PlanetCatfish.com

Experts will jump in soon, but in the meantime...

The cloudy eye could be a bacterial infection -- my 1st suggestion is to check your water parameters & think about possible over-crowding, or undue stress for the fish. Stress from poor water quality or over-crowding can leave them much more prone to infections. Do a water change. If you have lots of plecos together, make sure he has his own cave, is getting full access to food, isn't getting harassed by someone else. They can be fairly territorial, especially if space is limited.

best of luck!

Edited to Add: I just saw your previous thread about your 95 gallon tank -- it looks like you have 50(?!?) L-numbers in this tank, along with the Cichlids? http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 78#p250378 I'm really hoping I'm missing something here, as this tank is HUGELY over-crowded, no matter what kind of filtration you have on there. There simply isn't enough surface area or foot-print for that many plecos. There are not enough places to hide, and these are territorial fish -- they want somewhere to call "their own" -- not hang out in plain sight with 49 other plecos.

Sadly, in an overcrowded tank, disease (bacteria, virus, fungus, etc.) will generally spread much quicker to other tank-mates, due to the close proximity, stress & typically less-than-perfect water conditions.In people, crowding & living in close-quarters has led to all sorts of lovely disease outbreaks, including Tuberculosis, plague, small pox, etc.

All of your plecos' health would be improved if you give them ample room to not only move, hide, etc. but live a healthy & more natural life. Get a MUCH bigger tank, or find new homes for many of them.

Hi!!

I agree with the idea of the skin been eaten by another fish, but to confirm this I would need more info on the tank size and furniture and tank mates
Cheers
Yann

there is no fighting between the pleco's, somehow they learn to live in perfect harmony

You have created an "armed truce" scenario & sooner or later all hell might break loose.

I feared this might happen. It would appear that there has been a territorial dispute and some fighting has occurred resulting in the physical damage to the panaque which is now becoming infected.

treatment with an anti-bacterial medicine with increased aeration would be good but you'll need to ensure the fish is not stressed any further. Isolation while treatment is in progress seems the logical solution. You will need to ensure it doesn't suffer further upon re-introduction to the main tank but if aggression is starting then numbers may have to be thinned out to provide enough territory for all

Yann wrote:Hi!!

I agree with the idea of the skin been eaten by another fish, but to confirm this I would need more info on the tank size and furniture and tank mates
Cheers
Yann

Yann - see the thread linked in the post previous to yours - it has tank pics, tankmate lists & furniture

Yann wrote:I agree with the idea of the skin been eaten by another fish, but to confirm this I would need more info on the tank size and furniture and tank mates

See the link in the posting above yours; this tank is way overstocked, and it's probably a matter of time before real hell breaks out.

Btw: the above mentioned posting was locked and for good reason. You'll remember, Yann.

Sorry it looks like an infection but there is so many issues in your tank it could be any number of factors causing it ..

To me from the shape of the injury I would be suspecting its a little present from one of your larger protein eaters like the L014

At the minimum to prevent this kind of thing happening I would reduce the number of bottom dwellers in this tank... maybe try to split them up with the protein eaters in their own tank...... Yes your other post you stated they had been living along time happily but I can assure you theyre not .... It would be the equivalent of you living in a porta-loo , yes you could live in that small space and survive but youre going to be far from happy.....

Also in the other post you stated you did a 40% water change every Friday ... in my opinion thats no where near often enough in a tank that has so many inhabitants ..... at minimum try to do it twice a week to help prevent further infections

Hi Eyal,

I think Yann is asking about the other inhabitants of the tank to ascertain if it is the same fishes that were in the tank in the locked thread (I recall in that thread that the images showed cichlids but these were latterly removed). I think Marc misses this point and Yann is asking for a current stocklist which I think you should post before we do much more advising...

I am 100% sure this is a bite from another pleco. It has become infected. The fish needs removed to a hospital tank with the same water and treated. Actually, this behaviour is not limited to carnivorous plecos, all territorial plecos will do this from Panaque to Hypancistrus and everything inbetween.

Assuming you still have a lot of these plecos in one tank, I would say that as these fish grow in your other tank, this will continue to happen because of the reasons others have mentioned.

