Mouth Fungus (again)

[fishfever]

Tank Size: 26g
Age of the tank: 1 year
pH: 7.2
Ammonia: 0
NitrAtes: 5ppm
nitrites: 0
GH/KH: very high
Temperature: 78 F
Fish:

2 adult mollies
2 juvenile mollies
1 adult platy
2 juvenile dwarf platys
2 juvenile platys
4 baby platys
2 Buenos Aires tetras
2 Lamp Eye tetras
4 Von Rio tetras
4 cory catfish

Symptoms:

The most recent addition to our tank, a B.A. tetra female now has the very familar "mustache" fuzz growing on her mouth. It is quite small so far but I've already given her an MB bath (forgot the salt on this first bath) and put her in a 10g hospital tank. The male does not have this growth. The 26g tank was aggressively treated with all sorts of meds to the point of blowing out the beneficial bacteria the last time and it took nearly 2 months to get it recycled. I'm not sure why these B.A. tetras seem to be so susceptible to this mouth fungus thing. We had our previous male for at least 9-10 months without any problems until I added a new female and then they both came down with the fungus. Then I got careless and accidentally OD'd both of them with PP one night when they had nearly recovered.

So now I'm back to doing the twice daily MB/salt baths with the new female but I want to start in tank treatment right away because it's just started and I'd like to nip this thing in the bud if possible before it gets out of hand. On my last order with Carl's store, I loaded up with a bunch of meds for my "fish medicine cabinet". I now have API Liquid Fungus Cure which I didn't have previously. The package says this can be used with API antibacterial treatment. Since Erthomycin seemed to be helping, I'd like to combine these two treatments, if possible. Will this be safe? Carl?

[corycatwoman]

melafix worked for my mouth fungus on my cichlids. but according to carl its a wide based spectrum for gram negative bacteria but safe for aquarium treatment in communuty tank.

due to the fact that its a seperate case and has just started it may still work and may be best recomended solution. but to be completely safe id get one of the water treatment experts to tell you what would be best.


and if your positive it is fungus and you have fungus cure why not just treat the few fish that show the symptoms in your isolation tank?

[fishfever]

Sorry if I wasn't clear on this point, I am only going to treat the isolation tank since only the new female tetra has this problem (and it's very small so far). My question was whether or not it was safe to use Erythymycin and the API Liquid Fungus Cure simultaneously... the package seems to indicate it's okay to use the Fungus Cure with any other API antibacterial product. I have started both treatments this morning in the hospital tank after giving the tetra her twice daily MB/salt bath with a MB swab to start it off.

I'm going to be watching the male B.A. tetra very carefully in the main tank to see if he develops the mouth fungus, so far nothing and we've had him for over a month I believe. We got him from a different LFS so maybe he will be okay. It's very odd that only this variety of tetra seems to get this mouth fungus; we've had other tetras (some we've had a year) and none of them ever got this thing.

[Carl]

Oct 28, 2009 18:30:58 GMT -5 corycatwoman said:

melafix worked for my mouth fungus on my cichlids. but according to carl its a wide based spectrum for gram negative bacteria but safe for aquarium treatment in communuty tank.

Actually Melafix is a gram positive treatment which makes it more limited since most aquatic pathogens are gram negative.
Used with Pimafix which is has more gram negative characteristic allows for a more wide spectrum treatment.
Melefix is good for initial injuries or similar fin problems since many of these pathogens are gram positive bacterium that then pave the way for the more common gram negative pathogens such as Aeromonas or Columnaris.
Please Read this article: Aquarium Medications; Organic Remedies

I suspect based on controlled tests with these meds that your success was as much based on water changes you made as with the treatment.

Back to the original question;

You can use the API Fungus Cure with Erythromycin in a hospital tank, this will provide a more wide spectrum attack than one or the other. However this mixture will be hard on an established tank, so I think your idea of use in a hospital tank.

As corycatwoman stated, Melafix may be useful in place of Erythromycin for a more mild treatment since based on previous posts you likely have a less common gram positive infection such as Streptococcus

Carl

[babygeige]

I wonder if it is a tetra thing...? I had a couple of head and tail lights get this once or twice. Both times I was able to move the fish to a QT tank and treat with Melafix for a week or so, then it was gone. Weird.

[fishfever]

I may try adding both Melafix and Pimafix to the isolation tank also, I guess it couldn't hurt. I'm currently using Melafix in my main tank to help 2 platys that got their fins nipped a few weeks ago by an aggressive tetra who we returned after a few days. One of them has almost completely recovered while the other one is improving but the chunk of missing tail fin is still very noticeable. But after going through the nearly 2 month ordeal to recycle (with fish) my main tank I'm doing all my strong treatments in the hospital tank and I'm not taking a chance by messing around with weaker meds this time. LOL

BG, I think perhaps some varieties of tetras may be susceptible to this since this will be the 3rd B.A. tetra I've seen with this (possibly the 4th, the returned nipping tetra seemed like she was starting to grow something around her mouth as well). But the other two varieties we stock have been exposed to this and they don't show even a hint of it.

[Carl]

Oct 29, 2009 20:54:45 GMT -5 babygeige said:

I wonder if it is a tetra thing...? I had a couple of head and tail lights get this once or twice. Both times I was able to move the fish to a QT tank and treat with Melafix for a week or so, then it was gone. Weird.

