Ryukin with dropsy

[stix0504]

Tank Size: 30
Age of the tank: 4 years
pH: 7.5
Ammonia: 0
NitrAtes: 0
nitrites: 0
GH/KH: 180/150
Temperature: 80
Fish:

Ryukin

Symptoms:

My Ryukin has taken a sudden and drastic turn for the worst. He has had some fin rot that I treated with Furan 2. After the treatment he seemed ok until last night. I noticed that it looked like the fin rot was starting to come back and he was sitting at the top of the tank staring at the back of tank.

This morning he looked like dropsy was setting in. I immediately gave him a 30 minute MB bath with salt and kanamycin. Treated the tank with Furan 2 and salt again and a new wondershell.

He looks very bad right now- Pineconing is worse but he is up at the top of the tank again (he sat on the bottom for a few hours today after the first MB bath). I am wondering how often to give him the MB bath? Can it be repeated? If so, I still have my bucket on the counter from early today. Would it be ok to use the same mixture if the temp is ok or does it need to be fresh each time? I am baffled as to why the sudden turn with his health.

[goldenpuon]

I honestly don't know why this happened but for this, I would recommend that you increase the amount of aquarium salr in the tank slightly. And also when you give him a bath, add 1/4 teaspoon or less of epsom salt per gallon. You can also add extra aquarium salt (I forgot how much) in for the bath as it helps with fluid retension. The methyline blue is also a good idea to have in there.

You can give fish 2 baths a day. You need fresh water each time for the bath. Get it from your tank and when you are done, DON'T put it back into your tank. MB kills nitrifying bacteria so that was just a warning. I hope that helps.

This article from Carl will also help as it covers baths and dips. Aquarium Disease Prevention

Renee

[Carl]

Goldenpuon (Renee) is right as per the frequency as well as using fresh bath water.
Here is more bath info: Aquarium Answers; Fish Baths

Unfortunately the Furan 2 is likely not going to work this time as Dropsy indicates an internal infection for which Furan 2 is less likely to help with, not to mention the pathogen may have developed immunity to this drug.

Dropsy is often very difficult to treat and can be very frustrating, especially after achieving earlier success with your bacterial infection.

As well as the baths with Methylene Blue and Kanplex, consider using the Kanaplex in tank or switching to another antibiotic such as Minocycline (Maracyn 2 or (its less effective for gram negative infections, but often helpful for less common gram positive infections) sister drug; Tetracycline

The regular Wonder Shell will certainly help for necessary mineral cations that may help, although a Medicated Wonder Shell is not likely to add anything helpful at this point to the medication mix

Also see this article, but I doubt it will give help much at this point:
Aquarium Answers; Dropsy

BTW, how are the other fish?

Carl

[stix0504]

Thanks Carl and Renee. I don't believe that this Ryukin will make it unfortunately. I am just shocked at how quickly this transpired. His tankmate seems ok, nothing unusual. The weird part is the swelling, pinecone appearance is mainly on his belly scales. The sides are slightly out but not anything in comparison to his belly. I did add the Kanaplex to the tank as well. Currently he is in a bush, upside down and is showing some fresh bleeding in his fins and I don't think he has much longer

The other fish that were sick, my orandas, are back to their normal coloring except for Buttercup who maintained a few of his black spots along his dorsal fin. Otherwise they seem back to normal health.

[stix0504]

I just gave him his second MB/Kanamycin bath and moved him to a separate tank by himself. We will see what the night brings...

[Carl]

Sorry that the prognosis is not good.

Jul 31, 2009 15:35:38 GMT -5 stix0504 said:

The weird part is the swelling, pinecone appearance is mainly on his belly scales. The sides are slightly out but not anything in comparison to his belly.

This does seem somewhat out of sorts for most Dropsy cases which are from kidney or liver infections, this seems to indicate the intestines are filled with fluid, maybe increasing the salt in the bath or performing a dip that is at least 1.012 specific gravity (or about 2.3 ounces of salt per gallon), a dip should be between 3-5 minutes, no longer/ no shorter. This is often very hard on a fish, but occasionally makes a difference in very sick fish, especially with fluid retention.

See this article for fish anatomy:
Aquarium Answers; Fish Anatomy

Carl

[bikeguy33]

unfortunately i do agree with Carl here....the prognosis isnt good. i would treat one more day then you may have to do the most nasty thing any fish lover has to do. the belly swelling and spending the time at the top isnt good. i would agree that it is fluid retention...whether it be intestinal or a swim bladder issue. if he continues this way, you have to do the kind thing...

[stix0504]

He is still alive this morning but still sideways under the tree too. Belly still looking swollen although not as pineconed on the scales. Won't eat, breathing is labored. He does react when I come to the tank by trying to move although he doesn't get anywhere, just shifts positions slightly.

I am going to do the dip this morning and see where we are. It breaks my heart to think about doing the 'kind' thing. I will if I have to, but I am not one to give up hope easily..but if this continues today I know it would be better to put him down

thank you guys for all your help

[stix0504]

Just a quick update....I think (or am at least hopeful) that I am making progress. I have done the baths with increased salt and he seems to be tolerating it well and showing a little improvement. He is swimming again.....only problem is that it is still upside down. He manages to right himself and then flips pretty quickly back to his belly up position. I have been hand feeding him peas with garlic and he is eating good.

