Unknown Neurological Wrasse Disease (UNWD)

[hans4811]

Well crap, tried twice but vid doesn’t work for whatever reason…

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Well crap, tried twice but vid doesn’t work for whatever reason…

I was able to view the first video.

Your case differs in two aspects - the wrasse is breathing fast, and it isn’t eating. In the UNWD, the fish breath normally and at least try to eat.

So - in this case, I can’t rule out another disease, or stress from shipping - sorry either way though.

Jay

 

[hans4811]

Thanks for responding Jay…saw em for a brief few minutes this morning and didn’t eat, then gone for the rest of the day. Check again in the morning…fingers crossed, but not real hopeful… Didn’t notice the fast breathing…guess I need to look closer at it again.

 

[Wildreefs]

Looks like I can add to this list of occurrences of this disease, unfortunately !

Just received this Naoko wrasse from Reef Pro yesterday after an online auction that I won.

Turned out my lights and acclimated him to my salinity and PH very carefully. Put him in my display late afternoon yesterday and he sat under a toadstool for an hour or so and then disappeared. This morning he was up and about but stayed in an upper corner of tank and couldn’t control his swimming in current, head up and spinning. Tried feeding him but he didn’t seem interested….never bought a fish online before and this just reinforces why I don’t…LFS from now on !

That particular vendor has sent me 5-6 wrasses, and half of them exhibited those behaviors. Some last less than 2 days. I would stay far away from that vendor.

 

[hans4811]

That particular vendor has sent me 5-6 wrasses, and half of them exhibited those behaviors. Some last less than 2 days. I would stay far away from that vendor.

Yeah, never used this vendor before, never even bought a fish online before, always from my LFS…..lesson learned I guess. Thanks for sharing !

Wonder if during shipping he was injured. It was an in state ship, from West Palm to Jacksonville, but still, I guess rough handling of package could still cause an injury.

Shame the fish has to deal with this though…

 

[Wildreefs]

Why aren’t more people talking about this? Over the last 2-3 years, I’d say close to 75 percent of the fairy wrasses I’ve gotten has succumbed to this. LFS near my house who’s been around along time has 4-6 different fairies and 2 of them started to do the head up swirls before dying. I brought in a rhomboid and an earls a month ago , the earls did it on day 2, the rhomboid about 3 weeks later . First chalked it up to injury’s, but read this thread . If it’s a big issue why are the wholesales passing the buck , I’m sure they know something

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Why aren’t more people talking about this? Over the last 2-3 years, I’d say close to 75 percent of the fairy wrasses I’ve gotten has succumbed to this. LFS near my house who’s been around along time has 4-6 different fairies and 2 of them started to do the head up swirls before dying. I brought in a rhomboid and an earls a month ago , the earls did it on day 2, the rhomboid about 3 weeks later . First chalked it up to injury’s, but read this thread . If it’s a big issue why are the wholesales passing the buck , I’m sure they know something

Just my opinion - but like cyanide issues and Neobenedenia, it doesn’t show up at the wholesalers. Even retailers may not see it if they sell their fish quickly. The buck stops with the end consumer.
One way around it is to buy fully quarantined fish - the dealer picks up more of the losses then.
Finally, the prevalence of this seems to be increasing, or at least, more people are aware of it.
Jay

 

[Wildreefs]

Just my opinion - but like cyanide issues and Neobenedenia, it doesn’t show up at the wholesalers. Even retailers may not see it if they sell their fish quickly. The buck stops with the end consumer.
One way around it is to buy fully quarantined fish - the dealer picks up more of the losses then.
Finally, the prevalence of this seems to be increasing, or at least, more people are aware of it.
Jay

I see your point. Altho, I know the longer it doesn’t show the better, but I did have a lineatus over the winter that had been at the dealer just over 4 weeks , not qt’d, but quite a bit of time.

On top of that, a lineatus wrasse retail, short period of time cost around 300-400 retail , closer to $200 wholesale . To get one of those quarantined, I’d imagine it’s going to run 700-800

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I see your point. Altho, I know the longer it doesn’t show the better, but I did have a lineatus over the winter that had been at the dealer just over 4 weeks , not qt’d, but quite a bit of time.

On top of that, a lineatus wrasse retail, short period of time cost around 300-400 retail , closer to $200 wholesale . To get one of those quarantined, I’d imagine it’s going to run 700-800

Yeah, the high end wrasses are tough. I wish the end consumers knew more about the origins of their fish - I'd like to run a poll to see if fish from one region are worse than those from others.