I never thought about this (sorry), but the lights went on in my head after babygeige' post and that is you both may have been dealing with FNT Disease (not real common, but generally gram positive in its cause)

I also have an older article about this (I updated it a little too):
Aquarium Answers; Neon Tetra and FNT Disease

Carl

[fishfever]

Carl I read the symptoms of FNT - restlessness, isolation and they don't seem to fit this too well. All the fish I've seen with the growth around the mouth were/are still very active and playful with good appetites. But now that I read this article, I realize we did have a Flame Von Rio tetra come down with the exact symptoms described, a really long time ago. We noticed he would be very isolated and would stay in one spot. After moving him to a hospital tank (and probably using gram negative instead of gram positive treatment) it wasn't long before he had big trouble swimming and I'd find him resting with his head facing down and very pale looking skin. He hung on for a few weeks but really didn't respond to the treatments very well before we finally lost him.

[Carl]

I thought of FNT Disease for the Tetras, not the general mouth disease, although the pathogens could be related since both of these problems are more about symptoms.

Unfortunately FNT Disease is difficult to treat, but from my experience with it you are on the correct coarse, so I hope this helps

Carl

[murdock6701]

hope I don't sound out of place here, but I've had a few tetras that looked like they had lip fingus that turned out to be scars from lip locking during early aggression - look wierd but none worse for the wear after a few years.....

[Carl]

Oct 31, 2009 12:40:50 GMT -5 murdock6701 said:

hope I don't sound out of place here, but I've had a few tetras that looked like they had lip fingus that turned out to be scars from lip locking during early aggression - look wierd but none worse for the wear after a few years.....

I think this is a good point

Carl

[fishfever]

Hmmmm this opens up a possibility I hadn't considered. In some ways this makes alot of sense since I've never seen any other symptoms other than the appearance of the mouth... I mean appetites normal, active, no signs of stress in every case. And the fact I can't really get any medications to make a big dent is another curious thing which would be explainable if it was really just scarring. This variety of tetra is semi-aggressive and may act out more than others of their kind since I have never kept enough to make a school; usually just 1-3 at any one time.

So the $64,000 question is if I take a magnifying glass and take a real close look - how do I distinguish a scar around the mouth from mouth fungus?

[Carl]

When you look through a strong magnifying glass, the fungus should look like a mold while scare tissue should look lake a more irregular part of the fish' tissue

See this page for some pictures:
Columnaris/Fungus

Carl

[fishfever]

I took as close a look as I could with a cheapo scratched plastic magnifying glass under average lighting and to my untrained eye it looks more like the tissue is just a different color around the mouth, kind of like she has real lips (but white). There does not appear to be any growth or protrusions like something is actually growing, but again this is just my untrained observation. In the past when I have seen growth (columnaris on a platy or fungus bulb on a cory) the area protruded outward and this does not seem to be the case - the discolored area does not protrude out. I'm going to have to find my good magnifying glass and have a better look with better lighting. I used to have a very nice combo magnifying glass/florescent light for doing fine close-up work that was bolted down to my workshop bench but it seems to have been misplaced or lost when we moved a few years ago; that would have been perfect to view this!

If this is scar tissue around the mouth and I give the fish a MB/salt bath (swabbing the mouth first with MB), should the MB stick to scar tissue or come off easily like on most areas of the fish that have the slime coating? The MB does NOT stick to the discolored area (although I can see a small amount surrounding the area). I don't know if this is a helpful clue?

[Carl]

Kudos to your observations as well as Murdock's point about scar tissue.

Based on your observations I think this is what you are dealing with here. In particular, Methylene Blue will generally adhere to exposed or diseased tissue, however the normal mucous slime coating on fish will repel MB from adhering to the scar tissue (this is a generalization, but in most cases this point about MB is an excellent clue and when combined with your other observations, I think makes it a good bet that this is scar tissue)

Carl

[fishfever]

I think there's probably enough compelling reasons to swing the pendulum over to the scar tissue side. I've completed the 4-day Liquid Fungus Cure/Erythromycin treatment without noticing change. I also did twice a day swab/MB salt baths. So we have

1. Little/no response to typical mouth fungus meds
2. Area does not appear raised/growth but just discolored whitish (need to verify with better magnifying glass and lighting)
3. MB does not stick to discolored area
4. This tetra is the most aggressive/active one (of the 2 we have and including all other tetra species in the tank)
5. Keeping only 2 of them was likely to make them more aggressive
6. Aggression seems to be manifested in leading with the mouth

I think I'll call this one False Mouth Fungus or if Murdock doesn't mind, Murdock's False Mouth Fungus (MFMF). ;-)

[murdock6701]

I am honored - I treated mine for a while and finally gave up - like I mentioned earlier, nor worse for the wear, just lookd a little odd

[fishfever]

Nov 4, 2009 6:24:31 GMT -5 fishfever said:

1. Little/no response to typical mouth fungus meds
2. Area does not appear raised/growth but just discolored whitish (need to verify with better magnifying glass and lighting)
3. MB does not stick to discolored area
4. This tetra is the most aggressive/active one (of the 2 we have and including all other tetra species in the tank)
5. Keeping only 2 of them was likely to make them more aggressive
6. Aggression seems to be manifested in leading with the mouth

Forgot one other clue:

7. No other noticeable symptoms, just mouth appearance

I have returned the fish to the regular tank and she is doing just fine.

[Carl]

Somewhat off subject, but this is the kind of thread that really makes for a good forum;
Multiple persons with different inputs to arrive at an educated conclusion

Carl