On the salt dip.....2.3 ounces per gallon is approximately 10 1/2 TB, right? So far in his bath I am doing 1 TB per 2.5 gallon. I haven't done the dip yet because I have been trying to figure out the correct ratio for it (sorry, math isn't my strong suit).

[fishfever]

Glad to hear your fishie is doing better... You can use one of the online conversion calculators to help with stuff like this, such as www.onlineconversion.com

For volume, it is www.onlineconversion.com/volume.htm

It shows 2.3 oz (US liquid) = 4.6 Tbsp (US)

I'm an engineer but there's no way I'm going to try to remember all those conversions or bother to do a stoichiometry when there's so many online conversion helpers. ;-)

I think it's a hopeful sign that he's still eating even he can't be upright 100%.

[Carl]

Converting ounces to teaspoons is difficult since ounces as well as grams are measurements of weight where as teaspoons/tablespoons are measurements of volume (& not all volumes weigh the same, even salt can vary depending upon granule size, etc.)

I have some ways to convert in this article:
Aquarium Answers; Salt, Conversions

But running some numbers (& this is approximate since we are dealing with different measurements); you would need 14 teaspoons or 4.5 tablespoons of salt per gallon

BTW, I am glad to read of some improvement, it appears there is much fluid retention in the intestines/bladder

Carl

[supi]

Glad to hear your fish is doing better. Crossing fingers your fish will be doing better this evening.

[stix0504]

Thanks everyone. I just did the dip and I think it was quite rough for him because he is just not doing anything at all at the moment and is upside down still. I will keep watching and hoping. I appreciate everyones help.

[stix0504]

I'm very sad to say he died this morning. He never recovered after the salt (not that I think it was the salt, just never got better after it). In fact, he pineconed in a big way after the bath which is very confusing. It was just as if he completely filled with fluid. He was still eating as of yesterday, too.

I know that I did everything I could do for him and sometimes it just happens. His tankmate still looks good so I don't think there is anything to worry about there.

Thanks for everyones help and suggestions.

[Carl]

I am so sorry, especially since there seemed to be improvement.

Did this happen after the bath, or was this a dip?

3-5 minute Dips can be hard, but they cannot add fluid, in fact if harm comes to a fish it is from dehydration from salt.


Anyway, sorry for this loss

Carl

[stix0504]

Thanks Carl.

I'm sorry...I wasn't specific enough. My mind has been bombarded with baths and dips.

The salt I referred to was a dip. I did it for 4 minutes and afterwards back in his tank he just layed there. Then I noticed him swelling again (maybe a half an hour to hour had passed sinced the dip) and this time it was full swelling and not just his belly.

Another thing to note is under his eyes, on the circle that surrounds their actual pupils, there was a red curved line that looked like blood. Very thin, half circle lines on both eyes. Connected? Not sure but thought I would mention.

I contemplated putting him down before I went to bed but as I was sitting there weighing my options he swam (still upside down and not too coordinated) over to the front of the tank where I was sitting watching him and just stayed on the bottom in front of me. So I thought maybe ...just maybe he needed a little longer.

He was still alive this morning and looking the same. I went to do his MB bath. I put him in, waited the time and noticed about 5 minutes - 10 minutes from the end of the bath that he wasn't moving. I took him out, put him gently back in the tank and just watched for few minutes. But he was gone.

[Carl]

He may have been to far gone and this simply pushed him over the edge.

I generally use dips as a last resort for very sick fish (unlike baths which I perform for mild problems rather than dump medications into a tank).
The exception would be that I sometimes use dips for new fish to prevent disease transfer when isolation/quarantine is not possible. In fact just last week I performed a full dip for a Strawberry Pseudochromis prior to adding him to a local customers tank (I had to buy this fish from a questionable source, so I would rather risk any harm form a dip than a sick tank). He was stressed for the first day, but I went back the next day and he was eating and already made himself a home.
BTW, this was a pure Freshwater dip used for a marine fish, but it works the same as the opposite for freshwater fish..

In freshwater, I generally use only a half saltwater mix (about 2.3 ounces of salt per gallon), as this is only half what would be added for a marine tank.

Anyway, I sure hope you do not have to go through this again, you did EVERYTHING you could!

Carl

[goldenpuon]

I'm very sorry that you lost your fish. You did the best you could for him. Unfortunately, dropsy is very difficult to treat so consider it good that he hung on for so long and he even looked like he was doing better at one point.

[fishfever]

Sorry to hear of your loss - once the pine-coning sets in I know it's very hard to overcome... I myself am 0/2 trying to help a fish that had this. One was a new fish and one a fish we had for a few months. Looking back, I noticed listless/isolation behavior in both cases before the pine-coning became evident which is probably when I needed to act to have any reasonable chance of recovery.

[stix0504]

Thanks everyone. It is very comforting to me knowing that you guys care and understand.

It is hard for me when I lose a fish, which is hard for most other people (you guys excluded) to understand. My husband was raised a farmer and his family depended on the animals they raised for food. So when it comes to the death of any animals it is very hard for him to feel the loss because he was raised to not look at them as pets (and especially fish - he just can't understand). So when I lose any animal, I feel very alone in my grief. It's very comforting that I found a place that shares in my loss and can relate.