Illness/Sickness: Waterdog with illness

[cichlidjedi]

I was hoping some of you can help me out. I attended an Illinois area reptile swap meet this past weekend and purchased 5 Dwarf Waterdogs (Necturus punctatus). Now 4 of the 5 I have confirmed are for sure punctatus species. The 5th little guy I got is a different species I think Necturus lewis?
Now my issue is that this 2 1/2in. little caudate has a bad fungus growing on the back half of it's tail. When I got it this weekend it's tail was very white and almost looked like the start of a shed due to some damage it got on it's tail. It has gotten worse since I've got it home and as you can see some tissue is now showing and large tufts of fungus are developing. Should I use a scapel and amputate the infected part of the tail? If I do will it grow back? I'm afraid to use anti-fungal fish medications on this animal, so I'm hoping for some help. The other 4 are doing well and eating well,I will add pcitures below in another post. Any help would be great.

Chuck

 

[cichlidjedi]

Pictures of sick caudate Hoping to get good advice.

 

[Nathan050793]

Have you considered treating the fungus with salt-baths? It looks to me like the tail may be past the point where it can be saved; I'm not really an expert on treating medical problems though, so I would wait for a second opinion from someone a bit more well versed.

Good Luck

- Also it looks a lot like N.beyeri to me, much more so than punctatus or lewis, at least from those photos.

 

[pete]

I don't really know what would be the best option. Hopefully you can get that fungus under control. If you amputate it, perhaps the cut will get infected and it will spread further up the body. At least I can say for my N.maculosus, it had a piece of it's tail missing when I got her. That did grow back, but very slowly (relative to an axolotl's speed of regeneration). I didn't time it, but I'd guess that it took about an entire year, maybe more.

 

[cichlidjedi]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I had to amputate the tail because the fungus seemed to be spreading higher up on the tail. Were tail was removed it is no longer bleeding and he seems to be moving around better without a rotting tail. This is the second day in a row with a 15 minute saltbath to help avoid infection and also to help keep fungus from growing. I'll follow-up next week with updated pictures when he starts healing up better. Thanks again for feedback.

 

[Necturus101]

It's probally highly stress,make sure to have them in dark cold places where it can hide and it's recovery will be slow but it doesn't need the stress.Make sure it's well fed and give it time and see what happens.

 

[i_love_necturus]

I second Nathan, this is beyeri, or something from the beyeri complex.

 

[i_love_necturus]

Any updates on your waterdogs?