Cichlids

[Carl]

Sept 30, 2009 7:40:42 GMT -5 Penycat said:

But I finally caught the dad and got him inside, then started to lower the water level so I can get this thing cleaned out when OH MY GOODNESS!!!! There's another para in there!!!!! Somewhere some how, that first one that I thought died...didn't. I have an official pair!!! I screamed so loud that my mom who was over thought I was snake bit...lol I can't even believe it! All summer, I never saw them both, so just thought I was seeing the one each time *[img src="i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb53/evelynmarch26/smileys/lol7.gif"]

[/IMG] YAY!!! Paras for all!!! lol[/quote]

Good news!

I was wondering if he was simply hiding somewhere

Carl

[goldenpuon]

Congrats Penycat! I'm very happy you found her! XD You are very lucky to have all those babies too! I bet they are really cute.

[bikeguy33]

congrats.....glad both were found...

[Penycat]

Okay, everyfish is now in my garage happy and healthy. The juvies are in a 55g with a pair of bristle nose plecos and doing well...here's a vid of them (please excuse the music *blush*)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=oom-FTbCJSk

And then just today I put the parents into a 75g by themselves and within hours they were doing this - www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDAwZ_Rajy8

guessing there may be more fry in my future? *

[Carl]

Excellent!

Your videos show off your "brood" quite well.

Carl

[Penycat]

Thank you!!! I can't wait till they are selling size...that'll be fun:)

[goldenpuon]

The fry are really cute. And the adults look like they may have wanted to spawn in that video. Maybe they'll give you even more babies soon. XD

[Penycat]

I know, if they do, I'm going to be in a big time rush to get another 55g set up...lol and just found one of my angel pairs spawning last night while I was doing wcs. what is it about wintertime in the garage!?! lol

[Penycat]

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!!!

My paras have had that second spawning, which are now being moved into the 55g that the other babies use to be in which are now in a 110 to finish their growing out...get all that? lol My fishroom abounds with these babies! but none else. The guppies though I think are starting, least the purple Moscows. The Thai Mosaics have babies like crazy and the blue Moscows have a few, but more I can see are on the way. The Betta Rutlians have babies, but then the dad passed on:( The Betta Connoids are just hanging out happy as can be. The Jewel Cichlids are so needing to go, I'm not thrilled with them (they never come out, looks like I've got an empty tank at all times...*sigh*). The Tequilas are having fry all the time which is fun. The Blue Crays are growing, though not at breeding age yet. My one Jag Male is doing well and about to get a 125g which I hope to find a female his size then, but we'll see about that. Let's see, what else is in there...the angels are all sick which I'm going nuts trying to get fixed. It's funny to me that I was sent by one of my local fish club's members to one of Carl's websites about columnaris and the treatment of in case that was what I had (I don't think it is, but awesome page Carl!) But soon as I saw the Wonder shells, I knew it was Carl's:) The the ABNs are having babies like crazy...my long finned dad is back in the nest again with more eggs...OY!

And now with the addition of my new bird and rescued from the cats Snake and Lizard, life is fun here:)

[goldenpuon]

Sounds great Penycat. I'm glad you are happy with your pets. Congrats on the many breeding fish. XD

[Carl]

Congrats on your coninued success Penycat!

Thanks for the compliment too.

What are your Angels symptoms?

There is a virus that affects angels that is often mistaken for bacterial or other problems.
Symptoms include: Clamped fins, excess slime, listless with nose pointed up slightly, usually towards the back of the aquarium. It has an approximately 3 week infectious period.
There is no medication for this virus, rather Angels immune system, good water quality, must be relied upon for the cure.
UV Sterilization can help check the spread though, & quite effectively from my experience

Carl

[murdock6701]

congrats on your underwater world success! am very happy to hear your tequilas had fry!

