Yellow spots in the tank, what is it ???

I have bright yellow spots/clusters all along the silicone in my fish tank. The tank was bought in May, the "spots" started to appear 2-3 weeks ago. It starts like very tiny dots, almost like a powder, but then it makes bigger clusters. I scraped some off with a spoon, it is rather sticky and smelly (difficult to describe, pungent, mould alike, a little lemony ... but this could all be influenced by the tank water itself).

I searched the web for countless hours, to not avail. I contacted various labs and they all refer me back to a lab in Auckland which will charge a fortune to analyse it. I can't afford it.

I have lost fish (will do another post about that) and water params are fine, double checked with local LFS. The specialist there suspects this yellow stuff to have something to do with the death of some fish.

Has anyone ever seen this?????

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Thanks for your help,
Christine

hi Christine, can't say for sure what the yellow stuff is, other memeber may have seen it before.

What are you feeding them ?

The deceased plecs look to have bloat, and one I think I see a red area at his anus. That could be an internal parasite problem. Do you see any others live or not with the red coming out ?

Not sure , just best guessing until the mods take a look. hth

Hi Zeebo and thanks for your answer.

For info, I have another post (yet to be approved by the moderator), about the loss of my fish. I decided to separate the two although they might be related.

I had only 2 plecos and only one at a time. When the first one (the bloated one) died, I got the second one.

I feed the tetras and other fish Aqua One Tropical Fish. Not too much as I have learned Also a couple of pellets to the corys and wafers to the pleco. I tried feeding blanched veggies (zucchini, cucumber, romaine lettuce, shelled peas) but they never touched it. I believe that the first pleco ate what fell on the bottom and the middle/top dwellers didn't catch quickly enough, and his wafers. For the second pleco, not sure if he ate anything - veggies stayed intact, same for wafers, belly stayed as when I got him a week earlier.

As for your suggestion of internal parasite, I do agree. I know a little about bacterias and I suspect staphylococcus (this is currently investigated by a lab who has offered kindly to do it for free). The weird thing is that the first pleco was fine for roughly 5-6 weeks and so were the other fish, then suddenly they all start to die without apparent physical damage (like rot or itch). To me it just looks internal and it could be that yellow stuff causing it. I searched pictures/keywords on the web for hours (if not days now) and just can't find anything that looks close to what is on the silicone in the tank.

I wouldn't worry about the yellow stuff. New silicon gets a whitish growth sometimes

never seen it before. have you treated with anything, such as pimafix or something for fungal infections? if not might be worth a try.

I'm a bit reluctant to treat something that isn't identified. It could be bacterial, fungal, mould, etc ...
Now, by having said that, I got Furan 2 from API which "treats bacterial fish disease". I haven't lost any fish since I bought this so was thinking it my be a good idea to ask experts before adding yet another mistake to the many I've already made.

Furan is for Open sores, gill disease, fin and tail rot, eye cloud, body slime and hemorrhagic septicaemia. None of the dead fish showed any of these symptoms (nor do the live ones), though I suspect septicaemia to have occurred to the first pleco (the bloated one - bacteria will develop in the intestine and if it ruptures, septicaemia occurs).

Should I start treating with that?

Breamlegend, you say that new silicon gets sometimes a whitish growth .... Does it turn yellow? Mine is initially almost white, a very light yellow, but then as it builds up and clusters (thus concentrating I guess), it because much brighter and darker yellow.

I am not familiar with Furan, I guess it depends on what the active ingredients are. the reason I suggest pimafix, or melafix or both together, is that these are made of natural plant extracts like tea tree and do not harm the filter bacteria or anything.

Irene, I go back to the shop tomorrow and will try to get Pimafix or Melafix (preferring by far anything natural). Thanks for the advice. I will give it a go if it can't harm the remaining fish

The one thing that really obsesses me is that apparently fragiler fish such as the neons have all survived, and the plecos, which are considered to be hardy, died

BTW, Furan's active ingredients are Nitrofurazone and Furazolidone

Another rasbora died yesterday evening. At 8 pm he was happily swimming around with his buddy, and 11 pm he was lying dead on the bottom. No signs of disease on the body.

Got Melafix and Pimafix this morning, Ammo lock too .... will lower water changes ... and see what happens.

i would also support what Irene says. Use the 2 fixes, cant go wrong. was the tank cycled properly and what gravel have you got, could be the gravel as well. cheers jk :thumbup:
ps sorry for your losses hope they will stop

Gravel bought at LFS. Sorry, I can't remember the name of the brand. Smooth, small, non sharp, white/brown/black pebbles. Got told to stay away from colours. I washed it several times in tap water with prime, then spread it out on a towel in the sun to dry before adding to the tank (if you wonder why the sun/towel thing, it was to provide heat and remove moisture, both conditions that many bacteria/fungus won't like - didn't want to nuke it in the microwave).

"Was the tank cycled properly?"
Well, it appears from my other thread that the answer is no !!! If you are interested in the details: http://www.plecoplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=20737

From today onwards, I use Pimafix and Melafix, no more wc for a few days, Prime daily. Will see how that goes and try to get the tank cycled properly.

The species that died were the plecos, lambchop rasboras and guppies (not counting the panda cory, he wasn't looking great from day 1). No loss for neon/phantom/serpaes tetras and gourami, they might be tougher than the others? Have 1 rasbora and 1 guppy left (sad for schooling fish), if any more casualties it might be them.

My question still remains though: does anyone know what that yellow stuff is? Have a few very curious people around wondering

Its probably just coloured yelow from food or waste. I've seen it grow on new silicon airlines and tanks. Its called diatoms. A harmless algae forming on new tanks

Just had a look at "diatoms" and for the first time found a website with a pic that looks pretty close to what I have in my tank on the silicon.

Ladies of the forum, you should have a look at it, you might think twice before using an exfoliating cream in the future

http://www.cracked.com/article_18671_the-6-most-horrifying-ingredients-in-everyday-cosmetics_p2.html

Well, got some interesting news from the lab that accepted to test for free.

Here the message:

Hi Christine

We haven't identified it completely yet. We have doen a few different media preparations and it does look like there is some staphylococcus and maybe klebsiella.

Becky is our microbiologist. She is away till Monday. If you give her a call then she can have a look at the cultures and give you more info.

Cheers
J B

Click to expand...

From a very quick search, both bacteria, both damaging internal organs, especially gastro-enteral tract, liver and kidneys in fish. This would explain the extreme bloating of my first pleco, the anal bleeding on the second.

Will let you know when I have more information.

wow good detective work to all. cheers jk :thumbup:

confirmed, staph and klebsiella ! Perhaps more, will know over the next days.

Dilemna, can't treat with antibiotics, the little good bacteria I have would be killed too, so, in the meantime, since the fish seems to do well, I treat with Pimafix and Melafix (efficacy not proven, but worth trying).

Will keep posting when I have more news.

Pimafix/Melafix didn't do anything against the yellow clusters, so after 10 days I have stopped the treatment. I am going to leave it as is for now since the remaining fish are doing well.

3 weeks after previous post.

The yellow stuff has now covered the whole silicon but looks less like clusters, more like fine particles (similar to a layer of dust).