the more they keep to themselves.
 
Also, please be very careful about trying to adjust your pH. Fish react very badly to swinging pH levels. 

 

[RedNails]

Thank you so much attibone and This Old Spouse.  I have a plan based on your advice.  TOS, I will buy the ine of the water test kits you recommended and a few more barbs tomorrow.  attibones, he is isolated, pinch of aquarium salt added.  So, we'll see what happens.  I'll let you know how it is going in a few days.

 

[phoenixgsd]

, includes cleaning accessories, cleaning/changing filters
.

cleaning and changing filters? what exactly are you doing with the filter? i suspect this is the root of your problem, filters dont need to be changed routinely

 

[snazy]

The filter media inside the filter doesn't need changing. Depending on the tank and the type of filters, it may need a brief washing in tank water(not tap) every so often, some do once a week, but once a month and even longer can be fine.
 
Since you don't know what's causing it, whether elevated ammonia and nitrites or something else, start doing 50% water changes daily for at least a week and see if the fish responds. Make sure the water is dechlorinated and temperature matched. This will improve the water quality and help the fish fight off whatever is causing this. It's hard to tell from the pictures, could be bacterial infection, could be parasitic, could be just bad water quality. Start improving the water quality and see how it goes.

 

[RedNails]

 
, includes cleaning accessories, cleaning/changing filters
.

cleaning and changing filters? what exactly are you doing with the filter? i suspect this is the root of your problem, filters dont need to be changed routinely

Hello phoenixgsd,
 
I did not explain that very well did I?  The filters (charcoal) are not replaced every week, they are rinsed (cleaned).  We change them about every 6-8 weeks.  Sorry for not being clearer.  Thank you for your input.

I want to thank everyone for their input.  Mr. Magoo is doing fine.  I have taken your advice and changed our tank routine and schedule.  Again, thank you for your wisdom. 

 

[snazy]

This is very nice news. Well done.
 

I did not explain that very well did I? The filters (charcoal) are not replaced every week, they are rinsed (cleaned). We change them about every 6-8 weeks. Sorry for not being clearer. Thank you for your input.

 
And this is still confusing. Do you mean you replace all the media/sponges inside the filter or just the activated carbon? Generally, the main media/sponges are just to be rinsed from time to time. As for the charcoal/activated carbon, most people, including me don't use this at all. It's not necessary. You can just replace with another media or just leave them there. In a while they'll work like normal media.

 

[This Old Spouse]

Still interested to hear the answer to your question, snazy. Are you completely replacing the filter media every 6-8 weeks?