Hey all,

One of my panda cories appears sick. It has been staying mostly still along the bottom. Color is very dark, almost greenish. It looks skinnier than normal, gaunt in fact. When agitated by a shrimp or if it's feeding time the cory will attempt to rummage through the sand but its tail floats high and it ends up flipping over and spinning around until it rights itself then lays motionless again. Honestly the only way I can tell if it's alive most times is to look very closely at the gills. No movement otherwise.

2 of the 6 pandas of his bunch have already died, but they didn't have these symptoms.. they just lodged themselves in my wisteria plants and died, rather promptly. In those cases, no indication even an hour earlier of any problems. This is day two of this cory's condition.

Water parameters seem fine.. other cories, amano shrimp and RCS appear healthy, feeding enthusiastically and remaining active.

Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: between 10-20ppm


Any idea what's ailing him? Here's a photo, maybe there is something telltale about his appearance.

update:

on closer inspection I see small white strings coming from the end of his tail, and the 2 fins coming from the bottom of his midsection. the fins don't look like they are fraying, this looks like something hanging off the fins. the strings are very small, maybe .5mm. too small to photograph with my iPhone camera.

Maybe its just me, the Nitrate seems high.

Try a 10-20% water (use RO or Distilled water to simulate rainfall) change over the next few days. Corys live in an environment where there is a lot of fresh water interchange, almost daily, from huge rain storms. Their current water may have something in it that is making them sick.

Had some young bronze cory that did the same. prepare for the worst friend.

__________________
60 liter - Bronze, Habrosus and Panda Corys, Rasbora Maticulas, Neon Tetras, Marbled Hatchet fish, dwarf cherry, rhino and amano shrimp, assassin snails and damned pond snails

54 liter - Dwarf Redtailed Puffers, Garra Rufas and Garra Gotyla and more pond snails

45 liter - Still cycling. Crustations and Molluscs only

Sounds like parasites of some sort.

__________________
SUCCESS IS MEASURED BY YEARS, NOT MONTHS!!!
220 Tank build
http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/sta...late-3253.html