Little Moray eel has been hurt

mookz

mookz

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Could someone PLEASE assist me or point me in the right direction!
I have a baby Girdled moray eel that has been damaged, there is a open wound on his side with some pink matter protruding, i assume he got into a tussle with a crab that i gave him for food, we put 3 tiny little crabs in for him to eat last week and he went after them, he was soooo excited.

now it seems that either one of the crabs or my anemone crab damaged him *cries*.

We also noticed a large "brittle worm" (i think) in the sand could this scary looking thing have hurt him ?

please could someone please give me advise!!

its so heart breaking, he is moving about in his cave and sticking out his head, i only noticed it today, and thinking back he hasn't been as active for the past three days.

Could i catch him and try and push the stuff back in carefully or somehow treat it?
How would i sedate him etc?

*sigh*:(
 
the bristle worm wouldn't have caused it, but leave its stuff. if you can, treat it in a quarantine tank. i think what you could do is try and stop infection. that would be the best. a bit of vitamin c will help here. same as wat we take. i'm not sure if you can put tablets in to your display tank but if its in a quarantine tank it would be better. the guru's can help out more.
 
I agree with Scuba ninja - brstleworms are very unlikely to have caused this, what else is in the tank? how big were the crabs? is it possible there is a mantis or pistol shrimp in the tank?
To treat, i would suggest QT if possible, then treat with antibiotics, but if catching the eel will cause more stress than desired then you need to ensure your water quality is absolutely spot on as this will reduce the chances of infection, you will also need to feed well, which is contradictory with keeping the water quality up, so small and regular water changes with wet skimming should help.
If the animal is healthy, he should beat the wound, but you do need to find out what caused it.
 
Mike said:
I agree with Scuba ninja - brstleworms are very unlikely to have caused this, what else is in the tank? how big were the crabs? is it possible there is a mantis or pistol shrimp in the tank?
To treat, i would suggest QT if possible, then treat with antibiotics, but if catching the eel will cause more stress than desired then you need to ensure your water quality is absolutely spot on as this will reduce the chances of infection, you will also need to feed well, which is contradictory with keeping the water quality up, so small and regular water changes with wet skimming should help.
If the animal is healthy, he should beat the wound, but you do need to find out what caused it.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply
The crabs are tiny, he is about 12cm and the crabs are about 3cm across with small pincers.
He is in a Nano tank (40L) for now as we are upgrading to a 130L tank in the next week or 2, the water is topped up 5% everyday with 25% water changes weekly.
so we have visual on almost everything, no Mantis shrimp or pistol shrimp(i have noticed hundreds of tiny black and white shrimp about 1 - 5 mm long popping out of the live rock and sand chasing away small white crustaceans that are all over the tank).Other creatures are a tiny rock fish, 3 sea stars, anemone's, Snails, two hermits and two glass shrimp.(all the crustaceans and small fish are meant as food)

Could it have been the anemone crab? as he is the largest creature other than the eel?
Or maybe even the LR could have cut him in a fight with a crab?

The other problem is because of his size he will not accept any frozen foods i have tried everything (i used to keep brackish water morays and it took weeks to get them onto frozen food but they were much larger) and he only wants live food.
 
Mike said:
I agree with Scuba ninja - brstleworms are very unlikely to have caused this, what else is in the tank? how big were the crabs? is it possible there is a mantis or pistol shrimp in the tank?
To treat, i would suggest QT if possible, then treat with antibiotics, but if catching the eel will cause more stress than desired then you need to ensure your water quality is absolutely spot on as this will reduce the chances of infection, you will also need to feed well, which is contradictory with keeping the water quality up, so small and regular water changes with wet skimming should help.
If the animal is healthy, he should beat the wound, but you do need to find out what caused it.
Click to expand...
thanks for coming to the rescue mike, i felt a bit in the dark there, wanting to give help but not 100% sure on what was the best route
 
Keep up with the live food, it is possible he hurt himself on the liverock, in his enthusiasm to catch his dinner.
 
A quick update on my Moray (lovingly called toe-sock by my wife) he has fully recovered, devouring crabs and hermits and chattering his jaws at anything that dares move ;) thx guys soooooooooooooo much for the advise!!!!!

i have added in an extra 40 liter overflow unit with protein skimmer to compensate for his messy eating.
 
That is good news.

Morays have to have quite good mechanisms for fighting off infection and wounds because of the nature of how they live and who they eat. Bit like crocodiles.
 
how about some pics?
 
That's great news Mookz! Glad to hear it.
 
Excellent - we now need proof of this with lots of pretty pics of your little toe sock:lol:
 
Mike said:
Excellent - we now need proof of this with lots of pretty pics of your little toe sock:lol:
Click to expand...

Will do, gotta get some battery's for the camera, I am going to be collecting a bunch of hermits today, I should be able to get some pics of him inspecting the intruders :) .
 
Glad to hear he's OK Mookz, waiting for the pics :drool5:
 
Here he is!!!

Here is a action shot of him hunting a small fish, i went to the beach and collected some small purple hermits and baby mullets for him to eat.

the fish in the shots is a small rock fish i found in a rock pool.

You can also see a crabs leg....one of his previous victims.

hunt01.jpg


hunt02.jpg


hunt04.jpg


hunt05.jpg


hunt06.jpg


hunt07.jpg


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hunt09.jpg


:yeahdude:
 
Very cool. Have you got a thread about your tank? Would love to see and hear more about it.
 
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