Oscar Wound, HITH? & how would you treat

My Oscar, Rusty, has a large and growing surface wound on his cheek between his eye and gills. There is also another spot starting, same side, above his eye. I hate to think HITH because it's totally on the surface, pink and not craterish, but it is spreading. HITH, though, what I fear it is, doesn't make any sense. His tank conditions before my taking over his care were terrible. He's in the best environment he's been in, in over a year. I guess the stress of getting his tank clean might have caused it though.

I've taken out the activated charcoal, I did a water change. All levels are great, though nitrates are a little high. I'm getting ready to add aquarium salt to the tank because I really don't know what else to do. I also noticed some mucusy feces and his belly seems a little swollen.

I have some really great pics if someone thinks they can help.

Thanks so much in advance for any help you can offer.

Sarah and Rusty

 

Sorry to hear about your Oscar, and yea would love to see some pictures. You won't be able to post any pictures on this site until you are a week old here then put them into something like snapfish (that's what I do).
But here is a couple of websites that has helped me in the past diagnose some issues.

http://animal-world.com/encyclo/fresh/i ... 20Diseases

http://www.tropicalfishcentre.co.uk/index.html

Hope that you find a cure and reason for your Oscar's issue and hope that you can get it resolved quickly.

How much of a water change do you do at a time? How much are you feeding and how often?

good luck and keep us posted.

 

Thank you for your reply

Thanks so much for your speedy response. I've seen both of those sites. The problem is that I'm not quite convinced it's HITH, everyone has different opinions on how to treat HITH, (if it is that).

He's in a 75 gallon tank and I've been doing about 15 gallons at a time. The tank is at the high school and all the water there is softened so I have to bring it in by hand in 1 gallon jugs. :-( I use a net to get out the solid matter almost on a daily basis. I'm running two filters and rinse them out once a week, but not on the same day.

I hit the tank with some stress zyme stuff so hopefully that will help. My gut tells me to try the aquarium salt and give him a chance, but I don't know if that is enough.

Thanks guys!!

Sarah and Rusty