Reef Tank Quarantine Tank

My atlantic blue tang is having trouble breathing?

I got my atlantic blue tang on friday and it is now monday. He has no signs of any diseases at all. He is in a quarantine tank before i am going to put him in my 55 gallon Reef Tank. I took the water from my 55 gallon, i did a water change right before i got him. my water is in pristine condition right now. But he is breathing very hard and has been for about two days, and now i just noticed that he is breathing on one side and the other side is like the gills are sealed shut. can anyone tell me why or what the cause is.

Have you checked the water quality in the quarantine tank? Did you add an established biological filter to it? Are you currently adding any medication to the QT or doing a hyposalinity treatment?

It certainly may be gill flukes, but the first thing I would check is the water quality (ammonia and nitrite in particular). If either is high doing a water change in the QT tank should help some.

If water quality is not the issue, then I would suspect either flukes or some type of parasite.

Reef Tank Update – August