meicalnissyen

Hey All tried to do some reading on the search but found nothing specific

I have two tanks, both healthy. one has a big dempsey and good size red devil they do okay together, as long as the red devil stays up on his shelf (i made a partition)
the other tank has gourami, a huge pleco, old tiger barb small pleco and a "red terror " I can't find a reference to that name, but thats what the store called it it has vague vertical stripes and they are just stating to turn a pale reddish color it also has a false eye marking near the tail fin. he has become pretty (very) aggressive since the stripes changed. the other cichlid in the tank was a green severum and he is a bit to much smaller and to wimpy to hang with the terror now. never was much of a fish really, always listless, never ate much, usually drifting nose up at a 45* angle, he stated to get pounded to much by the terror and I have him in a nursing tank but he still just mopes along.

its been this way for for a couple weeks from prior experience I would have called him dead long ago, but he never gets worse, never better

any thoughts on recovery??
he has some pound marks on his side, and I have extra stress coat in there but thats it
been fed (offered) frozen krill, flakes, pellets, bloodworms etc

MissMTS

Welcome to Fishlore

I am sorry to hear about your severum I have actually been dealing with a similar problem myself with my Rotkeil severum and I am unable to get to the bottom of it. If you don't mind answering a couple of questions it might help us better diagnose things....

1. What are your water parameters? ammonia.....nitrite......nitrate.....
2. How is his coloring?
3. Does he have any white patches or markes on him?
4. Does he have any pitting or holes around his face?

Have you tried any medications? Not eating is usually a sign of internal parasites. Also, my sev loves veggies, so you might want to get some high quality veggie flakes or pellets and see if he will eat them. Best of luck to you! I hope his condition improves!

cerianthus

Red Terror. It could be either cichlasoma urophthalmus or Cichlasoma festae. Both goes on the same common name but latter being more aggressive than former. Most LFS probably wont know the differences. There are characteristics of fish that you can find to differentiate the fish. Cant recall at the moment but will post when and if I do remember. lol!
Check out the pics of both fish for comparison. Book would probably give better/correct pics than images from googling.
Would not keep Green Severum with Festae unless in large tank, I am talking 8' or longer with densely decorated aquascaping.

If Severum (very mild in temperment) is in isolation, try feeding better food such as live/frozen/veggies until recovers. Make sure keep your water in optimal conditions and severum should recover from injuries received from Terror. If secondary/tertiary infections take place, med as needed ASAP.
Adding salt to q/t will minimize certain infections. Just follow the instructions on the Aq Salt box. Make sure replace the salt removed due to water changes (proportionate amt to volume of water changed).

If injuries gets worse with further deterioration of skin and/or development of fungal infection, you can try Antibiotics but try not to combine two different kind at once. Try one then others in case first did not work.
This is my crude method but have yielded great result when dealing with large fish (Cichlids, lions, Triggers, Groupers, etc). Even had good results with injection of med using hypodermic syringe.
If you have Bacitracin/Neosporin Ointment, former worked better for me though, daily smear of Ointment have worked better and faster than tablet/capsule in the water.
Do not apply too much since any excess will just fall off (oil and water dont mix well) and end up polluting the water. If done properly, can even assist bleeding to stop.
I collect f/w and s/w fish with children for keeping in tank. Children being children, always handles fish when told not to unnecessarily. I dont use Med from lfs but depend only on Ointment for most possible infections arose from handling since yielded good results for few decades including tropical fish.
PLEASE DO NOT APPLY NEAR GILL OR AT/ON GILL.

Hope your severum recovers soon w/o further complications!

meicalnissyen

wish my mazda forum had hard information like this

water is great but nitrates are noticable, dont bother anyone else in the tank
color is dark, still with juvy stripes and has lots of white spots from terror atacks
did not notice pits, will try to check when I get home


I have those green blocks of marine veggies, will chuck one in and see if he nibbles
will try the bacitracin smear as well, since he don;t fight much at all