Ninja Woodcats

[fishguy1978]

I have just lost 5 of the 9. Their fins are all gone. 3 that are still alive have really tattered fins so I have moved one of them to a different tank.

Water test

[fishguy1978]

One of the survivors

[bekateen]

I have just lost 5 of the 9. Their fins are all gone. 3 that are still alive have really tattered fins so I have moved one of them to a different tank.2A503B7C-D49C-4C41-9D35-A80F3FCBD673.jpeg

That's what happened to some of mine. One day all of a sudden they had lost their fins and had only spines remaining.

Good luck.
Eric

[fishguy1978]

I have just lost 5 of the 9. Their fins are all gone. 3 that are still alive have really tattered fins so I have moved one of them to a different tank.2A503B7C-D49C-4C41-9D35-A80F3FCBD673.jpeg

That's what happened to some of mine. One day all of a sudden they had lost their fins and had only spines remaining.

Good luck.
Eric

None of the other fish in the system seem to be effected. I have corys, intermedia, grynia, swordtails, a prashardi, and banjo cats in the other tanks.

[Catfish-ologist]

Hi! This is very interesting. I currently own this species of wood cat, however, I have never observed this with them. I do have 3 Asterophysus batrachus with fin erosion of similar appearance. Comparing water parameters, my pH is much lower and is between 6.5 to 6.8. My nitrates are <10ppm. I keep all of my fish in super soft acidic water. It is remineralized RODI (starting TDS of 0, remineralized TDS of 100) and the GH/KH is 1. What temperature are you using? My Musaica is kept at 80-82 since it is housed with my zebra pleco grow-outs, TDS prior to water change averages 140. The zebras are moving out soon and the temp will be dropped to 76-78. My Gulpers like the temperature cooler (73-76), however, all of my fish share the same water chemistry. My Gulpers TDS are currently 137 in a 75 gallon tank w/ substrate. I currently keep 14 species of wood cat. The Gulpers are the only species where I've noticed this issue with the fin erosion. I haven't been able to figure it out myself. My Gulper's lost their spines as well. It appears to be the same issue. My Gulpers erosion started about 2 years ago but doesn't appear to affect their health. Have you tried lowering your pH?
Maybe someone else could chime in?
Thanks,
-- Sean

[fishguy1978]

Hi! This is very interesting. I currently own this species of wood cat, however, I have never observed this with them. I do have 3 Asterophysus batrachus with fin erosion of similar appearance. Comparing water parameters, my pH is much lower and is between 6.5 to 6.8. My nitrates are <10ppm. I keep all of my fish in super soft acidic water. It is remineralized RODI (starting TDS of 0, remineralized TDS of 100) and the GH/KH is 1. What temperature are you using? My Musaica is kept at 80-82 since it is housed with my zebra pleco grow-outs, TDS prior to water change averages 140. The zebras are moving out soon and the temp will be dropped to 76-78. My Gulpers like the temperature cooler (73-76), however, all of my fish share the same water chemistry. My Gulpers TDS are currently 137 in a 75 gallon tank w/ substrate. I currently keep 14 species of wood cat. The Gulpers are the only species where I've noticed this issue with the fin erosion. I haven't been able to figure it out myself. My Gulper's lost their spines as well. It appears to be the same issue. My Gulpers erosion started about 2 years ago but doesn't appear to affect their health. Have you tried lowering your pH?
Maybe someone else could chime in?
Thanks,
-- Sean

Thanks for the response. I had them at 80F when I first purchased. I have 8 29g aquariums that run off one sump. I dropped the temp to 75F because I have multiple species that prefer the lower temps. The fin erosion has been happening for a while but I thought it was aggression amongst them. I separated out 3 males into other tanks hoping that was the issue.
I don’t have RODI. I do have magnolia leaves and add them periodically. I run an irrigation drip so that the system has a constant water change.

[characinkid]

Thats crazy, that one that you show has no tail at all! So sorry to see this happen.

Are you sure that the fins are not being attacked by the other fish? What happened to the others that you moved a while ago, did the same happen to them in the new tank? Trying to understand if it conspecific or its maybe the gyrina(or another sp) for example?

[fishguy1978]

Thats crazy, that one that you show has no tail at all! So sorry to see this happen.

Are you sure that the fins are not being attacked by the other fish? What happened to the others that you moved a while ago, did the same happen to them in the new tank? Trying to understand if it conspecific or its maybe the gyrina(or another sp) for example?

Each of my woodcats species are kept in their own tanks. The T intermedia share their tank with C similis and some swordtails. The T gyrina with some G pyrosephalus juveniles. The T m with some swordtails. The T m that I moved were with C eques and C aeneus, hoplos and swordtails in 2 separate tanks.
So far only the T musaicus are the only ones effected.

