Today my Ryukin developed a spot on its left side, near the belly, toward the rear of the fish's body. The spot is red with a white center, almost like an inflamed pimple. The fish has a couple other small white spots that developed shortly after her purchase three weeks ago. The fish is frisky, eating, and swimming about, without any distinctly odd behavior, although she seems a bit hyperactive at times. No scratching that I've noticed although she does dart up and down around the sides of the tank. Here's a shot, enhanced to try to bring out the spot:



It has grown over the course of the day.

The ammonia in the tank has been high - upwards of 2ppm at times, and I finally have it down to just under .5ppm thanks to the help I've received from this forum. pH is right at 7.0. Nitrites and Nitrates are 0. I plan on doing another large water change tomorrow to get the ammo down to around .25 and try to keep it there. The water was treated a few days ago with ammolock, after which I changed to a small amount of Amquel for the water change today (about 75% of the tank was changed out).

I've had the fish for about three weeks and it is the only fish in a 10 gal tank, after its friend's demise yesterday morning. It may just be a symptom of the water quality but am nervous about the fish's health at this point. Does anyone know what this might be and if it is dangerous to Goldie? Should I treat with anything special or let it run its course in now healthier water conditions?

Many Thanks

Hi Clay, what were the symptoms of the fish that died?

Those pimples look like a form of bacterial infection, an ulcer or even a strain of columnaris. I suggest treating your tank with an antibacterial medication from your petstore asap.

The other fish had developed several white spots (this one has them, too), but they did not have this red area surrounding them. Friday morning I woke up to find him at the bottom of the tank gasping, uninterested in my appearance or eating anything. He was dead by the time I came home for lunch.

This morning the infection on the Ryukin has spread to be about twice the size it was in the picture. The white lump is still there, but the red area has grown dramatically.

It sounds like the same infection has attacked both your fish. If you are in the US you could use the Marcyn products, in the UK or Europe you could use Myxacin. This infection sounds like it doesn't mess around so the sooner you can start treatment the better the chances of success.

I've been reading about salt baths. Would this help? I am running to the pet store again this afternoon (they probably think I am crazy, I have been there every day for the last three), and will pick up whatever I need. Should I use the salt bath in combination with the marcyn? The marcyn appears to be an antibiotic so they would seem to be safe together but I don't want to worsen Goldie's problems through stress, and would take the gentler route to start with if possible.

Thanks for all your help, fishmerized!

Okay, another 50% water change this morning and the ammo is holding at .25 so am happy about this (finally!). I got aquarium salt and maracyn. I put the packet of maracyn into the water as directed to start this treatment then took Goldie for a salt bath in a 1 gal distilled water + 1/2C salt mixture. I first let the salt dissolve and the water get to room temperature which should have been a pretty close match to the tank. The tank pH is right at 7.0 so the distilled pH should be very close to the same.

Goldie did not like the salt bath at all. I put her in and she floated to the top, which I found encouraging at first but then she turned on her side. I gently pushed her back into the water and she was upright again then floated to the top and turned on her side again! I pulled her out and put her back into the tank, she spent approximately 25 seconds in the salt bath all told. She then sat on the bottom of the tank gasping for almost three minutes, during which time I was not sure if she would recover. But, she started swimming around again and pretty much was back to normal within another minute. I gave her a small meal for the day and she ate it up quickly.

Not sure what all this indicates, but the spot has at least stopped growing this afternoon and the fish seems in good spirits. I'm not sure whether I should continue the salt bath treatment tomorrow or not, she did not take well to it even for a brief period and she has been under stress from water quality, constant water changes, and the death of the other fish.

Any other advice would be appreciated, do you think it would be good to keep up the salt baths daily or treat the water with salt instead? Not sure how that would conflict with the maracyn, I hate to dump a ton of stuff into the tank all at once, seems like a bad idea out of principle.

I'm glad Goldie did alright with her salt bath. It can help with parasites (although i don't think that's the problem here) and it also kills many bacteria on the fish. In this instance it appears to have stopped the spot growing.

For the time being I would refrain from further salt baths and see how she fares with the marcyn. It won't hurt at all to salt the tank to .1%, which is 1 teaspoon per gallon. If the spot starts growing again, increase the salt to .3% over 3 days.

Remember to keep up those daily water changes just prior to dosing with meds.

Just wanted to follow up. The Maracyn treatment ended a couple days ago and the spot has completely disappeared! So far so good, she seems to be taking to her tank a little better now, but am still keeping my fingers crossed. Thanks again, fishmerized.