[Carl]

Dec 27, 2009 16:21:09 GMT -5 murdock6701 said:

congrats on your underwater world success! am very happy to hear your tequilas had fry!

yeah, usually tequilas only give most persons a hangover ;D

Carl

[goldenpuon]

Or make more tequilas. (as in Penycat's case) lol

[Penycat]

hey sorry about that, we were in TN to see the other side of the fam...lol didn't have internet access. Anyway, yeah I've lost a bunch of the angels and it's killing me! I wish I could get a good pic, but tomorrow I plan on spending a lot of time out there getting things re-organized and more major water changes now that my python is fixed.

The angels show a white cottony growth on their fins, tail, side, and vents. a few of them have a bit of it along their lat line on their bodies and it gets on their eyes as well. I tried the pimiafix that someone told me to and it killed almost right away all the plecos I had growing out in there (didn't know it would do that! ARG!) and that's when the angels started to die too, so either there was something up with the bottle of pimafix I had or they were too far gone. I've got about half the number I did before and some seem to be doing better after just a huge water change and added salt and I added a heat lamp over their tank as well. It's days like this that I wonder why the heck I'm doing this. I love my fish, but it's so hard to lose them like that!

[goldenpuon]

Sorry to hear about the loses Penycat. It sounds like you've got a bad case of Columnaris, Saprolegnia, or maybe even something else.

I have used Pimafix safetly many times and have never had any problems. It is not a super strong medication in my opinion and is pretty difficult (though definitely not impossible) to overdose. In fact I have been successful with it a few times in curing disease.

Unless there is something wrong with the bottle, I would say it is probably the disease and/or water conditions that are claiming the fish.

Triple sulfa may help if the Pimafix isn't working and there are a few other medications Carl has in an article he made about fish medications.

What are your numbers (ammonia, nitrite, etc.)?

Hope everything turns out ok.

Renee

[Penycat]

Well I'll be doing another huge water change later today, so the numbers will change a bit as they always do after a wc...but I'll do tests then to find out. I honestly haven't done much in the way of testing with my water

[Carl]

Sorry about your angelfish difficulties.

I will have to say (as noted by Renee) that I seriously doubt that Pimafix had anything to do with the deaths, if anything the Pimafix simply did nothing as it is not a strong medication.
See this article:
Aquarium Medications; Organic Treatments, Pimafix.

I still have wonder if you are dealing with the Angelfish virus, for which water changes, baths, maybe usnea, and UV Sterilization may check the spread, but effecting a cure is difficult as the fish must fight this themselves.

My suggestion is the water changes, UV Sterilization (to check spread), Methylene Blue/Salt/Usnea Baths.
Keep all parameters at their best, even "flow through water changes" have helped me in the past if this is the angel virus. This keeps exposure to a minimum and increases essential mineral cations and a healthy Redox.

Carl

[Penycat]

Thank you Carl for that info! the flow through is a good read as I've sort of done that with the tanks, but not with the holding tank as right now I don't have one, but I've taken my suctioning hose (which just goes right out the door and gravity does the work) and then put in the python to the same rate as the outflow tube and just let it cycle for a bit. I've not done this yet in the angel tub, but that might be what today holds.

The plecos all were totally healthy to the eye (may have had something internal that I couldn't see) but each one of them were totally okay till I added the pimafix, then by the next day all 8 of them were dead...that's too much coincidence for me, so I'm thinking that my bottle of the stuff was compromised some way and killed them, it's the only thing that was changed from when they were fine to when they died, I can't think of anything else that would have hurt the plecos. They didn't have any of the growth stuff that the angels did...just weirdness abounds here!

[Carl]

I wish I could provide a more solid answer as to the Pimafix/Plecostumus issue. I have not ever witnessed this.
My thought is a chemical reaction, but even here I do not know of any possibilities of any reaction with the active ingredients in Pimafix.
Aspirin & ibuprofen can interact and increase risk of internal bleeding, but I doubt you would have added either of these to your aquarium

Eugenol (found in Pimafix) forms esters when combined with carboxylic acids. These esters are widely used in perfumes, but again I cannot find any dangers to this.

As to the flow through water changes, what I mean by this is a slow drip of water in and out of the aquarium that takes over a day to change out an entire aquarium (such as one gallon per hour for a 25 gallon tank).
I use pre-treated water for the inflow.

Carl