Hi, all. I have a leopard pleco and he has a white spot on his head. I noticed it two days ago, but since he's new I thought maybe it was coloring I hadn't noticed before. Now it is most definitely not supposed to be there, but I'm not sure what it is.
Here's the kicker: my tank has ick and I'm treating for that right now. The temp is up to 84 and salt to 1tsp/gal. I don't know if that salt is high enough, but I was afraid the pleco would not tolerate it.
This doesn't look like ich, in fact he shows no signs of ich other than he doesn't appear to be eating at all. He was hanging around all the time until yesterday, now he's hiding. Last night, left a spirulina disk and sinking shrimp pellets for him, but he didn't eat the disk and I don't think he ate the shrimp--they disintegrate, but I vacuumed up quite a bit this morning.
Anyway, here's the parameters: 15gal, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5 nitrate, 7.5 pH.
Here's the questions:
What the heck is that white stuff?
Can I go higher on the salt for the two surviving barbs in the tank and not kill the pleco?
Are the disks, shrimp pellets, occasional blanched veggies/fruit enough for his diet? I'm new to fish and I'm thankful I read some stuff here or the poor guy would have died from starvation--the LFS said algae was good enough.
Here's the kicker: my tank has ick and I'm treating for that right now. The temp is up to 84 and salt to 1tsp/gal. I don't know if that salt is high enough, but I was afraid the pleco would not tolerate it.
This doesn't look like ich, in fact he shows no signs of ich other than he doesn't appear to be eating at all. He was hanging around all the time until yesterday, now he's hiding. Last night, left a spirulina disk and sinking shrimp pellets for him, but he didn't eat the disk and I don't think he ate the shrimp--they disintegrate, but I vacuumed up quite a bit this morning.
Anyway, here's the parameters: 15gal, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5 nitrate, 7.5 pH.
Here's the questions:
What the heck is that white stuff?
Can I go higher on the salt for the two surviving barbs in the tank and not kill the pleco?
Are the disks, shrimp pellets, occasional blanched veggies/fruit enough for his diet? I'm new to fish and I'm thankful I read some stuff here or the poor guy would have died from starvation--the LFS said algae was good enough.