Pectoral Fin Stuck In Gill!

I have a Purple Tilefish and noticed today that his Left pectoral fin is folded into his gill; NEVER seen this before! He is swimming, eating, breathing and acting completely normal and hangs with the other Purple Tilefish.

They have been in my 185 DT for 3 days; bought them over the weekend, placed in 20L QT, QT blew a seam at 3am draining 10g on the floor, bagged the Tilefish acclimated them into the 185, no problems, eating, swimming with other Tilefish, two small Mimic Tangs and two cleaner shrimp - all happy, no fighting.

This tank is also 38" deep, so the chances of successfully netting him or rather low. Could the cleaner shrimp have done this? They spent their share of time visiting the cleaners.

Any ideas on what to do?

These are the best pics I could get, will try to get better ones:

 

Can't say I have ever seen or heard of that either.

Those are beautiful Purple Tile fish, I have been tempted to get some in the future.

The decision to intervene and physically remove the fish for a moment provide assist by attempting to correct the issue would be extremely difficult for me.
I believe I would do a wait and watch on this one.

Good luck and bump for someone with a better idea.

 

When my chalk bass messed with a hermit crab things went bad. The hermit clamped onto the bass's lip and wouldnt let go. He was pulled from his shell and died, but still wouldnt let go. Took me an hour to catch the fish and remove the hermit from him. I say this because i didnt know if i would attempt to catch the fish and help him, or let him try himself. If i didnt help it would have died. I reccomend catching the fish!

 

Catch him, lay him down on a piece of wax paper, As quickly and as carefully as possible take a tooth pick and flip his fin from his gill. then put him back.

Thats what I would do. He might be a little scuffed up but it will grow back eventualy.

anybody else got any ideas?

 

I really don't think I can safely catch him - with a net anyways. I will get a fish trap this week and see it that will work. IF I could get him out, I think it would be easy to quickly fix him up.
I was hoping it would come out on it own, but not the case so far. He is still acting normal in every way.

See what I mean about catching him....:-/

 

UPDATE: Fin removed!

I didn't need to use my trap, I placed the net in the water at the surface for about 30 minutes to get them use to it, then fed the tank and first caught one of the mimics (If I was trying to catch this Mimic, it would not have happen...) I then caught the correct Tilefish rather quickly!

I had a cloth wet with SW layed out, put on latex gloves and put on my head set magnifier glasses - I looked like a halfazz doctor haha.

I made a FET (Fin Extraction Too) using a zip-tie and used the thin blunt pointed end to slip between his body and the gill/fin and lightly pulled it out.I held him in the net while doing this and his out of water time was 30 seconds.
Back in the DT, he immediately swam down into his night sleeping spot deep into the rock and hid. I fed chunks of Rod's frozen food and he came right out to feed (Piggish)as normal.

He is moving the fin and swimming with it, but it is more forward towards his nose than it should be. I'm sure it will get back to normal position in due time as it was forward, stuck in the gill for a while. He is also spending time at the fish wash with the Cleaner Shrimp.

He actually handled this well and when I cupped my hand around him while in the net, he totally calmed down and allowed me to do this.
I'll keep an eye on him and hope for the best. He's swimming and food hunting now 20 minutes after.
I will call this a success if all is well in a few days, but feeling some major relief right now!
Thanks!


F.E.T (Patent Pending...)

His left fin:

 

Glad you were successful.

 

Congrats, good job

 

WTG! Keep us updated.

 

Thanks!
He's been doing really good, the fin is still forward a bit but has full movement and swims and act completely normal.

These fish are just amazing with their colors and activities - my LFS got 4 more in yesterday and I got 2. They will be a happy foursome when they get paroled from QT into the DT in a few weeks.

I'll keep you posted on his recovery.