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I noticed a few small spots on the upper half of a vaillanti’s body, it looked suspicious so I checked today and I see a small patch of white. It looks almost like it was a small wound that healed, it has no texture and doesn’t look like fungus, just a small white patch on its scales.
The fish was restless a few days ago, swimming up and down the glass for no reason, but now it behaves normally, eating and swimming like its otherwise healthy. The other fish don’t show any signs of sickness.
What medicine should be used, maybe this is ich or oodinium, and the medicine that has been recommended for that is probably not available to me soon enough (hexa-ex or spirohexol.)Also see all fish in tank shaking or shuddering, not all the time but it looks out of the ordinary when it happens.
Patch actually does look a little like fungus now. Not just a flat white film, it is cottony.
The shuddering is still there, maybe that symptom helps figure out what this is since it seems like the very few spots on one fish that now has a patch are the only other things to judge from.Jacob, since this is a Parosphromenus-site and not a Sphaerichthys-site, I cannot exclude special problems with the latter. On the other hand, this is unlikely. But Sphaerichthys are known to be extremely sensitive to skin parasites, and your descriptions, if correct (some good photos would be helpful), seem to indicate a series of subsequent events: first a small lesion, followed by a bacterial infection, and now a funghus. Such a series is highly probable with delicate fish, and the first cause may lie well in the past (before swimming in your tank). This happens rather often by the massive environmental changes (going through several tanks in the import stations and in your tank, at last).
But it is difficult to tell now the best remedy. If you treat the funghus, you may succeed with that but may not act against its causes. If you take measures against those (probably ich or Oodinium) you may not heal its cause and surely don’t treat its consequence, the funghus. If you use several medicines at the same time, you may stress the fish too much and risk antagonizing effects. If you do nothing you may risk secondary infections with the other fish of the group. So what would I do?
I would separate the fish by not catching it with a net but with a glass catching item in order not to touch the fish’s skin. Use strictly the same water by transferring it from the old tank into the new. Then, if it proves to be funghus, I should treat that with a funghicide sold in your aquarium store. If the symptoms disappear, wait and observe. The fish may recover. If it doesn’t, you must treat against the basic infections, but first determine what it is.
If it proves to be Ich or Oodinium, try to get Tetra Hexa-Ex or JBL Spirohexol. If you don’t get it, try a veterinary or a pharmacy, and order “2-amino-5-nitrothiazole 97%”. This is the active substance contained in the two named before. A producer is called Sigma-Aldrich Logistik GmbH, Kappelweg 1, D-91625 Schnelldorf (Germany). The product referece is 133507-25 G. I am pretty sure that there are other producers, too, and, of course, in the U.S, too.Thanks for the information. Is there a fungicide ingredient that is best?
It looks like the patch is slightly larger and more cotton like but it also looks like it is hanging by a thread. The sick fish is still eating, and I noticed that it and its mate still are showing the occasional strange shuddering. Maybe that’s “shimmying” and is a clue.
But that symptom isn’t enough to justify trying to medicate the whole tank, it seems.
I will try and take a picture but I only have a cell phone and an old camera that may not be much better than that. Maybe it’s time to get a decent camera.The actual cause of the problem I asked about in this thread was putting in the wrong water, r/o water that wasn’t acidic enough. Somehow misread or was careless with the ph tester.
Tetra Parasite Guard cleared the symptoms but until I changed the water to the right values the vaillantis still acted strange.
Now I have 4 paros (the deissneri sold by Wet Spot) and a school of small barbs in this tank, they seem fine except for the paros scratching.
They’re eating and they colored up from what they were when they were in a store in mildly acidic non blackwater conditions.
So everything is fine except the scratching. I want to wait since they’re new to the tank and maybe this is some kind of stress or problem that will solve itself. My experience tells me parasite guard could also be helpful, it hasn’t ever shown itself to be harmful to the vaillantis and has worked every time I used it. (for nebulous symptoms.)
Ingredients:
Praziquantel, Diflubenzuron, Metronidazole and Acriflavin.
I don’t know if I’m over reacting or if the scratching is something that can’t be ignored.
The vaillantis have proven to be not as sensitive as I predicted and maybe this is true for paros as well.
Despite the size of the tank and the presence of other fish the paros seem comfortable. May move them to a 5 gallon eventually, just to make it easier to watch them.Jacob, I told you earlier that such scratching can have many causes but the main in Oodinium. In the first stages the parasites are too small to be seen with our normal eyes. We had many cases whre even the best experts didn’t see the picture they knew as standard-appearance of Oodinium, but being the best they new: that’s Oodinium, an indicator of some sort of weakness. You may have provoked that but your mistaken measuring of the false pH.
And therefore I advise you once again to get hold of the only medicine really of help, namely the substance 2-amino-5-nitrothiazole. I even told you a producer (in a former posting). The original substance will not be sold in aquarium shops but in drug stores and shops for veterinaries.
But in Europe there are two or more producers of pet fish medicine, Tetra and JBL for example, who use that substance (and nothing else) for special products of them, namely “Hexa-Ex” (Tetra) and “Spirohexol” (JBL), but those medicines are not sold against Oodinium (there are others, but mostly they don’t work, forget them all), but they are sold against the “hole-disease” of Discus. Forget it and buy it: it’s an effective and safe medicice against Oodinium, especially in that early stages.
There must be American partners of these big companies. Perhaps you try to find them out in the internet. The websites of the aquarium products producer Tetra and of the aquarium products producer JBL will probably lead you towards that goal.I can tell you that my valliants are doing a little bit like yours, – a bit schratching however not serious, and they seem fine all other ways. I have done nothing about it. I would hesitate to see it as a sickness and I would not treat for it unless I was sure.
I wonder if, – though we do use osmosis water, – whether there can still be little bits and things in it, which is annoying for the skin ?
About paroes with other fish, – I have one lonely harveyi with four much bigger malpulutta kretseri, – and the little harveyi is the first one to the food, – not scared at all.I saw one vaillanti scratch and act sick when they were first introduced, seemingly from being bullied, and when it was separated it got better but maybe tetra parasite guard had something to do with that. There never were any signs of disease on its skin then, just those actions that made it look sick.
After that, only the recent problem that was caused and cured with water conditions, though parasite guard also made the skin symptoms recede before I corrected the ph.
The licorice gouramies didn’t seem to scratch today, they were busy with live artemia so maybe they were too distracted to bother or maybe it really was a temporary sign of stress.
I was told with puffers, it’s normal that they scratch since they have no scales, vaillantis have scales but it’s been said many times that they’re sensitive to skin problems.
I don’t know if it’s the r/o just based on when the water conditions were wrong, it was dramatic how their behavior changed. They hid together and were inactive, in addition to all the strange skin problems. It seemed like it’s more than just the bacteria attacking them, they really didn’t like the wrong ph water, and when it was corrected they were pretty fast to return to normal.
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