Sick Geo's, anyone know what it is ??

I posted this on MFK but figured i'd try here too..

I need help before i lose all my OH's... Ok i've now lost 4 or 5 fish in the last 2 months and about ready to lose another. I have no idea what's going on.. At first the Fish look fine, then first day of illness they look like HITH is starting to form.. Second day turns into HITH on roids, (huge ugly hole) then a couple days later DEAD !!! What i don't understand is it's ONLY effecting my Orange Heads.. I have Satanoperca Jurupari, red severums, and 2 different kinds of pleco's and nothing is going on with them.. I do 60% WC a week, water tests ok.. Ph 7.2, Ammonia 0, Nitrate 5.0, Nitrite 0, Temp 80.. I've attached a few pics i just took, mind you this fish was perfect 2 days ago.. I'm at a loss, hopefully someone can tell me what's going on..
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Another mysterious parasite. It is definitely getting bad. Not sure what to say, I have know idea. Something is eating away at the fish.

Yea that's what it seems like.. I'm at a total loss.. This tanks been up and running for years and i've had little to no deaths of any fish or rays and now all of sudden i have die offs and sick fish over the last couple months.. And what's odd is they're getting sick one at a time, not all at once..

Look more like a bite to me?

I thought the same but I really have no aggression in this tank.. It's filled with a bunch of geo's that are all pretty peaceful fish. I had Africans mixed in awhile back but they have all been moved out to try and get my geo's breeding again..

It looks like a bite or injury to me as well, but that wouldn't explain why the fish would die within a couple of days. Is that a chunk of skin hanging off of the hole or some type of growth?

Check out the gsas airstone email forum . They have a few disease gurus on there who might help you id and treat . You do not need to be a member to use airstone I belive.

Sorry to hear about the sickness. I just went through "the plague" in my tank and lost most of my fish. $100+ in meds and still never got a handle on it. Just ended up cleaning the tank as best as I could and am trying some new fish.

I am tempted to have my water professionally tested for heavy metals or something to see what I am missing.

Yea i'm not sure what's going on in my tank either.. What stumps me is it's "ONLY" effecting the red head tapajos and nothing else.. I tested my water several times using 2 different types of test kits for each test and all came out the same.. I talked to Justin aka JK47 and he referred me to a certain med but it's not available anywhere around here, so i have to order it online if i want it. And it's like buying drugs, it's $30 for 25 grams.. lol
I've already lost 3 or 4 red heads and one more is on it's way from the looks of the pics.. And these guys were hardly cheap either, not to mention i've been growing them out for awhile now..

I was at the point where I also realized that these fish were so heavily medicated I really felt they would never reach their maximum potential. I still had a few different meds I had not tried but I was deep in cost with meds already and the fish were so weak I could tell it was not going to make a difference at that point.

Like you the time that had been put into the fish you couldnt get back. I lost my three year old midas who had an exceptionally good community tank personality. I had never seen or raised one before this easy going. It was kind of a rare find that way. My other fish were not cheap just like yours. I had a wild caught argentea and pearsei.

I am still having some issues going on right now. One idea I was given was to check for stray voltage in the tank. I really dont have a heater or powerhead in the tank to have these issues but I am going to still check. I also run a UV sterilizer which is also to help with water quality but still had issues.

A group of us 'conspiracy theory' people believe there is something in the water. They put it in for purpose of mind control. They always do this before any upcoming elections. It hurts your fish but it works wonders on the population.

Hang in there!

It looks very similar to what my 10 inch clown loach had. I treated the whole tank with prazi pro. Then a couple days later with erythromycin. Worked like a charm. I actually got this remedy from Jesse at Pet pourii. He had a big clown loach go through the same thing.

Otherwise all tankmates, water parameters etc looked fine. No amount of water changes etc helped. SO went with broad spectrum parasite treatment to stop the hole. Then erythromycin to stop the bacteria infection that sets in afterwards.

Cool thanks Cory.. I'm gonna move it into my 37 gal quarantine tank I set up.. We'll see what happens..