Looks like Black Spot. Treatment options?

[Khazmachi]

So I noticed one of my Keyholes glance off the sand bed the other day, and I didn't notice any usual marks or anything on her, but I was on my way out and couldn't give a closer look. Today I had the afternoon off so i gave all my fish a good look over, and it looks like all but my Severum have at least a couple little black spots on em. I've only noticed Keyholes rubbing against things, but they are not the only ones with spots. Aside from that all fish are still eating, and behaving normally.

Here is the best pic I got



Hopefully you can get the idea from that one. I'll try to take a couple more. Does it look like Black Spot?

Tested water before water change today:
Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates between 15 and 20

Tank specs:
75 gallon (cycled and up and running for years)
Cascade 1000, AC 50, and Whisper 60 filters
Water change schedule about 30% once a week
80 degrees F
Sand substrate, a few rocks, lots of driftwood, lots of fake plants.
1 severum, 3 angels, 3 keyholes, 10 lemon tetra
And a small number of little snails that hitchhiked there way in years ago on live plants.
The Lemon tetras are the newest addition so it may have been introduced by them.

So I've been reading up on this a bit, and seems like and interesting disease, and luckily not fatal. I keep reading that if i take out all the snails it will go away, but I feel like it would be near impossible to clear out all the little guys from every nook and cranny they might be in. Is there any way to clear this up without removing snails? Or is there a way to kill them and not hurt my fish?
I haven't heard much about this disease so any advise is much appreciated. Thanks!

 

[Berylla]

I've never heard of black spot. Anyone?

 

[Khazmachi]

Still trying to find more information on this before I do anything. I've been researching it the best I can, but have been reading different treatments. I've read:
Leave it alone, it will just go away
Treat with general anti parasitic medication
Treat with coppersafe

I've been reading up on coppersafe and it seems like pretty hardcore stuff. Apparently it will kill all the snails so it'll get rid of this for sure, but also its nearly impossible to remove from the system once its in there. Anyone have experience with Coppersafe?

 

[Berylla]

I think you should ID what exactly your fish are suffering from before you throw anything in the tank. For now, increase the frequency and amount of water changes to every day 50%, and give your substrate a vacuum. Swish filter media in a bucket of tank water, and wipe down the interior of your filter. The spot may just go away by itself. You can also try taking a clearer picture and doing a closeup on your computer so we get a better idea of what your fish has. I've never heard of black spot disease. If you have read about it somewhere, please provide a link.

 

[Khazmachi]

Here is one of the articles I've found on it.

http://www.angelfire.com/blues/fish_problems/BLACKSPOT.html

I wish i could get better pictures, but I just have my cell phone camera and I haven't been having much luck taking any. It just appears as little black spots, and there has been some rubbing on decor. Other than that they seem normal. I'm not planning on doing anything but water changes until I get more info. As long as its not getting worse it seems they will be okay for a while without any treatments.



This was the best shot I could get of an Angel. You can kinda see a couple spots on its head, and one on its side. Sorry for the poor quality, I'll have to keep trying when I get some time.

 

[Berylla]

Here is one of the articles I've found on it.

BLACK SPOT Fish Help/Disease.

I wish i could get better pictures, but I just have my cell phone camera and I haven't been having much luck taking any. It just appears as little black spots, and there has been some rubbing on decor. Other than that they seem normal. I'm not planning on doing anything but water changes until I get more info. As long as its not getting worse it seems they will be okay for a while without any treatments.


View attachment 192619
This was the best shot I could get of an Angel. You can kinda see a couple spots on its head, and one on its side. Sorry for the poor quality, I'll have to keep trying when I get some time.

Ahh, it's a parasite. From the article, it seems that the cure is to do nothing at all and let the parasite live out it's lifecycle. Take out your snails for at least a month, so that there are no more intermediary hosts for the parasite to breed. How simple! I wouldn't medicate unless the fish show signs of stress.

