Double Emergency Room - Sparkling Gourami's

I haven't ever kept sparkling gouramis but @Matt has and so may be more familiar with their behaviour.

However, on the basis of my current and former experience of other fish:

(1) the little white spot on the gill cover:
* male goldfish do get breeding tubercles on their gillplates when read to breed - but I'm not aware of others species getting these (a bit of internet searching might reveal the answer to this);
* it's possible that an isolated white spot can come and go (my lone neon green rasbora has had one on her mouth intermittently throughout the ~18 months I've had her), whereas its development into a fungus or into more white spots would indicate something requiring treatment;
* no harm at all in having whitespot treatment to hand, in case you do indeed need to medicate this - if so, time will be of the essence;
* keep monitoring ammonia, nitrite and nitrates to ensure that water quality remains optimum as per currently.

(2) sluggish, heightened breathing rate, buoyancy struggles and swimming difficulties:
* [assuming he is definitely a he and not a female full of eggs and being harassed into breeding by the other male]...
* nitrite can pose buoyancy difficulties - but your level is spot-on, so that theory can be eliminated in your case;
* some species do breathe faster if constipated - I particularly notice this in cardinal tetras (quick internet search concurs with this);
* try fasting for a day, then feeding pea (shell off, each half cut into tiny morsels) to relieve any intestinal blockages that might account for what you're witnessing;
* keep us posted after trying this, and we'll see how to advise further;
* have some medication for bacterial infection on standby, in the event of need to use it (eg eSHa 2000, Waterlife Myxazin).

@fcmf Thanks for your advice, I will fast for today and try pea method tomorrow. I have also ordered eSHA2000 as advised in case I need it.

@Matt Thank you too, I have some pouches of bloodworm to try also. The QT water is the same as the MT and is changed twice a week due to smaller volume and is currently at 28^oC and the MT is at 27^oC, which I upped last night.

At time of typing I am considering swapping the two guys over, mainly because the larger male (who is not plump in the belly and is more streamline) because he is really struggling in the MT to stay buoyant and I've had to assist him in the net near the top of the tank so he can rest and reach the top for air if required. The white spot as disappeared on the other fish and he seems fit and well albeit with the the redness in the tail fin where he has been nipped. I would like to point out that the main culprit of the "chasing" was the larger male who is currently poorly. 

In addition to this I have seen some attempted breeding behaviour but no nests or areas that are patrolled by only two of the fish. I initially noticed this aggression when the larger Male and two females joined this male in the tank after loosing one in a filter accident. Tank is 60L and is planted hiding spots and covered areas. they are fed a mixture of Micro pellets, tetra pro crisps and occasionally bloodworm or freeze dried daphnia. Regimented water changes of 50% per week completed yesterday and is temperature matched and de chlorinated. 

On the basis of what you've described, I would agree - swap the two fish over. In fact, you could lower the water level in the QT to just covering the filter, thereby reducing the distance the buoyancy-challenged fish has to travel. [I moved a seemingly at-death's-door fish from the MT into the QT approx 6 weeks ago - he's been doing so much better in there with the gentler filter outflow, etc.]

thanks ill get this done right away!

edit: I am too late, he is gone  check for 5 mins for any sign of life but none, on closer inspection his abdomen area was quite swollen. This was very fast <36 hours since I noticed any issues.

Thank you both again for your assistance. I will keep the other fish in QT to allow his fin to heal naturally and medicate as required.

Thank you for kind comments and advice. I am glad he didn’t suffer too long and now I have meds available I can react quicker next time.

