It seems I've got a little black cloud following me as far as fish lately. I'm posting this for a friend. She has a 12 year old, full grown female Midas cichlid that has suddenly developed some interesting problems. The fish is housed in a 140gallon with a canister filter, heater, all the usual stuff. Not a whole lot of decorations, rocks and some plastic plants, but the fish is a terrible digger.
About a week ago she developed a slight enlargement of the tissue at her shoulder, just beneath the start of the dorsal. It was slightly red, but the scales were smooth, she was eating and her usual behavior had not changed appreciably. As the days went by she developed five small pin-point red marks on her skin just at the scale overlaps and the swelling enlarged. It is now quite large, about 1/4" raised from the rest of her body and covers an area about 1" by 3" down the fish. The scales are still smooth. She's lethargic, still eating okay but not as hungry as usual. The gills also seem to be slightly darker red, but this is hard to be sure. Nothing has been changed to this tank in probably a year. A 30% water change is done by a professional maintenance guy every week, no changes in water quality in ages.
Sorry I cant provide any photos, I'll try to work on that in the next few days. Do we have any ideas? I can only think up one disease that causes swelling in tissues and that's Cryptobiosis.. caused by a protozoan infection. Anything else, besides a tumor?
Thanks for the help
>Sarah
About a week ago she developed a slight enlargement of the tissue at her shoulder, just beneath the start of the dorsal. It was slightly red, but the scales were smooth, she was eating and her usual behavior had not changed appreciably. As the days went by she developed five small pin-point red marks on her skin just at the scale overlaps and the swelling enlarged. It is now quite large, about 1/4" raised from the rest of her body and covers an area about 1" by 3" down the fish. The scales are still smooth. She's lethargic, still eating okay but not as hungry as usual. The gills also seem to be slightly darker red, but this is hard to be sure. Nothing has been changed to this tank in probably a year. A 30% water change is done by a professional maintenance guy every week, no changes in water quality in ages.
Sorry I cant provide any photos, I'll try to work on that in the next few days. Do we have any ideas? I can only think up one disease that causes swelling in tissues and that's Cryptobiosis.. caused by a protozoan infection. Anything else, besides a tumor?
Thanks for the help
>Sarah