[fishguy1978]

I decided to double check the other woodcats to make sure I wasn’t missing something with them to. The T intermedia look fine but the female T gyrina looks rough. She is housed with 2 males.
Pulled #6 dead

[fishguy1978]

Female

Female

Male

[fishguy1978]

[fishguy1978]

Pulled dead #7 today. Tempted to clove oil the last two but am holding out hope they recover.

[fishguy1978]

#8 was dead this morning and I used clove oil in #9. Project failure.

[Jools]

Sorry to hear that. What do you think went wrong?

Jools

[fishguy1978]

Sorry to hear that. What do you think went wrong?

Jools

I’m not entirely sure why the losses but a member on MFK pointed out these are a rheophillic species something I was not aware of prior.
The system they were in is ~1000l distributed in eight 120l tanks and a 140l sump. All of the tanks are planted so nitrates are kept low.
I’m also running 1440l/h (1.5x) turnover with 100w DC pump at 50% power. I had not calculated my flow before so it could be that I am running an O2 deficit. Would this explain the losses?
I have a constant water change running with cold water dripping 15l/h. My municipality only runs 0.5ppm chlorine so it doesn’t even register when testing. Tap water on the right and T m tank on the left. Test strip reads from ph 8.4 (red), chlorine 0ppm (white), alkalinity 80ppm (green). The brown is stabilizer which might be 30-50ppm Gh? This a swimming pool test kit so I don’t know how accurate these strips are. My liquid AP kit shows a similar result for ph though.

[Jools]

Not enough DO would certainly have the same result, but it doesn't explain the fin erosion. I've also seen fin erosion with too much current on some spp. too. Neither the case here IMHO.

I'd say 1.5% of straight tap water per hour would be a likely issue given wild caught low pH/dH species. With that setup, maybe best to quarantine wild caught for weeks in isolation and then add to the central system. I know it's hard (and I'm speaking from experience / similar issues) but it's also best just to leave fish in a tank and then worry about photos and sexing until they're settled.

HTH,

Jools

[Catfish-ologist]

I posted earlier in this thread that my Gulper catfish have a form of fin erosion which includes their spines. This erosion looks incredibly similar to fishguy1978's musaicia. Earlier in December, one of my female Gulper's lateral line broke out with lesions, for the 4th time. I brought her to a true aquatic fish vet (i.e. chief veterinarian of a major US aquarium) as I knew I was likely to lose her, no matter what. I decided that she was worth taking the additional risk on her and get her to the vet. At least, hopefully, I'd learn something that could help my other two Gulper's. I've had multiple virtual visits about the health of my Gulper's with the vet over the past year, however, this was the first in-office visit. The doctor agreed she was in poor condition. Her lateral line organ had been damaged from the lesions. He performed a skin scrape (which was negative) and a culture of a lesion. She was given injections of Amikacin as a last resort antibiotic. She survived the long journey to the vet and back home. Her appetite continues to be normal. After 2+ weeks, the results of her culture came back as Aeromonas sobria. This is a nasty bug. The short version is that my other 2 Gulper catfish have this bug as well. I purchased 2 of my Gulpers (a pair) about 2 years ago when they were about 3" long. Their fin/spine erosion issue started not long after I had them. It has been an extremely slow erosion. I obtained the 3rd Gulper less than a year ago. Her fin/spine issue started within 2 months of her arrival. The 3'rd Gulper contracted Aeromonas sobria from the other two Gulpers. It is a bug that is native to South America. While Aeromonas are common in the aquarium world, this particular one is not. Aeromonas are waterborne. My Gulper's are wild caught and clearly were not put through a sufficient wild caught fish QT treatment protocol which would have killed this bad bug. At this time I don't have all of the treatment details as I received the news yesterday. My plan is to post a complete detailed story in the near future once treatments are underway in a new thread. I felt that my Gulper's fin/spine issue was so strikingly similar to the musaicia that I wanted to reach out and share this information. Honestly, the shape of the musaicia's tail matched the appearance of my one female Gulper's tail.
I hope this information can be of some use. I will make an updated post later-on with more details on what I do with treatment etc.
Thanks,
-- Sean

[fishguy1978]

I posted earlier in this thread….
Thanks,
-- Sean

Thank you for the info. I will try researching said bug to see what treatment I should pursue.

[Jools]

My understanding is that Aeromonas is often present in aquaria, particularly those that see a lot of fishes. It only becomes problematic when other factors (see my previous post) weaken immune systems to the point that bacteria take over. This is why it can affect only one fish or a discrete group of fish in the tank when others seem unaffected. For example, when acclimatised blackwater fishes are moved carelessly into whitewater systems, it is commonly what negatively impacts the fish the most. It's about prevention as opposed to cure.

HTH,

Jools