The first sign of illness in fish, is its behavior. A fish may hide in a corner instead of being lively like it should be. Fish will show many signs of illness including droopy or swollen fins, damaged scales, discoloration, white spots on the body, and many others.
There are many illnesses that fish can have however, I will only talk about the most common of types. The first is whitespot, which is often called Ich in the United States, is a parasitic infection caused by Ichthyophthirius multifiliis. White spots are present on the fins and can spread to the whole body of an infected fish. Velvet disease, similar to white spot is caused by a protozoon called Amyloodinium and it only affects the gills. Bacterial infections are caused by opportunistic bacteria in the water, they gain access to a fishes body and affect the scales short after. Viral infections can be caused by many things, spring viraemia of carp is a spring virus and hemorrhaging can occur if a fish has this disease. Poisoning can occur from any household item or sprays that come in contact with the water or tank. Be sure to wash the tank thoroughly before you put your fish back into the aquarium.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
