Wasting disease trouble

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katana

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Jun 14, 2015
Messages
59
I know wasting disease is trouble all the time, but I can't seem to get rid of it.

I moved halfway across the country and all my fish survived (yay!) however, a few got very skinny so I believed they might have got wasting disease. I treated them, they seemed to perk up, I thought everything was fine.
Well I have another fish suddenly drop weight...so did I not get rid of it? Does wasting disease take more than one treatment to cure?

I used the API stuff. Mollies are the affected fish


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Ive never been able to figure this diesease out. I have tried numerous treatments with everything.....metronidazole, clout, de-wormers such as prazipro and fenbendazole, there were no worms in my case.....
Let me guess, the old ones get skinny and dont eat much, and any new additions get bloated and die within a week or two?
Can you observe any red worms that look like a paintbrush coming out their vent?
 
I haven't noticed any worms, just stringy poo and a few getting skinny.
So far, the oldest molly is fat and happy. I'll try to observe them more tonight to see if I notice any paint brush looking things


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Ya it mimic's camallanus but i never noticed any worms. I could never figure this disease out. Nobody could.
 
This is disheartening. I hoped maybe I just needed to get new medication.
Should I separate the sick fish from the healthy ones? I have them all in the same tank because I decided to treat them all for in.


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I know wasting disease is trouble all the time, but I can't seem to get rid of it.

I moved halfway across the country and all my fish survived (yay!) however, a few got very skinny so I believed they might have got wasting disease. I treated them, they seemed to perk up, I thought everything was fine.
Well I have another fish suddenly drop weight...so did I not get rid of it? Does wasting disease take more than one treatment to cure?

I used the API stuff. Mollies are the affected fish


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Sounds like tuberculosis ( a.k.a. wasting disease) and it's common in livebearers and sadly, not easy to cure. Yes, it will take much more than a single dose of any medication to eradicate it from the tank and any fish that is effected should be removed from the tank as it spreads most when the infected fish dies and the others eat it or it's waste.
This disease is usually brought on by poor water conditions and acidic PH waters. In livebearers, higher PH waters ( above 7.0) are best for long term health. As for treating, unless the PH or water conditions are fixed, no medicine will clear this up.
Assuming the water is not an issue anymore, this is usually a gram + disease organism which is why Tetracycline and its derivatives were thought to be the best meds to use however, since some meds can cause unwanted resistant strains of bacteria, it's best to do a sensitivity culture before using TC. ( Ask your local Veterinarian if they can do this for you.) Kanamycin can work on resistant strains of TB but it's best to use gram + meds first before using the Kanamycin. Sulfa 4 TMP Powder by National Fish Pharmaceuticals is a combination of 4 sulpha drugs and would be my first choice of action. If this drug does not stop the disease after multiple full treatments, then I would try the Kanamycin.
Sadly, TB is an easier disease to prevent than to cure ( and can be expensive to cure) and it may become necessary to sterilize the tank and start over. I would not add any new fish to this tank and I'd isolate any equipment you use in this tank from any other tanks you may have unless strong sterilizing efforts are done.

Hope this helps. (y)
 
WOW andy, are you sure?
This one really had me stumped for along time.
Thanks for that great info, could you elaborate if you feel like talking abit about it? I'd really appreciate it, as well as pass the word along.
Symptoms on mine as well as others were.....
-Skinny fish with chronic illness
-Swimming under food, taking a bite and spitting it out
-New additions would bloat and die within 2 weeks
-Stringy feces
-Red Dots
-Some had tail rot
-Paralysis "whirling" right before death
I never observed bent spines. I got some "wild guppies" from this one J$$K guy who turned out to be some teenager selling fish on AB, and i had this disease wipe out idk how many guppies, almost put me out of the hobby completely. Even took a sick fish to the vet for Autospy....they noticed alot of mucus in its gut but no worms or internal parasites.
 
WOW andy, are you sure?
This one really had me stumped for along time.
Thanks for that great info, could you elaborate if you feel like talking abit about it? I'd really appreciate it, as well as pass the word along.
Symptoms on mine as well as others were.....
-Skinny fish with chronic illness
-Swimming under food, taking a bite and spitting it out
-New additions would bloat and die within 2 weeks
-Stringy feces
-Red Dots
-Some had tail rot
-Paralysis "whirling" right before death
I never observed bent spines. I got some "wild guppies" from this one J$$K guy who turned out to be some teenager selling fish on AB, and i had this disease wipe out idk how many guppies, almost put me out of the hobby completely. Even took a sick fish to the vet for Autospy....they noticed alot of mucus in its gut but no worms or internal parasites.

