Red bump/ protrusion on Cory catfish... Please Help!

Hi,

I currently have 6 Cory catfish (only cories) in my tank and everything had been going well, until yesterday I noticed what looks like some sort of injury or disease on one of the fish. The weird part is it came out of no where which makes me think it’s an injury and not a disease. I also couldn’t find anything about diseases that looked similar online. You can kind of see that it sticks out quite a bit. See the pictures attached.

There is a red bump coming off of the side of one of the fish, above the fin. It almost looks like something is stuck on him, but idk. All fish, including the injured one are behaving normally and eating regularly.

current water parameters:
Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 10ppm
PH: 7.0

3 of the fish, including the sick one went through a bit of a nitrite spoke about 2 weeks ago... I hope this isn’t the cause. If anyone has seen this before or has any idea what it could be please let me know, thank you!

 

Nice clear pics.... looks like perhaps a bacterial infection/abscess or inflamed/damaged gills probably caused by the nitrite spike you mentioned. The nitrite is toxic to the fish and reduce the fish’s immune system, making the weaker ones more susceptible to infections. Nitrite can also burn/damage the fish’s gills.
I would do some partial water changes every 2-3 days to improve the water quality (do not disturb the substrate or filter as your tank is recently recovering from a deficiency of nitrifying bacteria). You may still have trace nitrite in the tank.

 

Thanks for the answer. Any recommendations to treat this?

 

It looks bacterial to me but I am no disease master.

like tomiyama said, I would do 30-50% WCs every other day and keep an eye on it. Add some lots more live plants to the tank if possible to help the fish and keep your ammonia/nitrites/nitrates under control and de-stress your fish. MAKE SURE not to over feed. I wouldn't medicate at this point.

 

It looks bacterial to me but I am no disease master.

like tomiyama said, I would do 30-50% WCs every other day and keep an eye on it. Add some lots more live plants to the tank if possible to help the fish and keep your ammonia/nitrites/nitrates under control and de-stress your fish. MAKE SURE not to over feed. I wouldn't medicate at this point.

Ok that sounds good. My ammonia/nitrite/nitrate have all been at good levels for the past 2 weeks, and I have a lot of live plants in there. But I will do frequent water changes and keep checking.

I wanted to add two Bolivian Rams to the tank in about a week if the water parameters are still good... is this a good idea with one of the fish possibly infected? I’m willing to wait a few weeks if that would make a difference.

 

Ok that sounds good. My ammonia/nitrite/nitrate have all been at good levels for the past 2 weeks, and I have a lot of live plants in there. But I will do frequent water changes and keep checking.

I wanted to add two Bolivian Rams to the tank in about a week if the water parameters are still good... is this a good idea with one of the fish possibly infected? I’m willing to wait a few weeks if that would make a difference.

Do you quarantine new fish? I would advise waiting until this is resolved before addin the rams, but you could get then in a week, and get their quarantine started while the catfish figures out whats what.

 

Why do you guys exactly think it is a bacterial infection?

 

Do you quarantine new fish? I would advise waiting until this is resolved before addin the rams, but you could get then in a week, and get their quarantine started while the catfish figures out whats what.

Do you quarantine new fish? I would advise waiting until this is resolved before addin the rams, but you could get then in a week, and get their quarantine started while the catfish figures out whats what.

I don’t quarantine, so I’ll probably just wait until he looks healthy again before I add any new fish. The redness actually looks like it went down a little so I’m hopeful.