Finrot on Ram!

[spida]

Help! Need some advice about finrot.

One of my rams has developed finrot. And the healthy Ram has been chasing her around.
Is it contagious?
What's the best course of treatment?

Thanks!

[vinz]

You have to figure out whether its finrot or its tearing caused
by the healthy one nipping its fins. In the latter case, you'll
have to separate them and the fins will heal eventually.

How big is your tank and how many Rams do you have in it?

[spida]

I don't think its the nipping coz parts of her fins were slightly translucent then they disappeared.

Don't know the exact dimensions of the tank, its not that big... errr... roughly 14 inches across, quite narrow. One of those that you can put on your desk, with a lamp on top.

There are 2 ballon rams in there, 6 small lampeyes, 2 golden suckers, and a couple of shrimps. There's a Java Fern in there as well... for hiding.

I know that's sounds like a bit too many fish for such a small tank huh? Might move the lamp eyes over to my other tank... or the suckers? haven't decided yet.

[DEA]

change your water regularly and nothing should happen
this sounds like what happens when the fin gets injured
just leave them alone for now, and keep observing
the worst thing you can do is to remove sick fish, because the additional stress is bound to exacerbate the progress of the illness

[vinz]

14 inch tank "ain't big enough for the two of them". Rams are very territorial. Even a 2.5 feet tank is not big enough for 2 depending on the layout. I suggest moving one to your other tank, preferably the healthy one.

[Dan]

Spida,

I will first off agree with vinz, in that your tank is too small for your rams... they need a healthy amount of space to prevent aggressive behaviour. I would second the recommendation to move one to another tank.

As far as the finrot... Finrot is bacterial in nature, and usually exhibits itself as frayed damaged fins, but with reddish or white lines at the base of the fin. Poor water parameters are the most common cause for finrot.
If you are not seeing any red or white areas surrounding the base of the fin, then I would suspect that the damage is being caused by fighting/nipping.

MelaFix will help with the healing of the fin, whether it be from true finrot or nipping, but it would be suggested to take one of the rams out of the tank to prevent any further disputes.

[spida]

thanks for all the advice.

there wasn't any red at the end of the fins, but she couldn't really swim properly.

I removed her from the tank last nite, but she died this morning. For a moment I thought it might have been dropsy, but no... it isn't.

So is it ok to leave the one ram in the 14 inch alone with his other mates? He tends to hide alot, but so far looking healthy.The main tank might be a bit rowdy for him, with platies and bumblebees.

[vinz]

Rams are generally peaceful as long as they are not protecting eggs/fries and the tank mates don't look rams. For some reason though, one ram I had before, kept hassling a dwarf gourami.

My rams were bolder when there are dither fishes like zebra danios. It's fine to leave your one ram where he is right now, but he might hide less if he has more active tank mates. Just my experience, not sure if this is the general ram personality.

[DEA]

i see many people advocating removing the fish from the main tank
barring contagious diseases, i don't really think that's a good idea
some diseases stem from poor environmental conditions
removing the fish from the main tank will simply stress the fish more, increasing the chances of fatality
others might be parasitical in nature
in which case dosing the main tank is the way to treat the disease
i personally find treating finrot in situ the best and most effective way of curing it
i have heard plenty of stories where the fish was removed, and died from the resulting stress of capture and adaptation to a new environment

[David]

but for spida case, it could have died from injuries due to fighting.....

[Dan]

DEA,

I agree that moving the fish to a new tank might pose a risk of contaminating the new tank... but only if this was a case of parasitic/fugal/bacterial infection... which there seems to be no concrete evidence provided of this, in this particular case...

From the description of both the tank size, it's occupants and the description of the damage, it appears to most likely be due from aggression... in which case the best remedy is to remove one from the tank. Had I suspected that this was true fin rot, then it would have been suggested to dose the tank to prevent the spread of the disease... but this did not appear to be the case here.

[DEA]

dan, my worry isn't about contaminating the new tank, it's about stressing out the fish even more
and call it eagle eye hindsight, but i realised 14in is barely over 1ft
my bad