End Of My Journal *heart Broken*

[tlagden]

Mmmm Very nice!! Oh and the tank looks good too!!!

I agree

 

[JamieH]

no probs is it hard to keep cichlids???

well.... no. as long as you meet their basic needs, and select species which are compatible. sometimes you get individuals which are worse than others...

Mmmm Very nice!! Oh and the tank looks good too!!!

I agree

shush!!!

 

[Betta5]

I hate people that say they shouldent be sold because they are 'deformed'. Your fish prove they are 'Normal'. Are any of yours dyed?

 

[JamieH]

Well happy new year fishes... first my tank suffers a wipeout... now it seems by severums have whitespot. i'm beggining to think this tank has a gypsy curse.

Brilliant.

My gold severum (my favourite) has sugar-sized white spots all over his fins, the green severum has a few and my female blue acara appear to have 3 on her forehead.

Water parameters are all normal. My fish get the best foods on the market, and i am religious with a capital R in doing water changes and maintaining my tank.

AS i see it there are two possible causes of this illness in my case;

1: in removing the excess severums and other fish from the tank I have stressed the fish enough to give the disease a foothold - meaning it was already present in the system

or

2: i have introduced it with the parrot fish.

Anyway... it seems there are a lot of potenial treatments and drawbacks...


The easiest way appears to be to turn the temperature up to 32' for 3 days - HOWEVER - the the heaterstat that came with my tank is only 200w and i remember the instructions stating in bold that it was designed to keep the tank around 'normal' tropical temperature within a normal home - ie it was not powerful enough to heat the water to extremes, or maintain the temp in very cold situations.

if i turn the heat up, and the heater can't get the tank to 32' for the 3 days required to kill the parasite, then all i am doing is speeding up it's lifecycle and making it more infectious to my fish...

I've treated whitespot with octozin from waterlife before - but have since been told this is not the best treatment for it... i've also been told that dropping a penny into the tank will release enough copper to kill the parasites, but this doesn;t seem very scientific.

i'm not going to be able to get any medication today - so i was wondering what the UK members here have used succesfully to treat whitespot???


Thanks in advance for your help

I hate people that say they shouldent be sold because they are 'deformed'. Your fish prove they are 'Normal'. Are any of yours dyed?

I have not, and will not ever buy fish that are dyed - it's obvious when they are. I also tell shopkeepers that i think it's digusting they sell them if i ever see them in a store... usually VERY loudly.

 

[RadaR]

1: in removing the excess severums and other fish from the tank I have stressed the fish enough to give the disease a foothold - meaning it was already present in the system

or

2: i have introduced it with the parrot fish.

Anyway... it seems there are a lot of potenial treatments and drawbacks...

Correct. From experience id say it was number 2 that caused the problem.

if i turn the heat up, and the heater can't get the tank to 32' for the 3 days required to kill the parasite, then all i am doing is speeding up it's lifecycle and making it more infectious to my fish...

It will speed up the cycle which means it will come out of the fish quicker and start to produce more ich (whitespot) When this happens you want to kill it off. Either with salt or medication.

Medication didnt work for me. I think it was the Waterlife stuff.
What I do after alot of research is

1. Increase temp to 30 (not all in one go)
2. Put in an airstone (because higher temps cant hold as much oxygen)
3. Add a tablespoon of aquarium salt (I used API) to every 3 gallons of water. Dont add the salt straight to the tank as this gives "salt burns" to fish. Dissolve it in some warm, dechlorinated water.

This should last for 2 weeks (in my experience). After the first week you can do a 50% water change (do a gravel vac here to remove the stage of ich when there are spores in the gravel) and add back the correct amount of salt. Try to get the temp the same when doing water change.

 

[JamieH]

1: in removing the excess severums and other fish from the tank I have stressed the fish enough to give the disease a foothold - meaning it was already present in the system

or

2: i have introduced it with the parrot fish.

Anyway... it seems there are a lot of potenial treatments and drawbacks...

