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Need help identifying this parasite

mjfromga said:
The bluegill is likely to outgrow the pumpkinseed and cause trouble. These fish are known for excess aggression in aquaria, and are best kept in numbers higher than 2 and in tanks larger than 50 gallons to ensure they have enough space.

Your setup CAN work - but won't necessarily. I have never believed in hostile tank setups... as I doubt the fish would be happy in such and when subjected to constant stress, fish can become ill much easier.

You COULD return these sickly looking parasite infested fish back to where you got them, but to get new fish you would ideally need to nuke your tank as nobody knows what those parasites are and they may infect another fish if you put the fish directly in.

Your kids would definitely be okay with an explanation. And you could always go with Firemouths or some other colorful fish for the kids.

But definitely try the salt and see if it helps. The parasites are eventually likely to cause wounds and malnutrition and lead to fish death and disease, which will be upsetting for everyone involved.
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I had 4 in there and these two were constantly being attacked so I removed the two bullies.
 
I will try the salt tonight. Does it have to be rock salt? Isn't that what you put on your driveway to melt ice? Will table salt not work?
 
Table salt has anti caking agents and in the US iodine is added as well which is why table salt can't be used. It must be plain sodium chloride with nothing added. API Aquarium Salt is is pure salt, but of course it's expensive compared to non-aquarium salt.
 
I did a water change last night and did 1 Tbsp per 3 gallons, so 18 Tbsp total. I'll keep everyone up to date on their progress.
 
That level of salt may affect the plants a little. So just keep an eye out for that.
 
Wanted to provide an update. No change on the parasites, they are still attached to the fish. During my water change this weekend I was going to increase the salt ratio to 1 Tbsp per 2 gallons of water in the tank. However, after my water change was complete, I redid the math in my head and realized that I wasn't accounting for the salt already in the tank, so now I almost have 1 Tbsp per gallon of water. There should be 44 Tbsp in my 53 gallon tank right now. My plants will probably die but the goal is to eradicate whatever these parasites may be. The fish appear to be fine. Any other suggestions are greatly appreciated. My water temperature is 73 degrees F, does anyone think I should increase the temp? Thanks in advance.
 
These types of external parasites often need to be manually removed from the fish. I could hold my Blood Parrot in the tank and pluck them off with tweezers easily... but these are wild caught fish and will object violently to being handled or anything.

It is likely you will need to sedate the fish a bit to attempt it. This is done with clove oil but if you haven't done it before - do not attempt without research as clove oil can kill a fish if given in too high of doses.

You can try the Dimilin I recommended, but again best results are achieved if visible parasites are removed manually first. Also, there's no guarantee it'll help as we really aren't sure what the parasites are. They don't seem like something found in normal aquaria.

And then there's always the last option, put these yucky parasite infested fish back where you found them, nuke the tank, and get fish from a healthy source for the kids. Honestly I don't think these fish are going to thrive long term in this environment even IF you are able to eradicate the parasites.
 
mjfromga said:
These types of external parasites often need to be manually removed from the fish. I could hold my Blood Parrot in the tank and pluck them off with tweezers easily... but these are wild caught fish and will object violently to being handled or anything.

It is likely you will need to sedate the fish a bit to attempt it. This is done with clove oil but if you haven't done it before - do not attempt without research as clove oil can kill a fish if given in too high of doses.

You can try the Dimilin I recommended, but again best results are achieved if visible parasites are removed manually first. Also, there's no guarantee it'll help as we really aren't sure what the parasites are. They don't seem like something found in normal aquaria.

And then there's always the last option, put these yucky parasite infested fish back where you found them, nuke the tank, and get fish from a healthy source for the kids. Honestly I don't think these fish are going to thrive long term in this environment even IF you are able to eradicate the parasites.
Click to expand...
What method do you recommend to nuke the tank? Bleach? Obviously I will need to throw away the wood and rocks because they're porous, but do I rinse out the tank and then fill the empty tank with a bleach/water mix with the heater and canister filter running to get everything clean? The pond they came from was 4 hours away and I don't plan on being back there til next summer. I don't really want to let them go in a lake around here, so I don't know what to do. There is a nasty small pond nearby with tons of green sunfish and snapping turtles. It's really a gross pond, surprised anything lives in there but they do. I feel bad if I had to put them in there. They do have a good life in the tank right now being fed meal worms daily.
 
A light bleach solution works. I mean you may not be able to eradicate the parasites, but the fish can probably live with them. They had them before you got them after all. They are unsightly and indicative of SOME type of issue, but with wild caught fish... you just can't be sure exactly how to deal with it.

DO NOT put these fish in any body of water EXCEPT the one you got them from. The parasites they have can easily infest another system and there's no guarantee that their species belongs in that system either. I would recommend euthanasia before I would ever recommend doing that. Don't do that!!
 
mjfromga said:
A light bleach solution works. I mean you may not be able to eradicate the parasites, but the fish can probably live with them. They had them before you got them after all. They are unsightly and indicative of SOME type of issue, but with wild caught fish... you just can't be sure exactly how to deal with it.

DO NOT put these fish in any body of water EXCEPT the one you got them from. The parasites they have can easily infest another system and there's no guarantee that their species belongs in that system either. I would recommend euthanasia before I would ever recommend doing that. Don't do that!!
Click to expand...
What ratio of bleach to water would you use? How long to run the tank with the bleach solution and how would I know of all the bleach is removed? I won't put these fish back in any body of water. 😀. I'm their last hope for survival.
 
In the old days we would give them a bath in Formalin. I can't remember the ratios now, but I do remember that thirty seconds and they were gone. We used to do this on bulk with goldfish and gill worms. You could watch the worms fall out of the gills.
 
If you're just going to keep the fish as is- then you dont need to nuke the tank. You cannot nuke a tank with fish in it. Bleach will kill the fish, that option was ONLY if you were going to get rid of the fish. You can try treating them with Dimilin.
 
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