I think my clowns are pregnant.

[ostrow]

That happened to mine once. Swallowed a pea whole. The bloating went away in like 4 hrs.

Then it wasted away with the mysterious disease my clown loaches were getting. In fact, I am back to one, my other two wasted away a couple weeks ago. The one I have has outlived 6 now. All the others just died of "skinny".

 

[Whisper Odinsky]

For what it's worth, clowns are ridiculously prone to ich, and if one of yours wasn't feeling well, it would most likely break out in little white spots, sooner rather than later.

you were just too right. there are white spots both of those cuties now.
going to fish store on the morrow to get some medicine. thanks again, i'd be so lost without this place!

 

[AquaNut]

For what it's worth, clowns are ridiculously prone to ich, and if one of yours wasn't feeling well, it would most likely break out in little white spots, sooner rather than later.

you were just too right. there are white spots both of those cuties now.
going to fish store on the morrow to get some medicine. thanks again, i'd be so lost without this place!

Aww. I'm sorry about your clowns. Hopefully, because you're catching it early, they'll be okay. One word of advice... in my experience, clown loaches don't like being moved; this is one of the main reasons they so often contract ich after you bring them home. I don't recommend putting them in a hospital tank for treatment. You can get them carefully nursed back to health, and then the stress of being netted to go back to the main tank can make it start all over again. Good luck Whisper!

 

[platypus]

Something else to bear in mind with clownies - because they are scaleless you'll need to do a half dosage of the ich treatment. My clowns have had it twice, once when I first got them and moved them into my tank, which as Aquanut said they didn't like at all, and another time more recently when I added some platies to the tank without quarantining them first. The first time I treated with Anti Whitespot Plus and they HATED it, were really lethargic for ages. The last time I used Protozin at half dosage and they were just fine - you have to ignore the advice on the box about treating on days 1, 2, 3 and 6 though and keep on adding the medication every day until there are no whitespots left. I have just finished the treatment and they are swimming around like lunatics and chomping away on bloodworm! Think I'll treat them to some cucumber tonight - Alien Anna you couldn't post me a couple of your snails could you? !

 

[ostrow]

Even at half dose there is still a good chance the clowns will react negatively to any m. green/formalin type meds. Aquarisol at full strength is the ONLY thing that has cured my clowns of ick, and even then not always. Mine are unhappy with something else now btw, as I have UV and no ick problems at all. They are died of something else, these last ones, that I can't figure out and that's why I call it "skinny."

But I know a bit about ick, I'm afraid. Search archives here on my name and you'll see the horror stories. Your choice, but the clowns IMO will have their best shot with Aquarisol. Aquarisol plus UV Sterilizer is best bet.

 

[AquaNut]

Whisper - I agree with ostrow on this one. Aquarisol is the best remedy available in Canada, ime, for treating scaleless fish such as clowns.

 

[Whisper Odinsky]

oh whew. i was just going to type *is it available in canada* but you already answered that one.
ok! i'll get that, and tell you how this goes.
moving the cuties would be stressfull, and besides, i've put them all thru enough cat- trauma, (whisper lounges behind the tank mortifying everyone, -she's my avatar- and odin, occasionally dive-bombs the tank, and falls in during fish-feeding time) so i shall leave em be.
thankyou, also for warning me about dosaging for future referance. i shall let you all know how it goes.
thankyou!!

 

[Whisper Odinsky]

:sigh:

i've been totally freaking over the past week. My hubby thought the whole time the clowns did not have ich, but he assumed it was just bubbles sticking to them (the ich never appeared to him) so he went about and bought 2 more clowns. (on the only manner of GOOD news, the LFS did a water test and our levels are perfect)
now all 4 clowns are infested with ICH, and finally, FINALLY it occured to him that i was right! so then im off to find this stupid aquarisol.. do i find it?
i ended up picking up some freshwater salt, (why? don't ask this moron.. she's still trying to figure it out..) and i read the intructions, and added it in. well fork- as soon as i put the salt in it occurs to me that i have a pleco in there and those clowns im not sure if they can even handle salt when i was purchasing the salt i was thinking of the rest of the tank.
Not to mention after i added in a couple of peas (for that bloating issue) my whole tank went all cloudy. for one thing, my filter stopped working, and we figured it would clear up after it was unclogged (that propeller thingy?) but no... its nice and cloudy and there's all these little tiiiinnny particles everywhere so i have been doing water changes and scooping out any peas and any rotting plants (not to my knowing) and the water is still cloudy-white.
so my big plan here, is to swap out the 5 gallon cory tank into the big tank, and then use this 5 gallon as the hospital tank and i need to somehow find some other medicine aside from fin rot

 

[platypus]

Sorry for all your woes Whisper Odinsky!

Firstly about the ich treatment - I have treated my clowns in the past with Anti-Whitespot Plus AND with Protozin, which both did the job. Protozin I think was slightly better for the fish as it is gentler and doesn't wipe out all the beneficial bacteria in your tank and so risk an ammonia spike. So if you draw a blank with the aquarisol maybe you will have luck with protozin? It's made by waterlife, I'm sorry I don't know if it's available in Canada but they have a website here.

PS about the salt - because clown loaches are scaleless it can aggravate them so probably best not to use it. Have you done any water changes since the tank went cloudy? This usually helps at least partially.

 

[Whisper Odinsky]

when the water went cloudy, we fixed the propeller thingy, and i removed the layered gunk off of the sponge, replaced the charcol, and lightly rinsed the sponge in a bucket of sperate tank water.
i spoke to my saviour at the LFS about the water, and she suggested replacing the sponge, but NOT the amonia packet thingy.
ugh last night was so horrible, my one clown jumped out of a bowl, and it took me at least 5 minutes to realise this.. and he DID survive, but now i can't find him in that hospital tank... aaaaaaarg.. anyway, i have, yes, done water changes, but only minimal- about a 15 % change. and to make matters worse, since adding back in my corys into the big tank, one of the oldest corys is now missing an eye, has a cut on the side of him, and my big beautiful blue gourami has a gash on the side of him and all the fish are picking on him
oiy.
the big tank includes:

2 blue gourami
2 golden gourami
2 moonlight gourami (black line and black dot on them)
2 velvet swordtails
4 green corys
1 pleco
4 zebra danios
1 long finned z. danio
3 golden (or lemon?) danios
1 applesnail
1 rainbow shark
1 betta (i know, i know thats a no-no with the gouramis, but he is so gentle, he has never, ever puffed up or chased them or anything..)

im off to change the sponge thingy.

thankyou for your kindness, and information. you (and all the other lovies who have replied in this thread) are very, very helpful!