I'd suggest we all focus on helping this fish in this topic and helping avoid further casualties.

Jools

Soon i'll give more detail's about the tank
Thank you all for helping

Hi bro's
Thank you all for replay
1st thing i want to say that i never had 50 pleco in one tank
I had 36 (10 more were in my other tank) and since the "known post" i took out almost all of the demasoni( only ten left) and i sold about 12 pleco including the real big one's

Now, sadly i have some kind of parasite that eating the flash of the pleco'es
It start with those white spot & continue with their skin been eaten

I was told to us "formalin" what do yo think about it??
It is safe for pleco'es such as 46,47,134,333,14,114,600..

It could be a heater burn, but that wouldn't explain the ragged fins. However, I agree eye damage is unusual in terms of biting. It would be useful if Eyal cost post a picture of where the heater is but maybe a bit academic. Whatever way the trauma has been caused it looks infected.

Assuming the fish is in a hospital tank I'd go with Barbie's advice. Formalin dips are useful for parasites and especially in quarantining new fishes, but I'd suggest not an ideal solution here as we're dealing with a bacterial infection on a very weakened individual.

Jools

Once again thank for the useful answers
I do not use an heater os summer days, so its not the cause...
It seems is infecting slowly other pleco'es

eyal8a wrote:It seems is infecting slowly other pleco'es

It will wipe out a lot (if not all) of them given the high stocking levels. To minimise loses I would suggest you need to remove all fishes showing signs of infection to hospital tanks. Ideally one closed system per fish, that may be hard, but it's a triage situation. Running a UV on the main tank also a good idea.

Jools

Thanks jools
What about using formalin?
I dont have a big hospital tank, only 40 liter...

eyal8a wrote:Once again thank for the useful answers
I do not use an heater os summer days, so its not the cause...
It seems is infecting slowly other pleco'es

I'm not sure if you're saying you don't use a heater during the summer, or that your heater simply doesn't turn on during summer days...

If you actually unplug your heater during the summer, is it possible your tank temperature is fluctuating more than you think? During our summers we can very easily hit 95 during the day & drop down to the 60's at night. Temperature fluctuations, even a few degrees, can cause undue stress on the fish, leaving them more prone to infections. Just a thought.

Hope your fish are doing better!
Amanda

We need photos to help you. Can you show us the other affected fish? And the whole tank?

I agree it looks like a heater burn, as the eye is also affected. This fish is a long way down the pecking order...

the L183 died...

Definitely a bacterial infection, as mentioned earlier. However, the placement of the patches is a textbook example of fighting injuries. Once the bacteria becomes more established, it's going to be substantially more difficult to correct the problem. Dosing with antibiotics may help in the short term, but something will have to be done to remedy the fighting issues or it will be a consistent problem.

Barbie posted while I was typing this, so I'll just close by saying "what she said".

Larry

I wonder if UV filter would help? just my 2c. I started using UV on one of my tanks and so far no issues.

Might be wrong here, but a UV filter might temporarily hide the problem, but doesn't generally FIX the problem (overly crowded tank with too many territorial bottom dwellers)... Shouldn't need a UV sterilizer on the tank to prevent bacterial or parasitic outbreaks on a stable, cycled tank. Water changes, filtration & well-suited tank mates who aren't feeling pressured enough/territorial enough to attack one another should prevent these problems.

Boyfriend always gets mad when I save yet ANOTHER "Fish Towel" -- his theory is that he (and his hardwood floors) NEVER want to get to the point where we NEED that many towels to solve a problem. Should be able to control it WAY before it gets to that point... Hope that makes some sense!

Amanda

I suggested running a UV on the main tank as an interim measure given the removal of obviously diseased plecos to hospital tanks. As has been said, I don't think UV should be necessary in a normal situation.

That said, without accurate stocking information (i.e. total tank inhabitants per species with sizes), and without regular updates, it's all rather optimisitic we can do much to help beyond well intentioned generalisation.

Jools

Clearly the solution is to add more catfish.

OP, what fish do you have in the tank currently? I remember you had an old thread where the tank was very overstocked so I am guessing this is the same one? Are you planning to separate any of the fish now and if so, what ones?