Zoreta

Our white mickey mouse and sunburst platies (who we've had for three weeks) have suddenly come down with bright red gills., the MM worse than the sunburst. The MM has bubbles coming from her gills when she eats off the surface, but not when she's swimming farther down. I would suspect ammonia, but the other fish, including one week-old fry, are in perfect health and the readings for the tank are fine (including 0 ammonia)

Any ideas what's wrong with our little platies?

20 gal tank
pH: 6.8
ammonia: 0
nitrite: 0
nitrate: unsure- we need to get another nitrate test, and the LFS won't get their new shipment until tomorrow afternoon. The health of the fry seems to support that it's safe, though.
temperature: 78
size: 20 gal (mature tank running for three-four years)

Lucy

When was your last water change? Could the nitrates be high?

agabr123

My first guess would have been ammonia poisoning...

You said you've had them for three weeks, meaning that you just bought them recently (I assumed they weren't the fry since you said they were a week old)? If so, did they (or any of the fish the shared a tank with) appear unhealthy at the store at all?

Lucy

Nice catch Alex, missed that she's had them 3 weeks.
Search Gill disease, see if the symptoms sound the same.

Zoreta

The ammonia's 0, though, and the other fish have no symptoms at all. Last sizable (25%)water change was about a week and a half ago, and I did a small (10%) tonight because the water was a little low and I want to keep the tank in good condition for the fry. The fish in the LFS tank looked fine- as did the platy up until today. I would be worried about nitrates, but the fry are in perfect health (they've started exploring the other plastic plants in the tank and if they see another fish they're extremely quick to return to their favorite plant)

They're swimming fine and aren't gasping, but their gills are red and bubbles come from the MM's gills if she swallows air. Is it normal for fish to have air go out their gills if they swallow air while feeding off the surface? The sunburst is perfectly normal aside from the red gills.

agabr123

Do you think you could get a picture of them? That might help us identify what's going on

≈ D ≈

Zoreta

I've been trying to get my mother to start doing weekly water changes (I would except that I can't drive to get the water, as our RO filter doesn't put out that much water) All of her aquarium books say biweekly, so that's what happens.

≈ D ≈

Zoreta

Bluntly, our tap water is horrendous- it has chloramines added, it's extremely hard, tests positive for MTBE and flouride, has 45 PPM nitrate, 10 ppm nitrite, 500 ppm chlorine, and a number of other nasty things. We use an RO filter and a water softener to take care of these.

Not all water conditioners list what they do, is there one to cover all of this?

EDIT: I am beginning to suspect gill flukes. I have maracyn, which is supposed to work on flukes- but will it hurt the fry? I'd hate to lose the little guys.

EDIT 2: I've been looking at pictures of other white MM and sunburst platy, and they all seem to have red gills anyway. The two platy seem to have changed their behavior slightly before this whole thing happened- they're a bit more frisky. Maybe they hit some part of the platy life cycle and that caused a coloration change- I just don't know. We got the nitrate test, and it's at 20 ppm. Slightly high, but not terrible.

≈ D ≈

agabr123

wow....where do you live? that's ridiculous for your water to be that bad....

Zoreta

I live in the mountains above LA. Our water is stored in these HUGE tanks near the top, so they have to put all kinds of stuff into the tanks to stop the stored water from going stagnant. Nasty stuff.