 

[Khazmachi]

That is what I was leaning towards, but the problem is I think there is no way I'll be able to take out all the snails. Its not like I have a couple big apple snails, I have a bunch of little ramshorn snails. I could pull out any ones I find, but there are bound to be more on wood and plants that I won't find. I guess now I just need to know if it will run its course with the snails in there, or if I need to do some serious snail removal. I'd rather not put chemicals in that are not absolutely needed. I also don't like the idea of buying loches just for the reason of getting rid of snails. I guess I could look into that option though.

 

[Berylla]

That is what I was leaning towards, but the problem is I think there is no way I'll be able to take out all the snails. Its not like I have a couple big apple snails, I have a bunch of little ramshorn snails. I could pull out any ones I find, but there are bound to be more on wood and plants that I won't find. I guess now I just need to know if it will run its course with the snails in there, or if I need to do some serious snail removal. I'd rather not put chemicals in that are not absolutely needed. I also don't like the idea of buying loches just for the reason of getting rid of snails. I guess I could look into that option though.

You can use flubendazole from Inkmkr, but my worry is that you will have a massive die off and your water will go bad. Could you take out what you can before treating with flubendazole?

Levamisole, Flubendazole & other chemicals for the aquarium

Email him to see what the length of treatment is for snails.

 

[Khazmachi]

Thanks Berylla! I'll look into that more if things get worse. I had a chance to look things over again today. The fish are still looking happy and healthy for the most part. Still saw one Keyhole rub agaist some driftwood. I did another water change today, 30% but still going on without any meds. It looks like the spots on my most affected Angel have cleared up already. Keyholes seem to be affected most by this. Mostly on the fins, and on the head a little bit on a couple of em. I tried to take more pictures today. This is the best one i got.



You can see spots on the fins in this one.
I think I'll be sticking to lots of water changes for a while before i try any meds. I'll keep ya posted on any changes

 

[Khazmachi]

Keyholes definitely have more spots today, but they are not rubbing as much though so thats good I think

 

[Berylla]

You can give them a potassium permanganate bath. If you go to walmart and pick up a small bottle of Jungle Clear Water.

In a large 5 gallon bucket or 10 Gallon QT tank, pour in warm dechlorinated water, with airstone and heater. Let it sit overnight.

Shake up bottle and squeeze drops of PP into water. Give it a stir. The color should be a light purple. Throw the fish in for a 4 hour bath. The spots should fall off. Keep the water a light purple color during the treatment. If it starts to turn brown, but more PP in a drop at a time to keep the color a light purple.

If your fish look distressed, have a bottle of hydrogen peroxide - a capful will neutralize the PP and make the water turn clear again. You can also use dechlorinator to turn your water clear again.

If you are interested in seeing the color of the PP solution, please check out my blog and jump down to Potassium Permanganate treatment.

Many Hats of Me: My Quarantine Process for New Aquarium Fish

 

[Khazmachi]

Its been a few days so here is an update. The black spots have seemed to have gone away on my angels. They are not as abundant on my keyholes, but still there for sure. My largest Keyhole doesn't appear to be eating, and the other two eat, but have stringy white poop. I've decided to keep the light off other than when feeding in hopes to keep stress at a minimum. Its been a few days since I've done a water change so I'm hoping I find time to do it either after work tonight, or tomorrow before work. The stringy poop concerns me, and I'm thinking I'll try some meds. I have some API General Cure, parasite medication, at home and am thinking of trying that. I have a QT, but I think I'll dose the whole tank because all but one fish have shown symptoms at one point in this thing. I wonder why it didn't affect my Severum at all?

 

[Khazmachi]

I fasted the fish yesterday, and when I fed today that same guy wasn't eating. He hardly moved, and when he did he was rubbing on thing. So I did a 50% water change and decided to go ahead with the API General Cure. I dosed 7 packets (it says one packet per 10 gallons). Directions say wait 48 hours then dose again so that is my plan. I'll keep the lights off I'll prob throw in 8 packets next dose because the odd number of gallons. Do I feed regularly while treating?

