# Rhom may have a possible head infection



## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

I believe that my rhom may have some kind of head infection. I read a book that said that if you find pits or holes on the head of a fish that it could be some kind of fungus/bacterial infection. Rhom has bumps and white spots that are not going away. There are also these worm-look-alike substance that is embedded inside the gill covers. The head is aslo showing signs of become opaque with a white covering flim. The pictures will not show it clearly. What do you guys think??
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The picture don't show it but on the fish's left side there are two additional pit/holes.
temp is 80 degress
ammonia is 0ppm
nitrite is 0ppm
nitrate is 20ppm
pH is 7.4


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## Dr. Giggles (Oct 18, 2003)

That appears to be the beginning stages of "HITH" disease. With pristine water conditions and a healthy diet it will go away. It will take a while though from what I have heard from others on this forum who had the same problem. Unless when he shits and it comes out white and stringy. Than you are most likely dealing with "Hexamita". The white opague part may be mucus. Same as the gills area. When my rhom had HITH it had what appeared to be a worm on the gill but it wasnt. It was the mucus.


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## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

Shoot, this sucks. When it poops, it does come out sort of white and stringy.(What does normal rhom poop look like anyways?) What is Hexamita then ?


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## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

Is it best to use Quinine Sulfate and Metronidazole early to treat it??


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## Rough996 (Oct 3, 2006)

Yanfloist said:


> Is it best to use Quinine Sulfate and Metronidazole early to treat it??


Hey Yanfloist, I think you're dealing with a couple of things there... first, your PH pushing the upper limits. That can stress the fish a bit. secondly, does the rhom have to turn on itself to manuver in the tank? If so, you may need to upgrade to a tank with a larger footprint.

If you've been following the other topic that you started - asking how you could heal it's fin - you'll find some of the things that I've done to treat a similar, but more severe infection. To start, you can help the rhom's gills by adding salt to your tank. Depending on the brand that you get, the amount of salt you need to add may vary. API aquarium salt is what I used and they recommend 1 tsp per 10 gallons of water to treat freshwater fish... it'll ease the work required of the gills and assist in the rhom's stress to begin healing as well as buffer any nitrites in the tank. You might want to consider raising your temp to 82-84 also.

As far as meds go, I did all that I could, but considering you're not as bad off you might be able to help him with some Melafix. If Melafix has no affect, it's probably bacterial and you'll need to get an antibiotic. I used Mardel's Maracyn, which can be bought at Petsmart. There are other types as well, but Maracyn is like the universal penicillin to us.

Good luck!!! by-the-way... How's that fin doing?


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## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

Rough996 said:


> Is it best to use Quinine Sulfate and Metronidazole early to treat it??


Hey Yanfloist, I think you're dealing with a couple of things there... first, your PH pushing the upper limits. That can stress the fish a bit. secondly, does the rhom have to turn on itself to manuver in the tank? If so, you may need to upgrade to a tank with a larger footprint.

If you've been following the other topic that you started - asking how you could heal it's fin - you'll find some of the things that I've done to treat a similar, but more severe infection. To start, you can help the rhom's gills by adding salt to your tank. Depending on the brand that you get, the amount of salt you need to add may vary. API aquarium salt is what I used and they recommend 1 tsp per 10 gallons of water to treat freshwater fish... it'll ease the work required of the gills and assist in the rhom's stress to begin healing as well as buffer any nitrites in the tank. You might want to consider raising your temp to 82-84 also.

As far as meds go, I did all that I could, but considering you're not as bad off you might be able to help him with some Melafix. If Melafix has no affect, it's probably bacterial and you'll need to get an antibiotic. I used Mardel's Maracyn, which can be bought at Petsmart. There are other types as well, but Maracyn is like the universal penicillin to us.

