Help, yellow tang breathing heavy!

[jasond]

My yellow tang is acting strange, he is breathing quite heavy and sticking behind/close to the rock, and not zipping around like usualy. I would guess at about a year old as he was quite small when I got him. No changes in temp/ph etc, any ideas?

Eating is still not a problem as I fed an hour ago and he ate lots as usual...

[michika]

Add in an airstone for additional oxygenation. Other then that, I don't know, we need some more details please.

[jasond]

Thank-you for replying...what other details would help? Temp is 79.5F, PH is 8.21, salinity 1.024 (just checked).

[Keri]

Do you know what your ammonia is at? Have you added any more livestock recently? are any of the tank residents missing? How are the other inhabitants acting?

[jasond]

I have added a frag of bubble coral, but all other fish are doing fine and acting normal. I am not sure of ammonia, this Hagen test kit I have is probably not real accurate.

The airstone will have to wait till tomorrow as I dont have one, only an air pump.

[fkshiu]

I'd just stick some airline in the tank without an airstone and crank the pump up. You don't need an airstone to get more flow and surface movement. You can weigh the airline down with a small piece of live rock.

Try to up to flow some more with a powerhead and point to towards the surface to create better gas exchange.

Remove any glass lids.

[jasond]

No lids, powerheads facing further up, lots of surface agitation now.

Thanks for the replies guys hopefully this guy makes it, I will report back tomorrow.

Jason

[Trigger Man]

I had the same thing today with my Achilles tang, it was breathing quick and heavy and not eating. Yesterday everything was fine. By this evening the Achilles ended up dying. I did pick up a few corals yesterday, so I'm pretty sure there was something on it. As well my Kole tang is now acting the same way. I've got lots of waterflow and have just completed a water change. All water parameters check out good. If you get a chance pm me where you picked up the bubble coral from.

[skylord]

I would be running some carbon in case any toxins have been introduced.

Scott

[jasond]

I got the bubble coral from a member on here, but I am pretty sure that is not what caused this (I noticed right when I placed the frag).

The tang was ok this morning but still breathing heavy. I will try running some carbon tonight when I get home.

[naesco]

Look very carefully on the yellow tang for ich. Look sideways along the body as it is sometimes hard to see on a yellow tang. I would start feeding garlic extract now.

Trigger, barring water quality problems, your experience with the achilles is typical. They do fine for a while than up and die for no apparent reason.

[Carmen]

Jason How's the tang? How's the bubble? Everything okay?

[Trigger Man]

Look very carefully on the yellow tang for ich. Look sideways along the body as it is sometimes hard to see on a yellow tang. I would start feeding garlic extract now.

Trigger, barring water quality problems, your experience with the achilles is typical. They do fine for a while than up and die for no apparent reason.

Thats what I thought too with the Achilles, but then a few hours later my Kole started showing the same symptoms so I medicated him in my QT and he is looking better today. Both of the affected fish were tangs and I had put new corals in the night before, which they had picked at. Hence I believe the coral or rock brought something with it.

[jasond]

Hi Carmen, the Tang and the coral look great today. I am not sure what happened with the tang, I pointed the powerheads up for more surface agitation and am running carbon today, and all seems well. The coral looks awesome, it even ate tonight!

I didnt notice the tang nip at the bubble coral, but definately could have. I feed Michika's food, so they get garlic almost every day. Anyways, all seems to be better, thanks for all your replies, greatly appreciated!

[Trigger Man]

Glad to here the problem has gone away. Always a little stressful when you know something looks off but you can't figure it out.