White patch on Dwarf Sunset Gourami?

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TropicalBarnacle

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Hello - I woke up to discover a white lesion on my dwarf neon gourami. It happened literally overnight. Is this hole in the head? How do I treat? Thank you.
 

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No it's not hole in the head disease.

It's probably an injury from swimming into something. Monitor it for white fluffy stuff (fungus), or red in or around the area (bacteria) and treat if required. Salt should be fine for both issues if it gets worse.

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SALT
You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), swimming pool salt, or any non iodised salt (sodium chloride) to the aquarium at the dose rate of 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres (5 gallons) of water. If there is no improvement after 48 hours you can double that dose rate so there is 2 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for 1-2 weeks. If there's no improvement after a week of salt, or if it gets worse quickly, post more pictures.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria, fish, plants, shrimp or snails.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

When you first add salt, add the salt to a small bucket of tank water and dissolve the salt. Then slowly pour the salt water into the tank near the filter outlet. Add the salt over a couple of minutes.
 

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