Angelfish Fins Look Like They Are Melting?

[flash_oesc]

Well, I figured once again, I'd access the greatest database I know of. I have 2 angels that look like their top fins are melting. It's really weird. I've attached pictures. Is this just a trait, or is this something that I've caused?

Water is good, temp is good. Fish are eating...a ton...NLS.

Thoughts?

[flyfisher]

hmm looks like fin rot angels look nice and healthy so you can probably clear up with some water changes 1st, then move to more aggressive treatments. ( bacterial infection)

[flash_oesc]

Really? Damn. I thought fin rot would have some white blemishes. This tank was a QT tank. Hi temp, salt and water changes. Currently only has 5 fish, over filtered and gets about 50% weekly changes.

[flyfisher]

ragged fins are a dead give away, when I have run into it I never had white blemishes maybe others have had different? So many variables from tank to tank that's why this hobby is so challenging always a surprise waiting around the corner.

[flash_oesc]

That's just it, they don't seem ragged, they seem 'melted'. It looks like shrink wrap under a lighter. Only the dorsal fin. Other than that, no rips, tears, or anything. Well...I have some Paraguard I can use.

[flyfisher]

Thankfully this is showing up in QT where treatment is still a pain in the a$$ but better than in your main tank where even more variables come into play.I have had good luck with Paraguard it is very gentle on most critters, but my first line on defense is always a partial water change.

[flash_oesc]

As I mentioned earlier, I'm constant in my weekly water changes. I gravel vac and water change weekly on all my tanks.

[ckmullin]

Myxobacteria ?

[PistolPete]

Is the light really hot? Is the water filled to close the top? Could the be breaking the water when at the top? If it's fin rot a quick course of kanaplex is my fav way to get rid of it

[flash_oesc]

Lights a T8, on the other side of plexiglass hood. Water is filled close to the top, and they do break the water at breakfast and dinner - but only briefly. I also have kanaplex. It helped an issue in my other QT tank.

[PistolPete]

Kanaplex clears up basic fin rot in 1 dose. I always dose at least twice anyway

[RD.]

The OP had sent me a PM about his fish and I thought that my response might be worth sharing here.

Many of the man made designer type fish come with poor/weak genetics, which is probably what those people meant. I went through the same type of thing as you recently with a red severum. Beautiful fish, growing well etc, but he had this skin/fungus type ailment that he just couldn't shake. I tried the same meds as you, Kanaplex in the tank water, Paraguard dips, salt, water changes almost daily, for 4 or 5 months. The water in his 90 gallon was so clean I could almost drink out of it! I finally gave up and did the sensible thing, put the fish down. Honestly some of the super bugs out there are next to impossible to get rid of, and sometimes if its a viral thing the fish may never shake it, while other fish in the same tank are fine. You could try medicated food but I honestly doubt that it would help.

You might be interested in reading this.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23294440

Imported ornamental fish are colonized with antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Rose S, Hill R, Bermudez LE, Miller-Morgan T.
SourceDepartment of Biomedical Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA; Department of Microbiology, College of Science, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA.

Abstract
There has been growing concern about the overuse of antibiotics in the ornamental fish industry and its possible effect on the increasing drug resistance in both commensal and pathogenic organisms in these fish. The aim of this study was to carry out an assessment of the diversity of bacteria, including pathogens, in ornamental fish species imported into North America and to assess their antibiotic resistance. Kidney samples were collected from 32 freshwater ornamental fish of various species, which arrived to an importing facility in Portland, Oregon from Colombia, Singapore and Florida. Sixty-four unique bacterial colonies were isolated and identified by PCR using bacterial 16S primers and DNA sequencing. Multiple isolates were identified as bacteria with potential to cause disease in both fish and humans. The antibiotic resistance profile of each isolate was performed for nine different antibiotics. Among them, cefotaxime (16% resistance among isolates) was the antibiotic associated with more activity, while the least active was tetracycline (77% resistant). Knowing information about the diversity of bacteria in imported ornamental fish, as well as the resistance profiles for the bacteria will be useful in more effectively treating clinical infected fish, and also potential zoonoses in the future.

© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

and this, from one of the researchers involved with that paper.

