Odd case of Internal Parasites

[Orion]

Boy I really hate starting a thread in this forum...

It would seem that my cyprichromis have internal parasites. I've lost 4 in four weeks. There are no outward signs of any of the ones that have died being sick. I do have one female that looks very bad, but she is still kicking for the moment anyway. She has a severly sunken in abdomen area.

I've had them for right at four months. And they were the very last fish to go into the tank. I've not added anything else since then. Isn't this a little long for IP's to start showing up now?

I'll admit, I haven't been as attentive in the past month as I should have been with water changes. But I've not gone longer than two weeks at most without one.

Ammonia - 0
Nitrites - 0
Nitrates - <5

I have lost a few other fish since I moved everyone into the 75. I'm down to one julie from 6, and my female N. brevis died a short while back. But I always blamed these to the aggresive counterparts. The female brevis isn't the first one that the male brevis has taken out. Stands a good chance that I haven't been paying enough attention to them and it comes back to my fault, not aggresion.

They all eat like Tanganyikan's should, even the skinny female cyp.

All other fish seem healthy and well. None have any outward signs of anything wrong with them. I've never faced Internal Parasites before, and I want to hit them hard and fast to try and recover what I can.

I've read a little on treating with Metro I belive it was for IP's, also treating the food with a garlic additive. Does this sound like a good plan? Any other brands/types of meds that I should get? I don't have anything on hand, so I will have to place an order online for them (seeing as now I have no LFS...).

I guess I've just been to wraped up in working on my 45 gallon that I've let the tank's and fish I have slip. Thank goodness I'm just about done with it. I feel like such a heel for this.

 

[Lotus]

I believe it takes a while for symptoms of the parasites to show up. Are you sure it's not some other kind of disease? Do you think they are intestinal parasites?

I think Metro/garlic is a good idea.

I'm currently testing out the Gel-Tek internal parasite med (although I'm not entirely sure that's what my dwarf puffer has). I know H2O is also testing some meds on definite internal parasites (cammalarus/roundworms). The fish supposedly eat the little gel blobs, which clears out the parasites. Jungle also has an anti-parasite food out.

 

[svetlana]

Jungle parasite clear contains metro but it is not enough to eradicate the IP although it is good supplemental med which causes no stress for the fish. Metro-soaked food or anti-parasite flakes should help if they are still eating.
It's really strange that the IP incubation period took so long (4 months you said). Maybe there is something else :?

 

[Orion]

Thanks Lotus.

I have no idea what's wrong to be honest. I realize that it could be a number of things. But the reason I lean tword internal parasites is because of the lack of any outward signs of a problem from the fish that have died, and the super skinny female cyp.

So if I treat for internal parasites, should I also treat for something else at the same time, like a bacterial infection? I don't like the idea of treating for two different things at the same time, so to treat one first, should I treat for the parasites? I would think so.

So the treated food gets it out of the fish and into the water, so what is going to keep the fish, or other fish, from contracting the same thing? My guess is that as long as I'm treating with medicated food that the parasites will not be able to host in the fish, and by not being able to feed, will soon die without a host.

What I find so odd about this, is that all my fish in this tank have come from reputible breeders except for the brevis, but I've had him for well over a year (or close too).

Sorry, I'm kinda shaken up by all of this. I've never had to deal with many problems before, and basicly need reassurance of what steps to take now.

I may get a few different kinds of treated foods and see how that works out.

 

[Orion]

Thanks for the tips svetlana. I may try and get the stuff that you soak the food in.

Yeah, I though it was a long time for the syptoms to show too, and in end the end it may very well turn out to be something else. I guess I'll start treating for internal parasites, and if I don't see any improvments after a while, I'll start treating for something else.

 

[Lotus]

Sorry to hear about your troubles

I wouldn't treat with antibiotic at the same time either. I would go for the IP treatment for a week or so and see what happens.

The anti-parasite meds supposedly kill the parasites, which are then hopefully passed by the fish. Another post said that it can possibly kill the parasites, but the fish have trouble passing them through the digestive system, in which case you could feed peas or brine shrimp to help clear the gut.

I had a really nasty systemic disease in a bunch of fish a while back... few symptoms, they just kept dying. It was very upsetting. Even though I had quarantined the new fish, apparently I hadn't quarantined long enough. I believe that was some kind of bacterial infection, but I still have no evidence.

 

[Orion]

Like I say, I really don't know what's going on. Just my best guess that its parasites. Gotta start somewhere, and it seems like a logical choice right now.

Temp stays around 77, would it do me any good to raise it a little above 80?

What really gets me, is that I have very little experince with diesease and such, so I'm at a loss for the most part. I just hate not being able to be on top of things.

Brine shrimp to clear the gut out? Would live BBS do better than the frozen I wonder? ( I don't like pea's, so needless to say we don't have any hehe)

Another peice of evidence that leads me to belive the problem lies within the fish and not the tank or water is that all the other fish look fine (of course so did the dead ones). My multie colony is still breeding like crazy with little fry all around, so I would think that if it were something in the water that they would be more likley to scum to what ever it is.

Wish me luck with this. Yeah I wanted to get some new fish, but shesh, I didn't want my old ones to die to get them.

If anyone comes up with any other idea's on diesease or treatments let me know.

 

[Orion]

This may or may not be relevant. If it is, then I don't know what to do.

