Weird brown spots on hippo tang?

jwheeler · #1 01/13/2007, 10:16 PM

I have a yellow belly hybrid hippo tang that I have in a 55QT tank with an emperor angel and a Niger trigger. They have been in QT since Dec. 26th. Today I noticed the tang has what looks like a brown coating on him in some spots towards the back end of him, on both sides. Kinda looks like chocolate smeared on him in some spots. Its not dots of it. The trigger looks fine. And the angel looks ok, maybe has a little fading in one spot, but I think thats ok. They all eat like hogs, especially the tang. And I've been feeding them dried seaweed soaked in Selcon and soak their food in vitachem. Any ideas?

rf · #2 01/13/2007, 10:31 PM

I had a Kole Tang with two brown spots. One next to the head and another near its tail. It ended up dying several days later. I did some reading and I am pretty sure it was a case of Head and Lateral Line Erosion. From what I have read good feedings with vitamin and selcon will usually clear it up. So sounds like your already on the right track if it is HLLE.

jwheeler · #3 01/13/2007, 10:43 PM

HLLE is not contagous like ick is it?

rf · #4 01/14/2007, 05:43 PM

I don't believe so. But from what I read it is mostly caused by stress. When the fish becomes stressed, for instance when being introduced, shipped, etc. it begins to loose its slime coat opening the door to bacterial infection. The idea is to supplement vitamins and help the fish rebuild the slime coat to fight off the infection and prevent further occurrences.