Help! Is this Ick?!

[cherryglue]

We just moved our little guy into a bigger tank and noticed he had some bacterial strand on one of his gills so we 'fridged him for 3-4 hours with some medicine for it, but my boyfriend put too much medicine in the water, I'm hoping its just the medicine...

but i want to know what you guys think, he's extra pale as well, he's usually a very dark grey, not quite black though...help us please, we love him very much and are doing everything we can for him, unfortunately we are very new at this and I don't want him to suffer because of that..we have moved him from a his medical bucket to a fresh bucket of de-chlorinated water, so he isn't just sitting in over-medicated water anymore..

ALSO! it's only on that side of his body...and just on his side and a spec on his tail..

He wont eat either..

 

[HayleyK]

You should not fridge for a few hours. It's stressful and should be done for days at a time.

What medication did you use? Axolotls don't have scales and can absorb chemicals very easily through their skin I would stop using it ASAP.

When axolotls are inactive they can turn pale. What do you feed him?

What are your water parameters and temperature?

To me it doesn't look like ick, it's not the bright white dot you see on fish. It could be a scrape of his slime coat. I would leave him in his tub of cool dechlorinated tub, and offer food. Maybe do a tea bath tomorrow but I wouldn't do it straight away he is probably stressed enough.

 

[cherryglue]

We have always used Melafix (API brand) and had no issues before, but we did accidentally put too much in his water, so maybe its making that happen.

We primarily feed him blood worms because he tends to fuss and spit out earthworms even if we soak them, he's picky and also wont eat his pellets.

As for his parameters, its a brand new tank set up and we are currently cycling very carefully, just got him set up in it 2 nights ago.
PH - 7.2
Ammonia - 0ppm
Nitrites - 0ppm
Nitrates - 0ppm

also, with tea baths, i would prefer to do it in a separate tub, his tank is freakin' huge lol, how long should we keep him in it and do we fridge him in the tea bath?

 

[cherryglue]

trying to decide if we should put him back in his tank tonight...

 

[HayleyK]

Again - I wouldn't advise using it as it's for fish, things with scales. From my research melafix is an extract from the melaleuca tree which can produce liver toxicity. I've personally never used it but most people here advise not to use fish medication on axolotls. There are salt bathing treatments, tea bathing treatments or vet prescribed medication.

Use any regular black tea and brew a cup. Let it cool and add it to 10L of dechlorinated water. You can put him in a separate tub and leave him in there for 15 or so minutes (I don't think there is a time limit). You can also add it straight to your tank and the yellow tannins will be removed with water changes. Tannins will help heal, soothe and prevent fungus occurring. If you would rather tea bath separately, let him chill for a while before doing so and then put him in the tank. Putting him in and taking him out to tea bath and back in will stress him way more.

Monitor your tank closely if you're going to cycle the tank with him in it to prevent more problems for your little dude.

Again I don't think fridging is necessary. Good luck

 

[cherryglue]

thank you very much, we are being super careful about cycling with him, we would be devastated to lose him, we've become very attached. We will be giving him a tea bath tomorrow if the weird residue, for lack of better word, doesn't go away. We really do think it was because too much medicine was added to the small amount of water, its supposed to be 5ml per every 10 gallons and i told my boyfriend to fill a clean 1 gal jug with water, dechlorinate it, and add ONLY 0.5 mls of the medicine and he went and "eyeballed" a little bit in a small tupperware bin...lol....never again..

thank you for all the info!!!

 

[layna]

Hello
I cant really see anything wrong with your axie.
As said above, fridging should only be done days at a time not for a few hours.

Dont use any fish medicines on axies as they are very sensitive to chemicals and it can do more harm than good.

In order to cycle your tank (you havent started) your going to need a little bit of ammonia in there try to keep it 0.25/0.5ppm for ammonia and when it converts to nitrite keep that at 0.25/0.5ppm too.
So let your axie make the ammonia, then do 10-30% daily change depending on the amount of ammonia in there.

If you were putting earthworms in a tub of water, this means they secrete a nasty tasting slime which your axie wont like the taste of. Instead try putting the worms in a pot, then dashing boiling water over them, then immediately put cold in. This will kill the worms but keep them fresh for your axie to eat, without the nasty slime.
If you stop offering bloodworms and only offer the earthworms or pellets, they will eventually eat them

Your axies tummy should be as wide as its head to be at a 'healthy' weight and for a full grown axie, bloodworms really arent nutritious enough

 

[cherryglue]

oh thank you!! Great tip about the worms, totally didnt even think to do that!!!

Also, update! it appears whatever was on him has almost entirely "peeled" off with him swimming around slowly trying to avoid us putting him back in his tank (thats stubborn lil' guy). Will keep a close eye on him tomorrow and keep track of it, we've been using the Melafix because a guy at an aquarium store that raised axolotls told us it was safe to use and its always worked well for us with his bacteria on his gills when he gets it every now and again. But i'm going to continue to try tea baths thanks so much, both of you!

 

[HayleyK]

It's most likely his skin. Thankfully axolotls are good healers so with some TLC and tea baths he should be all better.

Most fish shops just want you to sell something, he probably knows it works on fish and guessed it should work in axolotls too since most people assume axolotls are fish. If you have any questions the best place is to come to this site - someone will always be there to give you the right answer

 

[layna]

Bacteria on gills? Do you mean fungus?
Salt baths should be used for fungus, the sticky can be found at the top of the threads.

Also fungus is a secondary infection usually cause by some other problem first. Im thinking once you have cycled your tank you might not find fungus to be a problem, hopefully

 

[cherryglue]

it doesnt look like fungus, we were told it was just a mild bacterial thing o_o seems like now and then, our little guy has thin almost invisible "strings" (for lack of better wording) on his gills, like strands, of what people have told us are bacterial infections, nothing like the fungus pictures I've seen on here. at first we thought it was just some slime coat from the tank or something but after a few days his gills started looking a little withered, so we got the Melafix and it made it go away, but we also didn't know about cycling when that happened, so it was probably because his ammonia and stuff were high back then :/ we know now and have been working on it slowly, but with his parameters being basic, we know its nothing in out nrew tank, we did notice the night before we moved him that the stuff was on his gills again, but we figured it would be better to move him to a clean tank than do a bunch of water cycles on the bad water and then treat it (because my boyfriend got lazy and didnt wanna do daily water changes to cycle since we were planning to move him, but words have been said and that will never be the case again). So basically, we're trying to make the "sick" go away from being in his last tank :/