Pectoral Fin Damaged

[LindsayPanes 1]

A little update:

I got Metro and Prazi just in case and so I have them on hand for the future. I haven't dosed the tank yet but it looks like the fin might be healing a bit? It looks like dead skin falling off the fin, so I'm hoping that means there is new fin growth underneath. The red where the fin connect to the body still looks super irritated.

Fin 1 Fin 2

They're definitely not worms or a parasite, but I'm almost positive it's dead skin/fin. Do goldfish even have the equivalent of a scabbing process?

[fantailfan1 26,742]

It does look like it's improving   That looks like the fish is shedding slime coat in that area which would be normal if there was an irritant or injury causing the blood.  Please hold off on any meds for now and keep us posted with pic updates.  Once it's all healed up, I'd suggest doing 2-3 rounds of prazi.

[koko 14,377]

9 hours ago, Arctic Mama said:

Sorry Koko, I'm not convinced this needs medication yet.  Oxy and Metro would be great to have on hand but I'd only do clean water at present.  The assymetric nature of it and what I'm seeing looks like injury and aggravation of it, not an infection. And certainly not a system wide infection.

No need to say sorry hun .

I wanted the OP to have those on hand. I wanted to wait and see what the fish would do in clean water first. 

[LindsayPanes 1]

Just wanted to post a small update!

So clean water wasn't really doing the trick and the bleeding was actually spreading so much after about a week. Since I needed to go to the LFS anyway, I decided to show one of the clerks the pictures of the fin. Immediately he could tell it was infected and causing hemorrhaging from the fin. He sent me home with some Melafix and told me to dose aquarium salt and lo and behold, it worked!

The fin is now fully mobile and the swelling/opaque colour seems to be decreasing by the day. There's still a bit of redness behind where the pectoral meets the body, but that's going down as well.

Here's a picture from this morning

And another from this afternoon

Thanks everyone for your help! I hope this info helps in diagnosing similar problems in the future!

Edited April 1, 2017 by LindsayPanes

[FishyMandy 6,296]

I'm glad he is looking better!

[koko 14,377]

On April 1, 2017 at 2:19 PM, LindsayPanes said:

Just wanted to post a small update!

So clean water wasn't really doing the trick and the bleeding was actually spreading so much after about a week. Since I needed to go to the LFS anyway, I decided to show one of the clerks the pictures of the fin. Immediately he could tell it was infected and causing hemorrhaging from the fin. He sent me home with some Melafix and told me to dose aquarium salt and lo and behold, it worked!

The fin is now fully mobile and the swelling/opaque colour seems to be decreasing by the day. There's still a bit of redness behind where the pectoral meets the body, but that's going down as well.

Here's a picture from this morning

And another from this afternoon

Thanks everyone for your help! I hope this info helps in diagnosing similar problems in the future!

How is he doing now... Im so glad it is working for you  Sometimes that stuff is a life saver.

[LindsayPanes 1]

42 minutes ago, koko said:

How is he doing now... Im so glad it is working for you  Sometimes that stuff is a life saver.

He's almost 100% again! The fin itself still looks a bit odd and deformed (from being clamped up is my guess) but is fully mobile and mostly clear again. There does seem to be some slime coat shedding from it though. There's also no signs of redness where the pectoral meets the body either.

[fantailfan1 26,742]

Glad your fish is doing better!!

 

id just like to add that Melafix is tea tree oil and not a true antibiotic medication.   I'm not convinced the Melafix is what helped your fish or the several days of clean water...  

Either way it doesn't really matter in this case.  I'm glad the fish is improving.   Just don't count on Melafix treating a serious bacterial infection.