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Post by babygeige on Jul 10, 2010 21:11:23 GMT -5
If you've been following my thread "new tank," you'll know that I lost one of my new little angel fish last Sunday to what I believe is a parasite. I fed the rest of my fish (3 angels and 3 Colombian tetras) some anti-parasite medicated fish food Saturday-Monday, following the directions on the bottle.
Now it looks like 2 more angels have the same illness that killed the first angel. The tetras seem perfectly fine, as does the third remaining angel.
My dilemma is this: should I set up the 5 gal QT tank and move all the angels there to treat them, or just treat the whole 50 gallon tank? Would it be too stressful for the angels to switch to such a small tank?
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Post by bikeguy33 on Jul 11, 2010 11:31:43 GMT -5
if you can afford 10 times the meds ,i`d treat the tank if you can. other wise you are treating the symptom but not the disease so to speak.
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Post by Carl on Jul 11, 2010 12:21:00 GMT -5
Stephanie; Can you describe the symptoms in detail, as well as time line of these? I would likely recommend more than just Parasite Food, as well a Medicated Bath with salt, Methylene Blue, and maybe Metronidazole would be in order I almost wonder is you have the Angelfish Virus if your other fish are not effected. Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 11, 2010 16:00:26 GMT -5
I just decided to treat the whole tank. I'm using something from Jungle Labs in conjunction with their medicated food. It's a green powder that I can't remember the name of.
Carl, the timeline as I can recall for the first angel was about like this: I bought the angels on June 27. I began to suspect something wasn't right with the one angel maybe on the 29th due to some stringy poop and him breathing a little heavy. By July 1 I was convinced he was sick, he wouldn't eat and mostly hung around the top of the tank. But didn't have any appropriate meds or time to rearrange fish to QT him until Saturday July 3 and he died on the 4th.
I'm not sure about the Angelfish Virus. I didn't notice any excess mucus and I don't see any on either of the other 2 that are currently sick. Also, they are still swimming around. By the end of the week with the first one, he wasn't eating, but he still moved around, but stayed toward in the middle and top areas of the tank. Is stringy poo a symptom of Angelfish Virus?
So basically, the symptoms I noticed were heavy breathing, refusing to eat, stringy poo, and remaining near the top of the aquarium, but occasionally would go near the middle behind the tall driftwood I have in there or the heater.
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Post by Carl on Jul 11, 2010 19:02:19 GMT -5
Stringy poo is generally not a symptom of Angelfish Virus. My thoughts are treating as you have (if you could remember what you used and post it, this would be helpful). As well the bath I suggested earlier generally is quite helpful for the symptoms you did describe, which do fit an internal parasite, as well as an internal Aeromonas infectionClout or Jungle Parasite Clear are two helpful in tank treatments. Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 12, 2010 18:11:53 GMT -5
It's called Internal Parasite Guard, although the bottle says it clears internal parasites. It has Praziquantel, which I remember reading about in one of your articles, Carl. The anti-parasite medicated food also has prazi-stuff in it.
The directions for the Parasite Guard say to administer it every other day. I should barely have enough to get through the week. The food says to feed it for 3 consecutive days a week for 4 weeks. Today I have completed week 2 of that.
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Post by Carl on Jul 12, 2010 18:49:00 GMT -5
Stephanie, Jungle Internal Parasite Guard is a good product for in-tank treatment IMO, so hopefully this will help. Changing some water (20%) prior to each treatment generally increases effectiveness.
Adding baths to this treatment regimen would also likely be helpful.
Best of luck with your fish.
Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 12, 2010 19:06:39 GMT -5
Thanks Carl. I will do a water change tomorrow before the next treatment. I'll try to catch the angels and put them in a bath while I do the water change.
I tested my water today just to make sure everything is ok. I have a question. When doing KH and GH testing, should I be looking for when the water completely changes color? For example, with the KH test, at 4 drops, the color changed from blue to a greenish yellow, and at 5 drops, it really was yellow. So which do I go with?
Thanks again!
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Post by Carl on Jul 13, 2010 9:31:21 GMT -5
I would go with 4.5 to be more exact. so your KH would be 4.5 dKH or 80 ppm KH Regards; Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 15, 2010 21:25:30 GMT -5
I would go with 4.5 to be more exact. so your KH would be 4.5 dKH or 80 ppm KH Regards; Carl Ok. That makes sense. I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that the marble angel who was the most sick died last night. The good news is that the all black one seems to be recovering nicely. I've done MB & salt baths since Tuesday and today I did the 3rd treatment with the Parasite Guard. The bottle says to do up to 3 treatments. Since both of my remaining angels seem to be doing well, do you think I need to get more medicine, or would a couple more MB/salt baths be sufficient? I don't think I've seen any stringy poo dangling from the black angel since Tuesday evening. His breathing is pretty much back to normal as well. edit: I still have 2 more "treatments" with the anti-parasite medicated food as well. Tomorrow I am due to start the 3rd set of feedings with that.
