Dwarf Gourami with small lesion on head

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Isis19

Registered Member
Nov 21, 2009
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Hi there -

I have a female dwarf gourami who has had a small lesion on her head for a few weeks. Do regular water changes - about 20% once a week. Ammonia is zero, nitrite zero and the ph is 7.5. Lost my other female about a month ago to what I think may have been Gourami Irodovirus or a bacterial infection, she bloated chronically before dying and was making small backwards swimming motions.

Recently, had another male develop a bacterial infection in one eye - may have been an injury as the eye swelled up like pop eye and was cloudy - eye has since healed but is still clouded over. Treated with Sera Baktopur Direct Tabs. I live in South Africa and have limited access to most of the medications mentioned like Maracyn. Also did a course of the Sera Bakto food which is not antibiotic but claims to work against internal bacterial infections.

All my gourami seem very dark in colour, 2 male and 1 female 'marigold' dwarf gourami, along with 6 male guppies and one plecostomus in a 60 liter tank.

Anyway, back to dear Dwarf Gourami with lesion on head. I am not sure if I am dealing with something bacterial here (have treated for bacteria recently - even did a course of Metronadizole at one point about a month), Hole in the Head or Dwarf Gourami disease. The lesion has been there a while, it does seem to quite slowly be getting a bit bigger and raised, it is white in colour only, no redness. She eats well and seems healthy enough aside from this white lesion. I recently did a 5 day treatment of myaxin which seemed to make stuff all difference. When I first got the gouramis I would notice little white blemishes and would treat with Myaxin and it would clear the problem up, this time I may not have acted fast enough and it doesn't seem to have worked.

Any help or information would be greatly appreciated. Also - I do have some Oxytetracycline which is for poultry - they have added all sorts of vitamins to this antibiotic - can I still use it on my fish?

Thanks......
 

Kivstev

AC Members
Mar 19, 2009
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I've had nothing but problems with 3 out of 4 Dwarf Gourami. I had one die of bloat-like illness, one with a lesion on it's head (near the gill) that acted normally but died a few weeks after the lesion appeared, and another with a mystery hole in it's anal fin that I finally euthanized. All the problems were resistant to antibiotics.

I'm not sure your problem is related to DGD (Iridovirus) - but I suspect that it is or at least something that may not be curable. I've done much research on this and have yet to find a suitable treatment.

In any case it sounds like it may be systemic problem in your fish as there have been ongoing problems for quite some time. The Myaxin may have treated the symptoms, but not the disease itself. This is only an educated guess.

Unless you can specifically say what 'vitamins' are in the Oxy - I can't readily give an opinion on that.

Can you post a picture of the lesion?
 
Last edited:

joel.uejio

AC Members
Jun 1, 2009
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Joel
I have a DG who also has a head lesion (you can see some pics in my thread in this section). What I've seen is that he doesn't show any other symptoms or signs of discomfort -- just has an ugly pit on his head :(

I've treated with various meds: Melafix, Pimafix, now Maracyn and Furan-2. So far nothing has made a difference. I plan to try a few other meds if needed, but then will probably just go back to regular water changes and close monitoring.

Good luck with yours!
 
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