Purple tang skin issue       2/12/19
Hello,
<Howsit Bri?>
I noticed one of my purple tangs has a strange skin thing going on. It almost looks like peeling skin from a sunburn, or maybe mucus?
<So much the former, with a rxn of the latter>
It’s behavior seems unaffected, and it has no white spots. Not other fish impacted at all.
<A good clue>
No introductions to my tank for 6 weeks. Prior to that I introduced snails QTed for a full month. I did treat some Aiptasia with Kalk paste the day I noticed. Maybe it’s a chemical burn?
<Yes; biochemical>
Trying to rule out something infectious. I’ll attach several pictures. Thanks as always.
Thanks,
Brian
<I (fully) suspect a glance/exposure to a stinging-celled colony here. Should heal in time... days, weeks. Bob Fenner>

Disease Identification with Photos      5/19/18
Hello Bob and crew!
<Bri! Please re-size and re-send your msg.s WITH MUCH SMALLER files... you've crashed our mail server. Kbytes, not Mbytes. Thx. Bob Fenner>
Disease Identification      5/19/18
Hello Bob and crew!
<Hey Bri!>
It's been years since I've emailed you! I love using your site as a resource. I have a purple tang going through tank transfer (1.5 weeks so far) with recurring white spots. There were no spots for a week, but
yesterday a few appeared again. When I first got the fish, the original spots were concentrated on the ventral side, with only a couple on the rest of the body. There were maybe ten total. Fish breathing rate was (and continues to be) normal. Coloration is good. Appetite is fine. There were no spots for a week, but overnight a few showed up. There were only five spots on the fish this time, all concentrated on the left pectoral fin. I decided to clip a section of the fin and take a look under the microscope.
Attached are photos taken at 10x magnification. I'll try to attach a video as well.
<Please post the video elsewhere; perhaps YouTube, and send the link to it instead. We have limited mail server space>
Any thoughts on what this may be?
<From the size... looks too big to be protozoal... Perhaps just accumulation of body mucus... Happens>
Note in the videos that all movement is created by me changing the focus so you can see the whole cyst.
The organism was not moving at all and I did not see any cilia or flagella.
<Me neither... is this a dry prep.? That is, was there a slide cover over this specimen with water around it, supporting it?>
However, I just started treating with Seachem Paraguard 12 hrs before taking the sample, so maybe these parasites are dead?
<Mmm; maybe, but, could be as stated>
Or eggs of gill/body flukes perhaps?
<Not eggs... would be off the fish's body>
The fish has been treated with PraziPro, but only one round for 2 days. That was a week ago.
Thank you for sharing your ideas! I'd like to get more specific with my treatment protocol and your advice is much appreciated!
Lil Bri
<Do try removing the blobs from the spines, scales, put under a cover slip with a drop of water, and re-shoot and send. Thank you. Bob Fenner>
Re: Disease Identification with Photos      5/19/18
Oops! Sorry! I reformatted/resent the photos, but the video is only 3 seconds and I can't get it condensed to less than 1.8MB. Hopefully the pictures are enough for identification purposes! I thought that the
parasite might be Amyloodinium, but it's way too big!
<Yes; too big for any fish parasite I'm aware of>
The photos are only magnified 10x. Then I thought it might be the beginnings of Lymphocystis from stress?
<Nah; not likely>
It isn't pear shaped like the photos of Cryptocaryon on WetWebMedia, so I'm guessing not that.
<Agreed. BobF>

Re: Disease Identification       5/21/18
Thank you for your input! I did prepare the fin clipping as a wet mount, so the photos are taken with water supporting the body mucus blob.
<Ahh!>
It dried up within about 20mins of taking the photos and the blob shriveled to about a quarter of its original size. The fish hasn’t shown any more of them, so I’m unable to take another sample for you so far. I’ll send more photos of the issue resurfaces. Thanks again!
-Bri
<Thank you. B>

Re: Disease Identification    6/16/18
Hello Bob and crew!
<Li'l Bri>
I thought I'd give a follow-up email for our string (see below). My purple tang did not show any further signs of the white spots through quarantine. It is now living happily in my display tank and appears perfectly healthy! It appears to have been environmental, just as Bob predicted, and my guess is that it was due to sub-par water quality while doing the Tank Transfer Method in quarantine.
<Ahh!>
Thanks for the advice! Add one more happy fish to the list of all those that you have helped!
Lil Bri
<Thank you for your update. Cheers, Bob Fenner>