 

[jlk]

I actually really doubt your dealing with black spot. Even if you were, the parasite life cycle will burn out even if you do not remove the snails as a birds are necessary to continue it. This is a bit more common (though still quite unusual) with goldfish and koi ponds.

My guess is you are dealing with flukes. There are gill flukes and skin flukes. Skin flukes can cause black spots from damage. There may be additional issues here as you mentioned issues with appetite and odd waste. Continue with the GC for atleast four treatments then reassess how everyone is doing. You can feed normally. Make sure you are doing a big wc before redosing and keeping an eye on your parameters. Please keep us posted!

 

[Khazmachi]

I actually really doubt your dealing with black spot. Even if you were, the parasite life cycle will burn out even if you do not remove the snails as a birds are necessary to continue it. This is a bit more common (though still quite unusual) with goldfish and koi ponds.

My guess is you are dealing with flukes. There are gill flukes and skin flukes. Skin flukes can cause black spots from damage. There may be additional issues here as you mentioned issues with appetite and odd waste. Continue with the GC for atleast four treatments then reassess how everyone is doing. You can feed normally. Make sure you are doing a big wc before redosing and keeping an eye on your parameters. Please keep us posted!

Thank you for the input! Once I saw the stringy poop I started to second guess the black spot disease, but it still seemed like a parasite, which is why I decided to use the GC. So do a water change before every dose? Directions on package say to wait until after second dose to do that so I just want to double check. I'll keep the updates coming thanks again for the help

 

[jlk]

I forget what the box says but I believe it only suggests 1-2 treatments/doses. The active ingredients (metro & prazi) I use often and in bit different manner than they suggest but it also depends on what I am dealing with. My suggestion for now is to dose, wait 48hrs, big wc then redose the full dose. Continue this for atleast 7 days and lets see how everyone is doing. Internal bugs are best treated with med foods (assuming a fish is eating) while flukes are best treated via the water but you need to have flexible options in some cases. Hopefully, you will see marked improvement but if anything changes, please let us know!

 

[Khazmachi]

Yea on the box it only directs two doses. I'll try your suggestion, only 4 days of meds seems too quick to me anyway. So today I'll just feed, observe, and stop by the LFS to pick up more meds for tomorrow.

 

[Khazmachi]

There has been some good and some bad in the last few days. I've kept with the schedule of water change and dose every other day. So far I have dosed 7 packets General Cure on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. One Lemon tetra went from bad to worse, and then died Friday night. However everyone else seems to be doing better. I haven't seen any more rubbing. There are still a couple black spots on all three keyholes. Should the black spots disappear? The big male, who looks smaller now, is more active, but still not acting normal. I think he ate a little food, but hardly showed any interest in it. He still has white stringy poop. I'm really hoping to see more appetite in that guy tomorrow. I won't have time tomorrow for a water change, so I'll do that Tuesday. I have enough meds left for one more dose I'm thinking I should use it when I do a water change Tuesday. Does that sound right?

 

[Khazmachi]

Well its been one week since I started dosing with General Cure. The good news is that all my fish are eating again! The black spots seem to have slightly increased again, and there has been a little bit of rubbing on decor. So the treatment continues. Again I did a water change (about 40%) and dosed 7 more packets of General Cure. I feel like the concentration of the meds has to be increasing because I keep dosing the same amount and only take some out with water changes. Any ideas on how much longer I need to keep up this schedule? And should I bring the dosage down a bit now?

 

[jlk]

Just do larger wcs. The issue with using the metro/prazi combo is prazi does last bit longer but it takes quite a bit for it to be toxic. Metro's effects are short lived. Pretty much all of it has been metabolized or broken down within 24-48hrs. I would dose one more time after a big wc. If there is still no significant improvement, you will need to consider other options such as a stronger medicated food for those that still seem to have internal parasite issues. For external parasite issues, there are other options as well. Keep us posted!