I have a suspicion that it has something to do with the supply chain. Banggai cardinalfish used to be hardy until the virus got into the exporter's tanks. Green chromis have more issues with Uronema now that the supply chains have gotten so long....

Jay

 

[Huskymaniac]

That looks less of an issue. If the fish is still feeding, I would just keep feeding it see if over time, it continues to improve.

jay

I think maybe I can somehow get the fish back to normal. Was eating up until the end. Found dead this morning.

 

[hans4811]

One way around it is to buy fully quarantined fish

Not necessarily!

Bought my Naoko wrasse from ReefPro, a fully quarantined fish, and the price to boot ! Was dead the second day !

Showed the uncontrolled spinning and swimming head up within 24 hours…was crab food, never to be seen again ! Wrote an email to them with a vid attached showing them, and of course they denied it having this problem when shipped….so shipping ?…who knows.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Not necessarily!

Bought my Naoko wrasse from ReefPro, a fully quarantined fish, and the price to boot ! Was dead the second day !

Showed the uncontrolled spinning and swimming head up within 24 hours…was crab food, never to be seen again ! Wrote an email to them with a vid attached showing them, and of course they denied it having this problem when shipped….so shipping ?…who knows.

Sorry to hear about your fish. Identifying this syndrome from other possible problems is difficult. The single defining factor that we are using is if the fish spins/swims head up, but ALSO still feeds or at least tries to. If your fish did try to feed then it was probably UNWD. If it ignored food, then I would think that shipping trauma is more likely.
Jay

 

[baumer1781]

I'm seeing this issue after adding a McCosker's flasher wrasse to my DT. It was quarantined and sold by Dr. Reef. I have an untested hypothesis, and do understand that I'm new to reef aquaria when I say this. Is it possible that powerhead technology has just increased the flow rates and programs to a point that a wrasse might get injured if an unsuspecting blast comes from an MP40 or 60, something with new programmable functions? Their swimming style and long bodies might not withstand this.

Mine was swimming just fine for a week in the DT but I was acclimating an anemone so flow was being slowly ramped up at the same time. Could it be that the rise in programmable high flow for SPS is on the same timeline as these wrasses injuries? That would explain why we aren't seeing external injury. The idea came that now that it is swimming poorly, I see it getting severely pushed around by the 4k gph peaks. An odd thing about mine, it seems to have its right side up more often when it does manage horizontal swimming. Both fins are fine, it is eating a variety of foods. It often has its head up doing the pogo swim described though.

Seems like whatever it is, nothing that I do will likely help at this point, and just hope for the best I assume?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I'm seeing this issue after adding a McCosker's flasher wrasse to my DT. It was quarantined and sold by Dr. Reef. I have an untested hypothesis, and do understand that I'm new to reef aquaria when I say this. Is it possible that powerhead technology has just increased the flow rates and programs to a point that a wrasse might get injured if an unsuspecting blast comes from an MP40 or 60, something with new programmable functions? Their swimming style and long bodies might not withstand this.

Mine was swimming just fine for a week in the DT but I was acclimating an anemone so flow was being slowly ramped up at the same time. Could it be that the rise in programmable high flow for SPS is on the same timeline as these wrasses injuries? That would explain why we aren't seeing external injury. The idea came that now that it is swimming poorly, I see it getting severely pushed around by the 4k gph peaks. An odd thing about mine, it seems to have its right side up more often when it does manage horizontal swimming. Both fins are fine, it is eating a variety of foods. It often has its head up doing the pogo swim described though.

Seems like whatever it is, nothing that I do will likely help at this point, and just hope for the best I assume?

Yes, the injury hypothesis keeps coming up. It hasn't been completely ruled out yet, but the one deciding factor in my mind is the constant lack of physical damage to these fish....if the issue was from an injury, there should be associated missing scales or other signs of an injury.

Also, the first case I saw of this was a wrasse in a quarantine system with low flow and just an air stone. Other people have reported the syndrome in similar tanks with low flow. I think that a tank wall strike cannot be ruled out 100%, as all fish are kept in tanks, (grin) but again, I don't see signs of injury. Also, it is only seen in three different genus of wrasse, not other wrasses or other fish - to me, that implies some specific viral disease, but we still just don;t know.