Correct. From experience id say it was number 2 that caused the problem.

if i turn the heat up, and the heater can't get the tank to 32' for the 3 days required to kill the parasite, then all i am doing is speeding up it's lifecycle and making it more infectious to my fish...

It will speed up the cycle which means it will come out of the fish quicker and start to produce more ich (whitespot) When this happens you want to kill it off. Either with salt or medication.

Medication didnt work for me. I think it was the Waterlife stuff.
What I do after alot of research is

1. Increase temp to 30 (not all in one go)
2. Put in an airstone (because higher temps cant hold as much oxygen)
3. Add a tablespoon of aquarium salt (I used API) to every 3 gallons of water. Dont add the salt straight to the tank as this gives "salt burns" to fish. Dissolve it in some warm, dechlorinated water.

This should last for 2 weeks (in my experience). After the first week you can do a 50% water change (do a gravel vac here to remove the stage of ich when there are spores in the gravel) and add back the correct amount of salt. Try to get the temp the same when doing water change.

i didn't think i could use salt with my plec....?

I've added the venturi to my fluval 4 - which agitates the surface anyway - because i figured more oxygen cannot hurt, even if i haven't started treating it yet

i wasn't happy with how the tank was going before... but really this feels like the last straw.

 

[linda1503]

So sorry to hear about your fish getting whitespot. Hope you manage to save them all cos they are gorgeous fish. Please let us know how you get on!

 

[RadaR]

What type of plec is it?
Ive done this procedure with a bristle-nose in the tank.

 

[Betta5]

You can use garlic to cure white sopt. Im not sure about the complete method but i think you mix it in with their food,
sorry to hear about your problems, i hope they recover,

 

[ICE CUBE]

everything i could think off has already been said i hope your fish recover iam very sorry to hear about your fish

 

[JamieH]

thanks guys...

theres an extensive article on cichlid-forum which reccomends heat as a first line treatment... so i'm trying that

 

[ICE CUBE]

hope everything works out you had alot of bad luck with your tank lately goood luck once again sorry to hear that

 

[JamieH]

So sorry to hear about your fish getting whitespot. Hope you manage to save them all cos they are gorgeous fish. Please let us know how you get on!

Well... i hope so too!

What type of plec is it?
Ive done this procedure with a bristle-nose in the tank.

It's a sailfin plec...

hope everything works out you had alot of bad luck with your tank lately goood luck once again sorry to hear that

Well, having read a couple of quite extensive articles on the subject, I've decided to use the 'heat' method.

There's a really long article on cichlid forum about the pros and cons of each treatment... the heat method - keep the tank at 86f until 3 days AFTER the last fish shows no signs of infection seems like the least stressful method to the fish.

I've increased the surface agitation and none of my fish appear to be suffering any stress as a result of the heat.

Amazingly my blue acara's have been displaying to each other and cleaning their usual spawning rock this morning... so at least i can be sure that everything else is ok

 

[JamieH]

Right... major update time.

The Whitespot

Having followed the advice on cichlid forum for treating whitespot with heat (tank at 86'f until no more spots, then 3 further days), none of my fish ar flicking of have any spots left today. I'll be keeping the temp up till sat.

The New Aquascape

Yesterday I got four huge pieces of rock from a garden centre, and bought two big pieces of resin-based wood look-a-like ornaments. I saw them and had a flash of inspiration as to how they would all fit together in my tank.

I've also got some small pieces of mopani wood - although I won't use it all - still soaking. These will be fitted in around the decor and have java ferns attached to them.

I've got 3 bulbs of Crinum Thaianum on the way too... these will soften the display and add a bit of drama...


I wanted to have lots of big pieces of decor in the tank, lots of nooks and hiding places for all my fish, and have lots of different textures.... hope you like it!!!!

8)

Let me know what you think....

 

[cane76]

tanks look great mate
good luck with the white spot,waterlife do a good treatment