Methylene Blue vs Antibiotics Treatment

[Ichthys]

I wish we had an alternative to antibiotics for fish, as there are issues with misuse and overuse in untrained or unskilled hands. But they don't exist.

They exist, they're just not legal in the US (and Canada obviously). Europe is awash with them to the extent that we hardly ever need antibiotics.
That doesn't mean we're not still guessing when we treat our fish, and we still only treat for the obvious ailment when most times there are several, but our available treatments are much more bio-friendly.

 

[gwand]

They exist, they're just not legal in the US (and Canada obviously). Europe is awash with them to the extent that we hardly ever need antibiotics.
That doesn't mean we're not still guessing when we treat our fish, and we still only treat for the obvious ailment when most times there are several, but our available treatments are much more bio-friendly.

Can you list some bio-friendly treatments and for what conditions.

 

[Ichthys]

Can you list some bio-friendly treatments and for what conditions.

Have a look at Waterlife, eSHa, Tetra, Interpet, King British, NT Labs, allpondsolutions. They all do the full range of treatments. And there are others..

I'm not calling them bio-friendly, just more bio-friendly than antibiotics. Most will not harm filters or plants...

 

[Ichthys]

Can you list some bio-friendly treatments and for what conditions.

I only ever use Waterlife treatments. Protozin for fungal and protozoan diseases, Myxazin for bacterial, and Sterazin for 'parasites' like worms and flukes. They all work really well. Even for whitespot (Protozin) and worms such as Camallanus and Capillaria (Sterazin), you only need to pour in the correct dosage on the specified days. You don't need to clean the gravel or do anything else at all like you would with antibiotics. And we've had these treatments since the late 1960s. Fishkeeping is a lot easier over here.

 

[Essjay]

Ichthys's examples -
Protozin contains malachite green, formalin and copper
Sterazin contains acriflavine, malachite green, piperazine citrate and formaldehyde

 

[GaryE]

I use a little acriflavene, as my soft water set up is prone to occasional oodinium outbreaks. It is carcinogenic for us, but I expect we'd have to bathe in it. It has been banned in some jurisdictions because of that.

The two meds noted:

Ichthys's examples -
Protozin contains malachite green, formalin and copper
Sterazin contains acriflavine, malachite green, piperazine citrate and formaldehyde

are strictly for external problems. They are great anti-parasitics. It's internal meds where we lack. I can easily go to war with fish skin parasites and win. I can find all those ingredient legally, if I read the fine print on the remedy ingredients. In spite of the scary names, they're good. Hobby lore has linked copper to infertility in some livebearers, but I haven't seen the papers to support that. I don't use copper, so it has gone into the need to know someday maybe file.

Aquarium remedies used to be big business here, and even the department stores used to have shelves of them. Most were the same ingredients with different brands on them - the usual. Some turned out to be harmful, most worked and most are gone now. Even when I try to cheat and get stuff across the border in the US, the pet stores sell homeopathy and naturopathy. The "meds' available smell good and make us feel we're busily saving our fish, but the active ingredients just don't do it.

The shelves when I was last in UK stores were loaded with products. Recently, I learned about chloramine based treatments in some of them, but what replaces antibiotics, or replaces my fatalism, when it comes to gram positive or gram negative bacterial infections?

 

[Ichthys]

I nearly gave you a mention, @Essjay, for those ingredients, but I wasn't sure if it was you that knew them or one of the others on that other forum.

They're not strictly for external problems. Sterazin is our go-to med for Capillaria and Camallanus, as previously mentioned. Piperazine works very well on roundworms.

 

[Essjay]

I have a collection of ingredients for various brands of meds. Some are from the manufacturer's website, or the safety data sheet the web site links to; others are from people who have the medication and kindly sent me the ingredients. The Waterlife meds fall into the latter category, and some of those are from when I emailed the company to ask - it was Waterlife who said in response to my query that Octozin contains dimetridazole, for example. And a member on here sent me the Sterazin ingredients.

