Sick Oto, Small White Spot On Nose 5 Days Ago, Slowly Grown Since.

Around 5 days ago I noticed a tiny white patch on the nose of one of my three Oto. As they love swimming straight down against the current of the bubbles with their noses against the glass I assumed that he had just damaged a bit of his slime coat and it would heal up no problem, Checked water parameters, temperature, everything fine.

Over the days this white patch has grown, so I've seperated him out to a quarantine tank, got three rocks with algae on them from the main tank and moved them in there with him. Seeded a DIY 80 lph filter and added some Esha2000, chucked in an airstone and a little cave for the guy to hide in, some courgette and called it a day. Come this morning the patch is no improvement, so double dosed ESHA and started to have flashbacks with my recent battle with Columnaris, which took the lives of half my school of Zebra danios(strangely only female casualties).

So I'm here, with a few photos, Asking for a bit of assistance with ID-ing the disease/bacteria responsible. Behaviourally, he is no different to the other oto's, happily grazing through algae and courgette, shows no outward signs of stress and still plays in the bubbles with his nose on the glass but not quite so often. I'm worried of Columnaris, though have heard it is latent in all tanks and so understand that treatment with ESHA and hoping for the best is probably the best hope, the pictures aren't the best but show the problem quite well.

Ammonia: 0
Nitrites: 0
Nitrates: 20 ppm
Temp: 76 degrees Fahrenheit.

Only other relevant information I can give is that we've experienced a small heatwave recently, so temperatures in my tank rose slowly to around 77 degrees (over the course of 3 days, we have AC and a tower fan on the tank.) from a starting temp of 75 degrees and is currently settled back at 76 as I slowly lower it back.

Will continue three day ESHA double dose treatment in quarantine and hope for improvement. Scared of saltdips as Oto's hate changing water parameters
Help me save this little Oto-Stink-lus

 

Additionally, as reference, check my history for a thread about my battle with columnaris before. And attached to his post are a picture of scarface geppetto, so called because his columnaris infection affected his face and interesting here because of its similarities.



Alternatively, is my tank infected by some super bug which I should burn all my plants in a fire and run hydrogen peroxide through my tank? lol (joking, but only just)

 

bumping this

 

Awoke this morning to my Oto perched on top of the filter, after observation for almost 5 minutes, he finally moved, a weak kick of his tail wedging himself between teh stick on termometerand the edge of the tank. within an hour he has passed away. I've taken him out, and again observed the gills, nothing too strange about them, however as you'll see from these pictures, the facial scarring and bleeding is EXACTLY the same as what I thought I'd just gotten over. Now I really need help figuring out what is happening to these fish that is causing their faces to slowly rot away.

I've read that columnaris bacteria release a protein and cartiladge dissolving enzyme, Could this be what is causing this? Hole in the head is unlikely in this case I think, as typically it strikes larger fish and primarily cichlids .

 

Bump