# shovelnose cat shedding?



## equidae9854 (Jun 27, 2005)

My female shovelnose cat sometimes has a clear-white, membraneous substance peeling off of her body in large sheets. I have never seen it happen to my male shovelnose. It's almost like when snakes shed their skin. I was wondering if this is normal. Otherwise she is perfectly healthy.

Oh, btw, the male is about 10" long, the female about 8", and they are housed in a 180gal.


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## flamingo (Nov 5, 2005)

Hmm..if you ask my opinion, there could be something wrong with it. Skin slime additives may help out a little. Also, if you don't have what i'm about to mention in the next paragraph, make sure you have some fungal or bacterial medications on hand. I had a bullhead once that would do that, and a few days later it turned into some bacterial skin disease..needless to say it died. Same thing also happens with brackish fish put into freshwater, and the other way around. While its not a brackish fish, I thought i'd throw that in.


Now here's a big issue...do you have any plecos in with it? Commons are a HUGE deal when keeping larger catfish like shovelnoses. My cousin had one with his pair of TSN's, and it would suck the skin slime of them almost every minute of the day if I remember correctly. While it only makes small marks, eventually it could lead in the whole thing "peeling off" like you mentioned.

I hope that helps and keep it updated!


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## komodbeam (Aug 21, 2006)

equidae9854 said:


> My female shovelnose cat sometimes has a clear-white, membraneous substance peeling off of her body in large sheets. I have never seen it happen to my male shovelnose. It's almost like when snakes shed their skin. I was wondering if this is normal. Otherwise she is perfectly healthy.
> 
> Oh, btw, the male is about 10" long, the female about 8", and they are housed in a 180gal.


It would seem that you would have a water quality problem. But that wouldnt explain why your other shovelnose hasnt had these issues. Other than that, it sounds like it has a bacterial infection. Now i have a question of my own. How are you sexing your shovelnoses at only 10"? What species are these shovelnoses?


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## yukalaeli87 (Jan 24, 2006)

someone who moved into an apartment in the city gave me these cats, and told me they were male and female. I've only had them for about 6 months, so I'm still learning about them. They are both active and feeding well, and share a tank with a 12" pleco, 5" pictus, and 6" featherfin cat, two 4" silver dollars, and a 5" tinfoil barb, but none of them bother each other.


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## yukalaeli87 (Jan 24, 2006)

Oh, sorry guys, yukalaeli87 is equidae9854 as well. I replied from a different computer, my sister's.


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## yukalaeli87 (Jan 24, 2006)

And the water stats are stable with 0 NH4, NO3, NO2.
The pH is a tad bit high, at pH 7.2

Not knowing what is wrong with my shovelnose, should I treat the tank with anything, or watch it for a while?
Maybe some extra aq. salt and some Melafix??


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