# Red Pectoral Fin Bases, Help appreciated!



## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

So last week i had a subdominant yellow lab male who had began showing some very early signs of bloat behavior (spitting food, clear and stringy feces) so I broke down my tank in order to move him to a hospital tank prior to being moved permanently to another home (he responded superbly to the bloat remedy stickied to the top of this forum and has been eating and showing excellent signs in the hospital tank). Catching the little guy was not an easy task as I essentially had to remove all my rock work just to get him out, which led to a big tank rearrange. Everyone seemed pretty good afterwards although there was a little ruckus as new territories were sorted out.

Today, however, I noticed my alpha male Acei Ngara showing a tiny bit of damage to his right pectoral fin and the base of both pectoral fins showing a broad margin of of red with some minor inflammation where normally would be that blue-gray color of the rest of his body. It's a solid marginal band that almost looks like vasculature (although in a picture i'm including the red seems to be in the rays of the fin as well although i don't see nearly that much on visual inspection...sadly just the cell phone camera to work with).

Water parameters are good with 0 nitrite and ammonia and 20-40 nitrates. GH is about 25, pH is 8.2. His behavior is normal and he isn't showing any sort of lethargy or any abnormal behavior, and he ate like a champion at feeding this morning. He's also showing off like crazy for a gravid female. In short , it's business as usual. Right now my hospital tank is full so I'm probably going to do a large volume water change (was due tomorrow anyway) and see how he responds but i'd love to know if this something that's going to require an antibiotic treatment or if it's simply due to damage and that a little time and very clean water will help clear up.

I tried doing a search for this same situation and found a few threads that never received any answers whatsoever:

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... 7ef6c50a11

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... 4d537b59e9

Pics (sorry in advance for the algae and spots on the glass...was supposed to clean that tomorrow!):


























Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Looks (and sounds) like fighting... big water change is a great idea, but I wouldn't treat for anything. Just watch the fish that are getting chewed up and remove the loser if he's getting bad.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

Seems to have cleared up on it's own as the tank has settled down. Must've been as Triscuit guessed...silly territorial mbuna!


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