Fancy fish could harbor dangerous bacteria

by Rose Eveleth February 6, 2013


Around the world, private collectors and businesses maintain beautiful fish tanks stocked with colorful corals, speedy little cichlids and stately angelfish. But a hidden danger lurks: many fish that wind up in aquariums carry antibiotic-resistant bacteria that could pose a threat not just to a billion-dollar industry but to human health.

A recent study published in the Journal of Fish Diseases measured 32 different ornamental fish that entered the port in Portland, Ore., from places such as Colombia, Singapore and Florida. The specimen were found to carry 64 different bacterial colonies, and many were resistant to antibiotics to varying degrees. The bottom line: not only were the fish more susceptible to infection, but their bacteria harbored genes that could make them immune to drugs - genes they can pass along.

Resistance to antibiotics can develop in a number of ways, but the most common culprit is overtreatment, a practice commonly used when fish are transported.

The chain of events is pretty easy to follow. The majority of ornamental fish start their lives in Asia and other exotic locations and are shipped all across the globe. Those trips aren’t a walk in the park for the animals, says Luiz Bermudez, a microbiologist at Oregon State University, and one of the researchers on the study.

“It’s stressful even if we humans get in an airplane and fly for 14 hours,” he says, “so when a fish gets to a destination, many times the fish presents with a kind of stress-related disease.”

To prevent stocks from going belly-up before they reach their destination, many importers often proactively treat their catch with antibiotics. That, says Bermudez, is a big driver of the antibiotic resistance his team found in the study.

How antibiotic resistance spreads

It’s not just fish who might be in trouble, either. That’s because a resistant bacterial strain can pass its resistance to another species, Bermudez says.

So, in theory, an antibiotic-resistant fish bacteria could transfer the set of genes that confer that resistance to a bacteria that infects humans, Bermudez says. That means a human bacteria that was formerly felled by certain antibiotics would suddenly become immune to them.

Complicating matters is the fact that many antibiotics used to fight fish bacteria are the same ones widely used on humans. Among the antibiotics that the fish bacteria were best at warding off is Tetracycline, a drug used to treat everything from acne to rosacea to cholera in humans. Up to 77 percent of the studied specimens were resistant to this drug.

While it is unlikely that these bacteria will be transmitted from fish to humans, both fish owners and importers should be extra careful. “If you’re going to clean a fish tank, you should be aware that there is a possibility that you’re going to get some infection,” he says.

Aside from the health implications, antibiotic resistance could be a drain on the bottom line for aquarium suppliers. The global market for ornamental fish is worth an estimated $15 billion each year. The world spends $900 million a year alone on just the live fish - a figure that has grown an average of 14 percent each year for the past 25 years. Should certain fish become entirely resistant to the antibiotics that help them survive, the industry could suffer a huge economic blow totaling millions of dollars.

Bermudez says the ornamental fish industry isn’t deaf to the dangers of antibiotic resistance. It has already made some changes based on his team’s research - such as treating fish less frequently with antibiotics unless necessary and figuring out how to ship them more safely.

But the industry deals with 6,000-plus species of fish, shipping from more than 100 countries, and most countries have no specific regulations regarding antibiotic use. So while individual suppliers might do their part to cut back on antibiotics, many are likely to continue preemptively treating their stocks to avoid disease.

There are still some open questions for researchers studying this antibiotic resistance. For example, Bermudez wants to understand whether or not the bacterial community of imported fish changes after a few weeks at a facility in the United States. Perhaps, he says, importers could eliminate fish with these resistant strains before they are transported to fish tanks across the country, preventing the resistance from spreading

For fish and humans alike, the vicious cycle of antibiotic resistance should be a serious concern. That’s because the fewer antibiotics that work to fight a particular disease, the more likely it is to have a negative impact on the population. The more resistant genes that exist, the more likely other bacteria are to become resistant. The longer suppliers rely on antibiotics to broadly safeguard stocks, the more likely they are to develop resistance.

“So now we’re facing a kind of a crisis situation in the case of humans and animals, that many times we don’t have antibiotics or we only have one antibiotic that can be used to kill the microorganisms that’s causing the infection, and that’s a serious problem,” Bermudez says.