 

[Colin_T]

The problem I have with adding salt to my aquarium is my fresh water plants dont do well with it.

You're adding too much salt if the plants are dying.

 

[Colin_T]

Can you list some bio-friendly treatments and for what conditions.

SALT
For some fish diseases you can use salt (sodium chloride) to treat the ailment rather than using a chemical based medication. Salt is relatively safe and is regularly used in the aquaculture industry to treat food fish for diseases. Salt has been successfully used to treat minor fungal and bacterial infections, as well as a number of external protozoan infections. Salt alone will not treat whitespot (Ichthyophthirius) or Velvet (Oodinium) but will treat most other types of external protozoan infections in freshwater fishes. Salt can treat early stages of hole in the head disease caused by Hexamita but it needs to be done in conjunction with cleaning up the tank. Salt can also be used to treat anchor worm (Lernaea), fish lice (Argulus), gill flukes (Dactylogyrus), skin flukes (Gyrodactylus), Epistylis, Microsporidian and Spironucleus infections.

Heat (30C / 86F) to treat white spot and velvet.

Praziquantel to treat tapeworm, gill flukes and possibly white spot.

Levamisole to treat thread/ round worms.

Big daily water changes and gravel cleans can help too

 

[Fishfunn]

You're adding too much salt if the plants are dying.

Do you konw how much salt to add per gallon that would not affect the plants?

 

[Fishfunn]

I use a little acriflavene, as my soft water set up is prone to occasional oodinium outbreaks. It is carcinogenic for us, but I expect we'd have to bathe in it. It has been banned in some jurisdictions because of that.

I have oodinium outbreaks in my display tank and I always use a mixture of RO water and tap water, 60/40. The only treatment I found that took care of the outbreak successfully was copper, ie SeaChem Cupramine. I have very good tap water, so I was wondering if my soft water was somehow setting me up with these parasites. I would rather not use the copper if there was another way to prevent these outbreaks. I keep the aquarium well maintained.

 

[GaryE]

I find velvet parasites to be a softwater problem. When I kept livebearers I was hit with a nasty parasite in the same family/style, but it worked differently than velvet. So there are hardwater parasites not unlike my longtime nemesis. But classic, 'old school' oodinium has been a softwater pest, generally only of two groups - Aphyosemion killies and Microctenopoma. Nothing else seems to get it from among the fish I keep.

I keep my tanks well,but it just pops up sometimes. I assume it lives in the tanks, and only flares up if I slip up on some detail.

 

[Fishfunn]

I find velvet parasites to be a softwater problem. When I kept livebearers I was hit with a nasty parasite in the same family/style, but it worked differently than velvet. So there are hardwater parasites not unlike my longtime nemesis. But classic, 'old school' oodinium has been a softwater pest, generally only of two groups - Aphyosemion killies and Microctenopoma. Nothing else seems to get it from among the fish I keep.

I keep my tanks well,but it just pops up sometimes. I assume it lives in the tanks, and only flares up if I slip up on some detail.

This is the water straight from my tap. It is a little hard but other than that it is good. Chlorine is not measurable. I have no chloramines in the water.

 

[GaryE]

Unless I'm missing something (very possible!), we still haven't dealt with alternatives to antibiotics. Gutworms, nematodes, Ich, velvet, flukes - none would call for antibiotics. There are remedies over here that can deal with those things. It's bacterial infections which challenge us, and for them, methylene blue won't do much. I've netted fish out in desperation, and applied betadine to infected surface wounds. It has worked, though it has to be kept away from the gills and eyes. I've had very good success with that, as long as I worked fast and got the fish into clean quarters after.
I based that one on a treatment used by the old timers, with iodine, from the Innes book.

But for flavibacter, etc? I've controlled hole in the head with heavy water changing - it becomes asymptomatic and the lesions heal. But miss a change by 2 or 3 days, and it's back and has to be 'cured' all over again.