All those symptoms could be a couple of different ailments but an autopsy result of no worms or internal parasites eliminates most of them and points more towards a bacterial infection ( which TB is) and the fact that the new fish you added became sick too really points to a system wide issue and not a localized internal one.
In the past, one of the more common post mortem signs of TB was a brown coloring in the abdominal area. If you saw that, you knew to treat the entire tank and sterilize everything that had come in contact with that tank and fish. Today, this may not be as clear as there are new strains and effect fish differently. All the symptoms you mentioned could be linked to a bacterial infection so the fish does not have to have all of them for it to be considered TB.
Internet research is okay but I strongly suggest you have books ( not just ebooks:whistle:) in your library so you can research and diagnose your fish's ailments. I highly recommend this book: Handbook of fish diseases by Untergasser ( get the english version unless you can read and understand German :brows:) as a great diagnostic tool. It's available on a number of sites and not super expensive ( I got mine on Ebay used :whistle:) and has a grid "If this, then go to this step" approach for diagnosing issues. What's nice about this book is that if you are uncertain, you can look through and pose a different scenario and then see if what you are seeing better fits something else. ( I was able to diagnose the sleeping disease in one of my Angels this way.)
Sadly, this is part of animal keeping. Diseases happen and it happens more when the fish are stressed. Overcrowding, poorer diets, poorer water conditions, etc all leave fish stressed to some point. So while you may feel the tank is "healthy", the fish are really the ones that tell you whether it is or isn't. ;)

As for your experience with the wild Guppies, just another example of why it is sooooooooo important to QT all fish coming into your tanks for an extended period of time. This will allow most problems to surface so they can be treated before exposing your main tank to them. Ever wonder why zoos and aquariums QT their animals for MONTHS before they let them into their exhibits? THIS is why. (y)

Hope this helps. (y)
 
Wow I wouldn't have ever thought about tb. I'll try to find that medicine as soon as I can. I have kanaplex and metroplex :/ and the Api general cure


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Wow I wouldn't have ever thought about tb. I'll try to find that medicine as soon as I can. I have kanaplex and metroplex :/ and the Api general cure


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Fish TB is now a more scarier disease than before as some strains can infect Humans so you need to be careful and know what you are dealing with which is why I recommend having that book in your hands. (y)
You can find that Sulpha med here: Fish Medication - Products Catalog pg.4 ( at the bottom of the page. (y) )
 
WOW andy, are you sure?
This one really had me stumped for along time.
Thanks for that great info, could you elaborate if you feel like talking abit about it? I'd really appreciate it, as well as pass the word along.
Symptoms on mine as well as others were.....
-Skinny fish with chronic illness
-Swimming under food, taking a bite and spitting it out
-New additions would bloat and die within 2 weeks
-Stringy feces
-Red Dots
-Some had tail rot
-Paralysis "whirling" right before death
I never observed bent spines. I got some "wild guppies" from this one J$$K guy who turned out to be some teenager selling fish on AB, and i had this disease wipe out idk how many guppies, almost put me out of the hobby completely. Even took a sick fish to the vet for Autospy....they noticed alot of mucus in its gut but no worms or internal parasites.


Any white nodules or deformities of the skeleton seen out of interest by the vet?

If memory serves me correctly, they are looking at more comprehensive disease testing for overseas fish in quarantine before they come into Australian fish shops. Which sounded good for catching bacterial and viral diseases (except for I guess the unlucky fish selected).
 
I separated the sick fish from the healthy ones. I'm nervous about it since it is catchy to humans. :/ I'll look into getting those medications if I can. Not sure my husband will want to spend a lot of money on my fish though :/


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I separated the sick fish from the healthy ones. I'm nervous about it since it is catchy to humans. :/ I'll look into getting those medications if I can. Not sure my husband will want to spend a lot of money on my fish though :/


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Unfortunately, medications can get costly and this is an expense that needs to be figured into the budget of fish keeping. Just like food and Vet bills for your house pets (like dogs and cats), medicines for your fish have to be considered. There is however, an economic calculation that most people don't like to consider but is reality. Sometimes, it's cheaper to replace the fish than treat the fish. For many common species, this is the case. However, with a disease such as TB, adding new fish prior to sterilizing the tank is just asking for trouble. So if you are not going to medicate or sterilize, I would seriously consider not adding any more fish for a few months just to make sure the disease is not still active within your other fish. If your other fish continue to break down, then I would seriously consider restarting the tank after complete sterilization.

