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We have had 2 julli cory cats for about 2 months now. We started out with 5 cory cats, but lost 2 within the first week and another one a few weeks later. After we lost the first two, my husband made sure to find them everyday to make sure they were eating, etc. He has always noticed that the one remaining cory cat has a white mouth but it wasn't until recently we realized he has no barbs and his mouth his shaped more like a normal fish mouth than a cory cat mouth. So we are wondering if maybe he injured his mouth before or if he has a deformity. His mouth doesn't seem to look fuzzy. He doesn't seem like he has any issues eating.

I tried to take a picture, but it isn't very clear. Just wondering if his mouth is anything we should worry about.

Forgot to mention: ammonia-0, nitrite-0, nitrate-5, ph-7.4, average water temperature 80F.

What type of substrate do you have? Is there rough rocks in the tank like lace rock? This looks similiar to what my first albinos would have when I kept them on gravel. They basically wore off their barbels and "noses" digging and would end up passing away from the wounds.

That definitely looks like abrasion from a rough surface. I'd move him to a quarantine tank, or remove whatever is causing the injuries and treat him as soon as possible. The mouth looks pretty much non-existent, so I'm not sure if it can grow back, but if you say he can still feed properly, the best thing would be to help his wounds to heal over. I know adding a few new friends will always make a cory quite happy once everything's worked out!

Please be sure to keep us updated! I know all of us will do all we can to help!

Supercorygirl wrote:What type of substrate do you have? Is there rough rocks in the tank like lace rock? This looks similiar to what my first albinos would have when I kept them on gravel. They basically wore off their barbels and "noses" digging and would end up passing away from the wounds.

We have a dirted substrate with an Eco-Complete cap. We also have a large piece of driftwood and a Texas Holey rock and some slate in the tank.

FerocactusLatispinus wrote:That definitely looks like abrasion from a rough surface. I'd move him to a quarantine tank, or remove whatever is causing the injuries and treat him as soon as possible. The mouth looks pretty much non-existent, so I'm not sure if it can grow back, but if you say he can still feed properly, the best thing would be to help his wounds to heal over. I know adding a few new friends will always make a cory quite happy once everything's worked out!

Please be sure to keep us updated! I know all of us will do all we can to help!

What do I do to help him heal his wounds?

We tried to get a picture from the front of him.

I'd sand the edges on the slate to round off and remove the Texas holey rock as these are the most likely causes. Put the fish in quarantine, and start a regime of daily small water changes and melafix/pimafix. Do one week of the melafix then one of the pimafix. Add extra aeration to the tank, a few weeks of this should enable it to heal and grow its barbels back. This method has had the greatest amount of success for me.

I completely agree!

The jaw bones of a Corydoras are extremely minute, and I don't think your cory will regrow a functional mouth with barbels; since he has such a receded snout now, he won't be able to dig through substrate well at all, so he'll likely just get it right off underwater surfaces in the future. That is wonderful to hear that he seems to not have many problems with eating, and to see he's still willing to eat is a great sign! I believe if his wounds heal over, he should do just fine!

I forgot to mention that I too have a slab of slate in my aquarium. It's got those typical rough, fractured edges, but my cores never seem to bother with those; they like to rest on the smooth top of it, though and feed off of it. Texas Holey Rock is pretty rough, like sandpaper: I'd think that decoration would be the most likely source.

I really don't think the rock is Texas Holey Rock. My husband said that is what the rock was, but when I looked online at pictures, the rock doesn't look like the Texas Holey Rock. I think it might be more of a sandstone. The cory cat sits on the slate and doesn't mess with the edges.

We have been treating him with antibiotics, so we will see if that helps. He still seems to be eating and trying to eat up fish flakes, so we make sure he can get to some flakes.

You're right, the form is somewhat there, and I looked up pics and that definitely is some kind of sandstone. I guess it'd be banded sandstone, though I'm not sure how valid that name is.

Sandstone would work just like sandpaper, though now that I think about it, your cory would have to be around that decoration a lot to get that kind of damage; I could imagine that would happen if the substrate was something like crushed sandstone. However, the wound doesn't look inflamed, so I wonder if it could be just a deformity rather than a recent injury after all. Regardless, if he's eating and can eat well, that's a good thing for sure!