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I bought some neon tetras along with other fish yesterday, on the way home I noticed that one of the neons's red line, for lack of a better word, was very dull, it was a dull orange.. I orginally thought that it was just the stress of the journey home, but later on in the evening when I looked into the tank I noticed that it was still the only one to not to have coloured up. so I thought that it might be neon tetra disease, but I checked the symptoms of it on this site, it doesn't seem to match.. The only symptom it has is faded colour. It still shoals, eats.. it's been two days and it's colours are still faded. The others are brightly coloured the way that they should be.


I thought that it might have been so inbred that generations upon generations, the colour have gradually faded, but I don't think so because the others are brightly coloured. I don't think that I need to isolate it since it's eating well and shoaling with the rest.

What do you think?

Thanks in advance for whatever help/advice you can give me.
R_Boy1

I would go with stress. I had a Bala sharks that lost its black for 4-5 days.

Thanks Steven. I probably would agree if it wasn't for the others's vivid colouring but perhaps you're right, and the Neon is just a particulary senstive one. I'll wait and see what it's like in a few days but I still would like input on what other members here think.

Thanks.
R_Boy1

Hi,
Is it only the red stripe that is faded or, perhaps,
is the neon also slightly faded. Along with stress
as, perhaps, THE main reason for coloration fading,
it could also be something covering the fish, such
as "Velvet."

Glance at this site and see if the fish has
some or all of the symptoms:

http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/disease/p/velvet.htm

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

How many did you buy? Did you already have some Neon's in the tank? What else is in the Tank?

It sounds like a good case of stress to me especially if there is only a small number.

I recently bought some very small Cardinals lovely strong colour. 30 minutes later a very pale colour 24 hrs later back to their very good colour.

I add a little Melafix to the tank and for the first few days I added to their diet frozen blood worms.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info
Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
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It could be stress...

Also, sometimes other species or varieties get mixed in with each other at the LFS. It's possible the one fish is something different, like:

gold neon tetra

diamondhead neon tetra

mon cheri neon tetra

green neon tetra (separate species)

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"Also, sometimes other species or varieties get mixed in with each other at the LFS. It's possible the one fish is something different, like:

gold neon tetra

diamondhead neon tetra

mon cheri neon tetra

green neon tetra (separate species)"

If it was a different species it would most likely not shoal with the other neons.

Frank - It's only the red line that's dull. It is a lot duller from what it should be. I'm pleased to say that the red line is looking a bit more vivid and redder today.

Unfortunately, two of the other neons have gotten a single white spot on their fin. I've had ich before so I know how to treat it. Melafix and Pimafix along with a temp increase, right?

Keithgh; I got six new neons. I already had one Neon in the tank from my last batch of 12. What else is in the tank, er.. Just some guppy fry, a few adult males. No adult females. My last one perished a few weeks ago. And a pair of cherry barbs, bought the same time as them and three new albino cories as well. And a lonely julli cory.

I refuse to use bloodworms after what happened at the first & last time I used it. It fouled up the water, a few of the fish tried it but weren't just interested and swam off. And It introduced ich into the tank!

Superlion; I looked at the links; and the Dull neon's red line is like that of the green neon but it doesn't have that green colouring. It is defintely a Neon tetra, it just isn't as bright as the others. Thanks anyway.

Off for now, thanks everybody.

R_Boy1

Refresh my memory here, is pimafix really an ich treatment? I didn't think it was. Melafix is a very mild treatment, more a destresser and mild antibiotic than actually killing anything like ich.

I would not use pimafix or melafix to treat ich.

Here is a link to more useful medications for ich

As for raising the temperature...all that is going to do is make the ich nice and happy and speed up it's reproduction process.
It can be used to some extent if you are treating the tank with a proper ich medication, however otherwise it simply speeds up the life cycle and makes for more ich. One should have a full understanding of the ich life cycle and how medications work before raising the temperature. Yes, the spots will drop off after a day or two with a raised temperature, however knowing that the spots (cysts really) fall off is actually part of the life cycle means that you're just speeding it up.

If you were to use actual ich medication while raising the temp you may have a better chance at killing the ich as the only time ich can be killed is after it falls off the host and is reproducing in its free swimming stage before reattaching to the host and starting all over again.

There has been much literature about raising temp to kill ich, however the temp that is needed is well above what most fish will be comfortable staying alive with, 95F and up. With the number of ich specific medications available such treatments such as heat, and salt, are IMO quite outdated. It'd be the same as trying to heat your tank the way they used to, with candles under it (only possible with slate bottom tanks!!! so please no one try!).


As for the tetra being dull... some fish just take a bit more time getting used to their new tank. That one could have been newer to the store than the others and was therefore still a little stressed from moving to the store before you got him and moved him home. I've had fish that insisted on sulking for weeks before coloring up.

^_^