Came home to find the skinny female in the above mentioned posts and saw that the spine was severly bent just behind the head. It doesn't seem to be perminate at least right now, as when I was netting her she was straight for a short time.

TB mabey? If so, any idea's?

Also, with this new information, should I still continue the plan to treat for Internal Parasites?

 

[Lotus]

It could be TB, but it could be many other things too, causing the bent spine.

I would still treat for parasites, the meds aren't that bad, and it shouldn't harm them.

 

[Orion]

I've finaly got everything in and have started treatment. Next time I will pay for expediated shipping...

Per Seachem, I'm using a cocktail of metro and garlic guard with frozen brine shrimp and am keeping the slurry in the fridge. I am going to feed three times a day with a toothpick. I figured a toothpick was the simplest way to feed while keeping from over feeding the tank.

I've not had anymore deaths, but in the past few days one of the male cyps have started to develop the sunk in belly. It's not bad yet, but it's noticable. Insteed of the normal plump shape of a cyp, this one is flat on the bottom. Not a good sign, I hope I'm not to late.

They aren't taking the brine shrimp with the normal frenzy of eating. It may be the garlic that's throwing them off. I'm going to mix up a seperate batch with only metro and no garlic and see if that makes any difference.

*sigh* if all my cyps die off due to this, I guess that will take care of my worry of adding tropheus with cyps.

Still none of the other tankmates show any sign of trouble. Only the cyps.

Here's hopeing for the best. *celebrate

 

[Lotus]

Good luck with the treatment!

Have they been eating non medicated foods normally or do they seem like they're not as hungry as normal? Sick fish often eat less.

 

[Orion]

Yes they have been eating just fine. The cyps inparticular seem to be rather stuborn when it comes to new or different food, so for now I'm hopeing it is nothing more than that. This is why I want to prepare some food without the garlic and see if that does make a difference.

I also will prepare some of the staple NLS food that I feed with the garlic and see how well they take that.

 

[H2O]

I have been treating my tank for camellanus worms-with seeming success. I am currently using Prazi-Pro and Jungle internal parasite food. (I tried to feed Gel-tek, but couldn't get them to eat it.) I haven't lost anyone in about 2 weeks.
Right after I started treatment with the Prazi-Pro, I lost 1-2 fish per day for 4 days. Probably from the worms dying, and rotting inside fish.
Prior to noticing the camellanus worms barely sticking out of 1 (and only 1) fish, there were no symptoms, although looking back, the angels growth had slowed quite a bit.
I know this is gross, but the next time a fish dies, you might want to do an autopsy. If there is an internal parasite, you should be able to see it.

I just wanted to share what I've learned so far-best of luck with your fish-hopefully you will be able to save the rest.

P.S. on a completely different note-I absolutely love your avatar!

 

[TLM4x4]

Yeah, good luck with your fish Orion...I hope treating them will be successful!













po po purrrrrrrrsian kitty kitty bein tortured so by da masta

 

[Orion]

Thanks H2O that does help. I'll be sure to keep an eye out on the waste to see if I actually see any thing. A necropsy probably isn't a bad idea at this stage, if it's already dead then I'm not going to do any harm I supose.

Thanks to you too TLM. And don't let the kitty fool you, she likes more than you may think.

 

[Lotus]

Good to hear they're eating!

I'm trying out the Gel-Tek on a dwarf puffer of mine, but I am soaking the bloodworms in the gel to see if it works that way. I'm not sure she has parasites, but it certainly hasn't killed anyone in the tank yet (including amano shrimp).

It might be a good idea to do a necroscopy, and see if there's anything there that you can see. I have a fish health book with some nasty IP pics, if I can help you with ID in any way (the book doesn't have pics of everything, but some of the common parasites are in there).

 

[TLM4x4]

How are the fish looking and doing this morning Orion? Im sorry for your troubles...

 

[Orion]

Thanks Lotus, from the looks of things I may end up getting to do one.

This morning another male is showing sign's of the sunk in stomache, and this one is acting differently, a trait that the others hadn't shown. He has isolated himself from the rest of the school, and is swiming verticly aginst the back glass nose down. But I don't this is a swim bladder issue because he is able to stay quite boyant right where he want's to be, and can swim in the normal possition at times too.

This is really getting agrivateing. But I can't throw in the towel on only day three of treatments, that would just be silly.

I've mixed up a total of four different batches of medicated food now. Frozen brine with metro and garlic, brine with only metro, NLS pellet food with garlic and Metro, and NLS with only garlic.

Went to petsmart today and stocked up on some frozen foods as I will not pay the shipping for them. I got some mysis shrimp, so I will try it and see how they take it.

Still perplexes me how this is devistating my cyps, yet no other fish in the tank seem affected.

 

[Orion]

So the one that was swimming verticaly was bobbing up and down among the sand this morning. I have since isolated him and will preform a necropsy this afternoon.

One external note I can already make is that some of the scales seem to be missing on both sides of the body just in front of the tail. I didn't notice this before, but I hadn't been able to get such a good look either. I don't know if this is related to the illness, or maybe where he had rubbed on some rocks, or other wise knocked into them.

I don't know if it would help or not, but would adding the metro directly to the tank water help anything? It has directions on the tube for adding it to the water, but unless the parasite was in the water I don't see how it could affect it much.

 

[FroggyFox]

I would agree that putting it in the water may not help a whole lot, but would it hurt anything?? (besides the $$ for the metro of course)