Need help - Battle of the parasite...

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Nedly

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Jul 10, 2014
Messages
76
Location
Maine
I have been trying to fight off some parasite for weeks now and it has been a royal pain. I purchased a fish at some point that had it. I got "PraziPro" and have been using that, but if I do so much as a 10% water change they take over again and the fish are itching. Now two weeks back when it started I pulled all the fish, put them into a temp tank, and I flushed the big tank. I gave everything a bleach bath from the decorations to the rocks.

Afterwards I filled it back up, and for the most part the parasite died off. I have pulled the carbon and kept it out as much as I could. I had to quarantine one fish that was swamped with the parasite, I have her in a 4 gallon now. I tried to do a 10-20% water change on the small tank when I was vacuuming and within like 3 hours she had them all over her side finds again. Not to mention after I had her in the tank for like 3 days I noticed a couple of worm looking things floating around and wigging out, my guess is she pooped them.

I have ran PraziPro according to the instructions, and also put in tea tree oil and aquarium salt to try and help with it all. I keep my tanks perfect, I have all of the testing kits, they are never dirty what so ever. My water is perfect at all times and I put a ton of care into trying to do this right.

My reason for writing is because after two weeks of working the PraziPro through the tank, if I do so much as a small water change the fish start to itch again. On top of that my quarantined fish is pregnant. She is the only one now where it is visible that she has parasites. As far as all of my other fish they have gotten much better, I just noticed them itch if I do a water change, and this female had them come back within hours of a water change.

Is there anything better to use to kill the parasites? What should I do? At this point I cannot even run carbon I have to have the PraziPro so concentrated or the parasites show within hours and I have been treating them for about two weeks now...
 
I had wondered if it was my water, but I ran tests on it before and it is always clean. It is a deep well, and has 0 ammonia, 0 nitrates or nitrites, no chlorine, and only a PH of about 7.6-7.8. So the only thing I usually have to do is drop the PH. Not to mention I ran TDS tests on it and they read about 120, which is halfway between city water and FDA approved filtered water...

I am pretty sure I know the exact fish I purchased that had it, and it was the first to die in this whole process. It was some "reverse marble molly" and so it was black with white dots naturally, so I did not notice the dots were parasites until it was spreading...
 
What color were the worms that you saw?

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I was reading another thread on here talking about "clear stringy poop" and my quarantined fish has it! It must have a couple parasites? Inside and out?.. I need something..What ever it is I will buy! I just need some advice as to what to get and what might work better than the PraziPro..I have lost several fish to this parasite and would rather not see the rest go...
 
White...very small too..It was wigging out in the water and the filter snagged it, so I figured the PraziPro was doing its job, but it is not reaching the 100%, it just seems to be holding them off. And that is not the only parasite, she has the white dots on her fins and scales...I had almost all of them gone, she looked fab. and then I did a small water change and boom her fins were covered again..

It looked just like a super small worm...
 
Jungle has a good anti parasite medicated food. You should try that. Fenbendazole is another option that you can use to medicate your own food.

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I am just reading that the food was discontinued by the manufacturer so you might have a hard time finding it. Fenbedazole you should be able to find on amazon. At least that's where I got mine

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What about the external parasites? Will the medicated food treat them as well??
 
Knowing what to prescribe is difficult without knowing exactly what kind of parasite you Have. If you could get a picture that would be very helpful. I have a big book of fish diseases that list treatments. If we can narrow it down I can get you better advice.

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Usually stringy feces means internal parasites. You might have both.

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This fish is so nice, I tap on the glass and she comes to say hi. Very easy for taking pictures that is for sure. This parasite thing has been evil and I am waking up every day pulling out my hair. I think she is pregnant as well, she has been bloated, aggressive, bottom floating, and the dot on her belly has been getting bigger.. She has both shed and pooped these parasites. It all came from one fish I purchased, i had originally been treating it in the same tank as the rest. When it passed this fish took over everything it had. Thats why I quarantined her and started treating them all separate.

All of the other fish look great, I have a bigger 50 gallon tank and all are fine. There was one bumble bee platy that got them a little a couple weeks back when it all started, but the medicine cleared them up. Although, he is the one I saw scratching again with yesterdays water change..So I imagine I am just holding the parasites off at this point..
 
Here they are!
 

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Have you tried adding some salt to your aquarium?

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Yup! As well as tea tree oil. I had safe coat in there for a while, and added start zymes when I gave everything a bleach bath...
 
Let me remind too, these things were gone the day before yesterday. She had 0 on her as far as I could see, then I vacuumed the bottom which was about a 20% water change. That night she had this, and it has progressed through out the day, and I did add more PraziPro after the water change, and I am not using active carbon it is just the white style filter. The water has been perfect too nice and clean...These parasites are half immune to the PraziPro I think. I am just barely warding them off....
 
That's the thing with parasites. They can quickly become immune to medications.

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I'm still doing some narrowing down. My friend is a fisheries biologist so we will get to the bottom of it!

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Can I ask what method you used to great with salt?

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Treat* oops @_@

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Just aquarium salt..by "Jungle" suggested to "use monthly (maintenance)"..
 
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