Good luck!!! by-the-way... How's that fin doing?

i thought ph only needs to be stable? 7.4 isn't too bad for rhoms.
oh yeah, the fins, its on my other rhom...the smaller one.
the fish does not have to turn on itself to manuver.
i never had to deal with this kind of problem until now. i guess having a bigger fish means we got to be more knowledgeable.
alright, I'll try what you said. thanks

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## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

Yanfloist said:


> Is it best to use Quinine Sulfate and Metronidazole early to treat it??


Hey Yanfloist, I think you're dealing with a couple of things there... first, your PH pushing the upper limits. That can stress the fish a bit. secondly, does the rhom have to turn on itself to manuver in the tank? If so, you may need to upgrade to a tank with a larger footprint.

If you've been following the other topic that you started - asking how you could heal it's fin - you'll find some of the things that I've done to treat a similar, but more severe infection. To start, you can help the rhom's gills by adding salt to your tank. Depending on the brand that you get, the amount of salt you need to add may vary. API aquarium salt is what I used and they recommend 1 tsp per 10 gallons of water to treat freshwater fish... it'll ease the work required of the gills and assist in the rhom's stress to begin healing as well as buffer any nitrites in the tank. You might want to consider raising your temp to 82-84 also.

As far as meds go, I did all that I could, but considering you're not as bad off you might be able to help him with some Melafix. If Melafix has no affect, it's probably bacterial and you'll need to get an antibiotic. I used Mardel's Maracyn, which can be bought at Petsmart. There are other types as well, but Maracyn is like the universal penicillin to us.

Good luck!!! by-the-way... How's that fin doing?

[/quote]
[/quote]
i thought ph only needs to be stable? 7.4 isn't too bad for rhoms.
oh yeah, the fins, its on my other rhom...the smaller one.
the fish does not have to turn on itself to manuver.
i never had to deal with this kind of problem until now. i guess having a bigger fish means we got to be more knowledgeable.
alright, I'll try what you said. thanks


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## lo4life (Aug 12, 2008)

Yea just as long as your PH is STABLE your alright.. Now if it went from 7.0 to 8.0 yea thats not a good thing. (kinda dreastic but you get the point)


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## Dr. Giggles (Oct 18, 2003)

Yanfloist said:


> Shoot, this sucks. When it poops, it does come out sort of white and stringy.(What does normal rhom poop look like anyways?) What is Hexamita then ?


Hexamita is basically a flagellated protozoan (a parasite) that dwells in the intestines. Many fish have these but are able to fend them off when healthy and not stressed but when a fish is put through alot of stress they (the protozoan) can overcome a fish. Simply dont wait too long. My rhom's progress with HITH accelerated so fast that I had no chance to save him. If your fish is eating you have a good chance of saving him. Mine stopped eating and the mucus came on real quick in its later stages of the disease. DonH gave me this advise a while ago for treating Hexamita. Remove all carbon if you have any, Perform several 25% daily water changes before treatment. Raise the temp slowly to 86 - 88 degrees, make sure you have plenty of oxygenation at these temps (a powerhead at the surface level) will be perfect, treat with metronidazole (preferably medicated food). Follow the instructions with metro to the tee. Do not overdose. Either way what ever you choose to do, wait it out or treat, good luck. Once finiished treating with metro slowly bring the temps down to a more comfortable level. I think GG had his rhom go through this also without treatment. You can shoot him a pm and see what he did to get his rhom cured. The only thing I know it took him a long time to get him cured.


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## khmerboiRED (Jul 15, 2008)

my oscar had the same problem. I just did more water changes daily.


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## notaverage (Sep 10, 2005)

I can not see anything in the circle of the first picture?

Hopefully you can turn it around. I have seen HITH once and it was on a Tiger Oscar and it was BAD.
This doesn't look too bad...then again i have never personally dealt with it.
Good luck!


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## Yanfloist (Oct 1, 2007)

I am leaning towards waiting it out and just keeping the water clean. But if I see a increase is holes, mucus, and stringy crap then I will have to treat it. This rhom could have both Hexamita and HITH disease.


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## RedneckR0nin (Nov 5, 2008)

Please post pics and info in my Sick fish thread


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