gills on a blood parrot.

[andruboz]

i have a blood parrot who had a chunk tanken out of its face by a puffer 5 or 6 months ago. i healed up nicely but now the side of the face that got bit has oddly looking stuff in the gills. the gill on that side looks like it swallowed a big ole blood worm cube thats now sticking a little bit out of the gill. is it a coincedence that its the bitten side thats shredded? it seems healthy. no other fish in the tank have it. is there a parasite that looks like blood worms? i didnt notice this abnormality when it was injured or for the months after, but now its rather noticeable.

will try to get a pic.

[optix]

Could be a SERIOUS case of gill flukes? if you can see them that bad thats a pretty bad case of them if it is indeed flukes

[andruboz]

thought gill flukes were white.. these are bright red. i dont know.

i found one website that said fish can get bloodworms but it didnt offer a cure of any kind. not very encouraging.

should i move this guy to the Q-tank asap?

[optix]

I had a gourami a long while back that had gill flukes that were white with a red streak in them:confused: very weird, then I gave it to a friend to make room for my cichlids once my cichlid sickness took over and it just recently died of a bacteria that was white on the outside with red streaks and showed up on the body. What are the odds huh, but if these are seriously completly red wow. I don't know much about that

[Haggisman]

What you are seeing is the red gill filments that every fish has.The problem is that when a gill plate is missing or damged the filments are exposed.This wont be a problem unless other fish decide to pick at the filaments.

[Tightdog1]

yea i think HAGGISMAN is right they are just the actual gills themselves that are protruding, but get a poic an we can help you even more.

[andruboz]

the fish is so healthy i should have assumed that, but instead i paniced and threw in some anti parasite tabs. it didnt make sense that this would be the only fish with a parasite. hopefully a dose of [unnecessary] medicine wont mess anybody else up.

[Tightdog1]

if anything is disrupted it would be the benefocial nitrifying bacteria, you may lose some of them, but dont worry after a few water changes things will be back to normal, jsut try to keep the blood parrot away from fish that may attack it.

[andruboz]

its my nicaraguan tank. 3 nics, a slightly bigger blood parrot, a bumblebee cat, a small rainbow shark, and a butterfly fish, a small bristle nose, and a c.a.e. its a pretty low aggression tank. the bigger blood parrot use to ram the smaller one but now they just nudge each other- almost affectionately. the blood parrots and the odd male nic will probably have to move when the other 2 nics hit 5-6 inches or decide to spawn.

thanks for the info / advice.