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Post by Carl on Jul 16, 2010 9:05:56 GMT -5
My opinion is to continue recommended treatments (the feedings if I am following this thread correctly), as well a few more baths. I am sorry to read about the loss, but you have also had success with a problem (internal parasites) that is often quite difficult to treat, so congrats on your success as well Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 25, 2010 15:27:13 GMT -5
I treated the tank twice more with the paraguard and did a few more baths. I haven't seen any signs of stringy poo or heavy breathing on either of the angels in about a week. This weekend is also the 4th week of the anti-parasite food. According to the directions, this would be the last treatment with this as well.
Do you think they're in the clear? Next weekend I'd like to get a few more of the Colombian Tetras. They're pretty frisky with each other, and one of them is starting to look a tad beat up, just a frayed tail fin so far. I'm hoping to get more of them before things start to get worse.
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Post by Carl on Jul 25, 2010 18:01:11 GMT -5
I think you have done about as good a job as possible, so IMHO you should be good to go Carl
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Post by babygeige on Jul 31, 2010 19:45:44 GMT -5
I lost another angel! This one was always the healthiest, never showed any signs of parasites or anything. Over the past 4 or 5 days, he would hide most of the time and refused to eat. I was going to move him to isolation today, but he was dead this morning. At first I just thought that the Colombian tetras were just too boisterous and stressed him out, but I don't know what was wrong with him. There were no external signs of any problems at all. We're all pretty bummed. He was the most curious and had the most personality of the 4 angels that I bought.
Today I went to the little local chain store that I visited a couple of months ago and bought 3 of their koi angels. They are now in the 5 gal with a medicated wonder shell. They will stay there for a couple of weeks until I am reasonably sure that they aren't sick and that the inhabitants of the 50 gallon are done dying for a while.
The little black angel that had the parasite still seems to be recovered, at least. He's the last one I have from the 4 I bought last month.
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Post by Carl on Aug 1, 2010 10:36:59 GMT -5
I am really sorry about the loss of this personable/curious Angel Stephanie Was this fish exposed to the sick angel and was he treated along with your survivor? I think the isolation for a few weeks while treating with a Medicated Wonder Shell is a good idea. If at all possible, consider adding a UV Sterilizer to your 50 gallon aquarium, although this will not do too much for a parasite (although the UV will help with improving the fish' immunity), the UV will certainly help in case there are other issues that have not been identified such as a bacterium or virus. Carl
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Post by babygeige on Aug 1, 2010 15:04:37 GMT -5
Yes, he was exposed to the sick angels and was treated in the 50 gallon with the (now only) survivor and the 4 Colombian Tetras.
I've tossed around the idea of getting a UV sterilizer. One of these days I probably will.
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Post by Suzie Q (Lori) on Aug 6, 2010 11:41:29 GMT -5
Steph, I'm sorry you lost the angel
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Post by goldenpuon on Aug 8, 2010 14:04:32 GMT -5
Sorry you lost the angel. Hope your new ones are doing better.
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Post by babygeige on Aug 11, 2010 17:45:44 GMT -5
Thanks everyone. I've only got 1 of the 3 new ones left now. He seems ok, maybe a little jittery, so I'm not positive he'll last much longer either. The only thing I can think of is that possible all of these angels are from the same local breeder and he/she is not very good at breeding healthy stock. If this angel survives another week or 2, I'll move him to the 50 gallon to live the black angel that's in there (the only survivor of the first batch.) If I decide to get any more, I'm going to have to get some from Petsmart or something. Maybe they don't get theirs from the same breeder. I may just decide to ditch angels altogether if I lose either of these remaining 2.
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Post by Carl on Aug 11, 2010 18:23:23 GMT -5
Sorry about your "bad luck" with angels I definitely think you need to find another source. at least for the time being. My guess is either this source has genetically weak Angels, parasite issues, or the dreaded angel virus is present (or even "all of the above"). I had a lot of issues with more than one supplier/source of angels back in the 1990s, but I did not give up and finally I found a good local source for me, my clients, and my aquarium store; So please do not give up on these beautiful fish Carl
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