Lastly, the book I mentioned has been seen recently on Amazon for as little as $4.00-$6.00 including shipping and well worth the investment (IMO) for your future fish. I would seriously consider purchasing it for your library. (y)
 
I have not added any fish and haven't been planning on it (since they have babies so much) so I won't need to worry about that.




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What andy is trying to say is that its absolutely the Worst BACTIERIA you can have in your tanks, and you might not be sucessful, with ANY antibiotic.
You might just want to take stuff down and clean it all real good with bleach...eveything buckets and tubes everything really scrubbed clean, throw away used pads, no trying to save "good bacteria"
From what i have heard, even if you throw many diffrent antibiotics at Fish TB, your sucess rate is low, and its expensive and hard on the fish.
Im not saying take everything down and start over now, because as we know most bacteria are opportunistic, meaning they only get out of hand when there is stress, but im saying, do your research about Fish TB and be prepared at some point to throw in the towel and scrub everything clean and start over, ive done it many times. Sometimes is the best thing you can do, give yourself a little break and a time to start over and be more careful about adding new fish.
I just found out my guppies go camallanus again, so here goes like another 15 guppies im gonna have to put down. I just dont have any choice, the disease wont go away, and im down to 1 tankful of fish, so i mine as well euthanize them and start over with all new equiptment later on down the road, after i take a break from fish for a couple/few months....otherwise all the nasty diseases they get drive a fishkeeper insasne!
 
I just found out my guppies go camallanus again, so here goes like another 15 guppies im gonna have to put down. I just dont have any choice, the disease wont go away, and im down to 1 tankful of fish, so i mine as well euthanize them and start over with all new equiptment later on down the road, after i take a break from fish for a couple/few months....otherwise all the nasty diseases they get drive a fishkeeper insasne!

Sounds like your fish have either an immunity to your medications or your system needs some extra cleaning. ;) Before you throw in the towel, you might want to try Fenbendazole powder for fish to deworm them. Medicate the whole tank if possible so you get any stages of the worm that may be present.

Yes, fish keeping exposes you to many different diseases but so do other pets as well. Yes, medications for treating these diseases can become costly. But good aquarium husbandry also prevents a lot of diseases from happening. Just like you have disease organisms in your own body waiting for an opportunity to strike, so do the fish. Healthy fish, like healthy humans, have an immune system that when working properly, prevents these "bugs" from attacking. It's only when the person or fish get's excessively stressed that they succumb.
I like to think of sick fish as a symptom of a larger problem. Why did the fish get sick? If you dig deep far enough, you will probably find that the water quality wasn't as clean as you thought or the food wasn't as healthy as you thought. So before tearing everything down, try figuring out what happened. (y)
 
I appreciate it andy. And No delapool i didnt observe any white nodules near the vent, just the symptoms i described.
The disease i had before was exactly the one the OP described, and as Andy pointed out sounds like fish TB
On a seperate note, I have been fighting camallanus for a long time. This is the Second time ive broken everything down and bleched it, then started over.
The second time ive also used the dewormer Fenbendazole powder as a "last resort" and it still has not cured them.
I feed them the fenbendazole flake from angelsplus.com once, then the levimasole flakes 3 weeks later. A month or two after that, i go to give them their last de-wormer treatment (remember prophalactially, these fish should no way even have camallanus, de-wormed them twice and started out in bleached tanks with new guppie) and once again i notice a female with paintbrush like threads coming out her vent.
I noticed a few fry today, sigh. I also just finished feeding them the de-wormer food again, gonna give them their last dose of fen. flake later on today.
Im moving into a new apartment in a few days or so, and if this is my chance to take everything i own fish wise and throw it in the garbage so i never have to deal with this worms again, im gonna take that chance.I down to one ten gallon tank i resealed and a old used spoonge and old HOB heater, not much in the way of losses anyways. Ill start over and be done with these camallanus nitmare.
 
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Wow! Sounds like they are really entrenched into your fish. Sorry to hear that. Sounds like Chlorox time for sure. :( Guess there's a lesson in there on where you buy your fish from. :eek: Stick with pro breeders for quality fish. ;) :whistle:
 
That is sad news. :(

I was talking with my father who has been a farmer, meat inspector and now works in quarantine. Australia he said is very lucky in that our import rules and testing are so strict that anything like TB should be extremely rare. If the source of your fish is good, far less chance imo.

Finding out the chain of custody for your fish - that seems much harder. Most fish shops here will just say they come from over eastern Australia (which admittedly would go through state quarantine as well) but it is all a bit vague.

For the OP, good news your worries are less.
 
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