Tiger Barb With Open Mouth & Spitting Food Out

[rust81]

Please help....one of tiger barbs in my 70L community tanks isnt able to eat! I had a tiger barb die 1 week ago but i dont know why and now this one is looking like he is heading along the same path. Nothing has been added to the tank for 3 months. All the tiger barbs have been in there for about 1 year.

The tiger barb in question looks like he has something wrong with his mouth - it is open and he isnt able to eat his food. He goes to eat it, but then ends up spitting it out. The one that died last week looked like he had caught his mouth on something so i treated the tank with anti fungus and finrot - which says that it deals with mouth rot. That course of meds has finished tonight so i have done a 20% water change and now added melafix to the tank. What does it sound like? Water parameters have a slight trace of nitrite which i am putting down to the meds in the tank - everything else is fine. Please help!!!

 

[rust81]

I've managed to get some pictures of him - in the first pic he is the one on the LEFT

This time he is on the right. You can see that his mouth is open and that it is pretty red underneath his bottom lip

In the final picture, he is on the right again. Ignore the white glare by his lip - that is just the shine off the lights in the tank. You can see his mouth looks a lot different compared to the barb on the left.

 

[rust81]

Can anyone help; please???

 

[rust81]

The barbs mouth is looking really tatty now - has any one got any ideas what to do? I have dosed the tank with myaxin and will continue to dose this daily as per the instructions. Will this take out any external parasites if there are any?