Jay

 

[Dweezilz]

I'm seeing this issue after adding a McCosker's flasher wrasse to my DT. It was quarantined and sold by Dr. Reef. I have an untested hypothesis, and do understand that I'm new to reef aquaria when I say this. Is it possible that powerhead technology has just increased the flow rates and programs to a point that a wrasse might get injured if an unsuspecting blast comes from an MP40 or 60, something with new programmable functions? Their swimming style and long bodies might not withstand this.

Mine was swimming just fine for a week in the DT but I was acclimating an anemone so flow was being slowly ramped up at the same time. Could it be that the rise in programmable high flow for SPS is on the same timeline as these wrasses injuries? That would explain why we aren't seeing external injury. The idea came that now that it is swimming poorly, I see it getting severely pushed around by the 4k gph peaks. An odd thing about mine, it seems to have its right side up more often when it does manage horizontal swimming. Both fins are fine, it is eating a variety of foods. It often has its head up doing the pogo swim described though.

Seems like whatever it is, nothing that I do will likely help at this point, and just hope for the best I assume?

I had one from Dr. Reef that also had that same issue. Mine was good for 2 weeks in the display and then one day he was showing all the signs. That means he was good for well over 30 days at Dr. Reef's and then 2 weeks in my display. I'm not 100% convinced they don't suffer a spinal issue due to a glass strike that doesn't leave external damage on the head, but as Jay said, nobody knows for sure what is going on and people who know way more than I do feel it's likely not that. The wrasse genus that get this would also have to have a more susceptible spine for some reason since not all types of wrasse have the issue. I also think I read that some of the wrasse in the wild show this so I don't know that spinal injury could happen as easily in the ocean.

I tried to nurse mine in an acclimation box for a week; he ate when food happened to pass right by his mouth, but it just kept getting worse, so I ended up putting him down with clove oil. Make sure to reach out immediately to Dr. Reef who is absolutely fantastic about backing up his fish.

 

[Shooter6]

I had one from Dr. Reef that also had that same issue. Mine was good for 2 weeks in the display and then one day he was showing all the signs. That means he was good for well over 30 days at Dr. Reef's and then 2 weeks in my display. I'm not 100% convinced they don't suffer a spinal issue due to a glass strike that doesn't leave external damage on the head, but as Jay said, nobody knows for sure what is going on and people who know way more than I do feel it's likely not that. The wrasse genus that get this would also have to have a more susceptible spine for some reason since not all types of wrasse have the issue. I also think I read that some of the wrasse in the wild show this so I don't know that spinal injury could happen as easily in the ocean.

I tried to nurse mine in an acclimation box for a week; he ate when food happened to pass right by his mouth, but it just kept getting worse, so I ended up putting him down with clove oil. Make sure to reach out immediately to Dr. Reef who is absolutely fantastic about backing up his fish.

Another cause that makes sense to me is they are hitting the glass when diving into the sand.

 

[albano]

Another cause that makes sense to me is they are hitting the glass when diving into the sand.

?? fairy wrasses?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

The other argument against this being a strike injury are the symptoms; gradual onset and then the fish continue to feed and will live for quite some time like that, but never getting better. Aside from the lack of bruising from the fish hitting something, that sort of injury is acute, it doesn’t grow worse over time. Then, why don’t some of the fish just outright die from it? Why don’t some recover?

I think in the end, histopathology is going to show some infection involving the spinal nerves.

Jay

 

[Dweezilz]

The other argument against this being a strike injury are the symptoms; gradual onset and then the fish continue to feed and will live for quite some time like that, but never getting better. Aside from the lack of bruising from the fish hitting something, that sort of injury is acute, it doesn’t grow worse over time. Then, why don’t some of the fish just outright die from it? Why don’t some recover?

I think in the end, histopathology is going to show some infection involving the spinal nerves.

Jay

I have zero clue but always looking to answer the unanswerable. I wonder if there's any possible way that due to their constant motion the injury might get worse? Maybe swelling continues to grow for days and they continue to injure themselves with movement? Like if they somehow could be kept totally still, it would get better. Have we seen that if we don't put them to sleep it just gets to the point of no movement at all but still alive and willing to eat if food is put near their mouth? I'd think with a disease maybe willingness to eat would decline.

With mine, I don't know specifically that it was getting all that much worse after a day or so, it just wasn't getting any better, which in my mind was worse! I know I saw him spaz out a few times in the tank when I turned the lights off/on abruptly a few times while programming my Hydra before the issue started. It's just so odd that if it was a disease nobody can pinpoint it. I guess if not enough people are looking it's hard to pinpoint.

 

[sc50964]

Following. Always thought it was spinal or back injury