Thanks,

Today has been normal. Feeding time was a frenzy and our hospital admission is also feeding and doing well. No medicine added hoping for a natural fix 

Thanks for the update and sorry to read about this.
Fishkeeping is so often about "learning on the job" and constantly so (eg what works one time doesn't necessarily work the next time or for a different fish), and, frustratingly, often clarity is only gained after the event.
I still berate myself over mistakes in the past.  The fluctuating status and sudden demise of my last elderly x-ray tetra recently doesn't sit right with me, in contrast to the other two x-rays' deaths which were gradual and clearly heading in one direction - and I'm still trying to figure out what accounted for the dramatic improvement for several days to a week followed by his catastrophic demise.  Unfortunately, processing these and accepting them is never straightforward, so you have my full empathy.

It is unfortunate that I can readily think of others on here that have also had similar experiences, myself included. I can empathise with your situation and the resolve that comes from it to improve is important to recognise as a massively positive thing.

One thing we can probably all agree on is that we never stop learning - the every day is a school day principle - which is why I find forums such as this so valuable, for helping me learn from others experiences too. So that you for being so open with us about your experience and highlighting the need for ensuing a good balanced diet for our fish to everyone.

but have since learned that the medication affects the fish more than the disease it is intended to treat.I now know it is more likely that it was me who killed the fish with medication not the whitespot. I now know that whitespot should be treated with heat alone - 30 deg C - for 2 weeks, and if that doesn't kill the whitespot to add common salt to the tank.

I knew of this alternative to treating whitespot but not that it was now considered the preferred option generally (albeit, in hindsight, you realised it would have been the better option in your own case).  That's helpful to know / file away in my own head for future reference, if this is the case.

@Sue when you say common salt do you mean table salt? I seem to recall you being very aware of the difference between the two and without remembering the detail of the chemistry (I still struggle with this subject and so things like this tend not to ‘stick’ with me) I made a mental note to never table salt in the aquarium. Perhaps I’m being picky about a word here - not my intention really - just want to make sure @LeakysLab has the right product?

Very interesting to read the better treatment is temperature and I can well imagine that it much less impactful of the fish. If I ever have an outbreak (been fortunate so far) then I will be sure to use this approach. I wonder if there are any species that can’t withstand this temperature?

Also I wonder do you think we should update this thread? https://forums.thinkfish.co.uk/fish-medicines/medicines-for-treating-different-conditions/

I'm a bit concerned about us updating threads with definitive statements such as "the best treatment is..."  In Sue's case, she deduced that this would have been the best approach - but I'm not sure that we can necessarily extrapolate that more generally, as many factors are involved that might affect ultimate treatment outcome including stage of the whitespot's lifecycle that it's discovered at. 

I've had a browse around various forums and, in a nutshell, few folk advocate that approach per se; the vast majority advocate medication but I'm well aware that many folk are product-oriented.  Taking into account various discussions including the benefits and risks of raising the temperature and adding salt, what appears from my reading to be the optimum approach is medication (particularly beneficial if the whitespot has moved into the fish's gills as temp and salt won't help by then) in conjunction with regular and thorough vacuuming of the substrate, increased water changes to 50%, temperature increase (subject to species' toleration) plus combatting the ensuing reduced oxygen with increased surface agitation (etc), +/- salt (depending on the species' likely tolerance of that). This would also appear consistent with https://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/features/how-to-solve-a-problem-like-whitespot/ which suggests heat and salt as an adjunct to meds. So many factors seem to be involved in whitespot that a multi-pronged approach is probably wise.

I'm just conscious that we seemed to head down a route of advocating 50% water changes before.  I delved into various forums to have a look at the nature of the discussions, and these larger water changes than the conventional 25-30% ones seemed very much to be in response to specific situations and problems, as opposed to 'per se'.  Indeed, after that, I've kept an eye out for the well-renowned experts' views on these matters (eg staff of PFK mag) and the general 25-30% water change seems to still be advocated under ordinary circumstances, at least for reasons of not causing swings in water chemistry, but depends on the species (eg some species require larger ones) and other factors, and some problematic instances do require as much as 50% at the time.

Absolutely, I think we should be sharing opinion based on our individual and collective valuable experiences, but I wonder if we could be less 'categorical'.