Pictus Catfish White Spot

[dfield]

Help

I bought a tank with stock in it and although we tried to minimize stress the two Pictus Catfish picked up white spot really bad. I have a cloan loach who also has it, but most of the other fish seem ok.

I have to tiny Corydoras and an Albino Plec that seem fine, and although the white spot has now gone from the Catfish the Loach still has it at this point, but it is only 2.5 days since I dosed so that may clear. the catfish seem to have lost the shine off parts of their body, so I am not sure if the meds did that or not.

I have been reading on various forums that you need to be really careful with treatments as they dont do well with it.

My fist question is, that the dosing instructions on the meds says to repeat the does on day 4 and given the effects on the fish, if they all show clear by day 4, do I have to repeat the dose?

Secondly, if I do have to re-dose, should I perform a partial water change and put the carbon filter back in to clear all the first dose of meds out of the system before doing it again.. I just wonder if I did that as a precaution so that there is no build up of too much medication that would cause the catfish more harm.

I dont want to cause a problem by adding meds if its unnecessary but then again I dont want a re-occurrence of the whitespot if I don't re-dose.

Please help I have a day and a half before I need to do anything.

 

[fishyfeet]

i would turn up the temp and you can either use aquarium salt or an ich treatment at half dosage, i was told when i got a few on these to add an half dosage of ich treatment when adding them to the tank as they are prown to stress.

 

[dfield]

I have some fish in my tank that wont tolerate the salt, I have turned up the temp though and increased the oxygenation of the water via air stones.. they are coping I just dont want to re-dose if I dont have to.. the instructions just mention not to re-dose with other meds within 7 days, but it doesnt say whether the 2nd dose is optional or compulsory regardless of whether symptoms have gone or not

The catfish are about 15cm now and are really nice fish, I'd hate to do the wrong thing by them.

Also I just noticed the two Honey Dwarf Gouramis are a little bloated, so salt is really out for the moment.. I have just bought a new tank though for meds, so once cycled it will give me a few more options..

 

[fishyfeet]

I think you have to do a good water change and run a carbon filter to remove meds before redosing other wise it is going to be too strong, di

 

[Gidge]

That's unfortunate. You do need to be careful with medication doses. Pictus and clown loaches especially, as they have skin not scales. You should use a half dose to be safe.

White spot actually works in a cycle. The white spots that you are seeing on your fish, are just one stage of their life cycle. After infecting the fish, the parasite will drop off into the gravel/sand and become encysted in a free-living dormant state. This is the stage when they are vulnerable to medications. As Fishyfeet suggested, you should raise the temperature to around 29/30 celcius as this speeds up the life cycle of the parasite.

You need to re dose the medication on the fourth day, whether you can still see white spots or not. If the spots seem to have 'dropped off' your catfish, this is a sign that it is starting another stage of the parasites life cycle, so now is the time when the medication can get onto them.

I personally would not do a water change as this can stress the fish out and you really need to make sure you put water back at the same temperature.(but Fishy feet is probably much more experienced then i am) Also leave the carbon filters out, they probably have white spot in them now.

I have treated both pictus catfish and loaches using this method, and all have recovered just fine.


I hope that helps you. I am just a newbie to this forum but have had alot of encounters with white spot unfortunately. Good luck!

 

[dfield]

Hi

Thank you for the advice, what a nightmare this white spot is! I am also a newbie to fish - I got bought a tiny tank as a gift and we put some Mollies in and 2 days later they had babies.. one was fine with the babies but the other was eating them.. so bright idea I decided to buy a bigger tank and move her over.

I didnt really plan to buy one with fish included but thats the way it worked out, and so I inherited all these fish and unfortunately as the person who had them had put sand in, rather than gravel, upon moving the filter got completely clogged up with sand and stopped working.. so I cleaned it out.. with tap water BIG MISTAKE... next thing I am having to do water changes every 2 days, have white cloudy water and fish that are not liking it at all! Hence the white spot.

The water is now clearing nicely and so at least that hell is over.. but its like you sort one thing out and then another thing comes along!

I knew nothing about any of these fish so have been googling like mad to research them.. when I read all about the pictus catfish and their intolerance to the meds I was feeling just a bit out of my depth!!!

I am now eyeing the two Gouramis suspiciously and thinking they might have the first signs of dropsy <<sighs>>> I am going to treat them separately and am just waiting for another tank to arrive to put them in.. GAAHHH

 

[Gidge]

Thank you for the advice, what a nightmare this white spot is! I am also a newbie to fish - I got bought a tiny tank as a gift and we put some Mollies in and 2 days later they had babies.. one was fine with the babies but the other was eating them.. so bright idea I decided to buy a bigger tank and move her over

I am told (and have seen) that mollies and platys aren't the best parents haha. If you give the babies plenty of little hiding spots, lush/bushy plants, some will have a chance of survival. Most of them will get eaten though unfortunately.

I didnt really plan to buy one with fish included but thats the way it worked out, and so I inherited all these fish and unfortunately as the person who had them had put sand in, rather than gravel, upon moving the filter got completely clogged up with sand and stopped working.. so I cleaned it out.. with tap water BIG MISTAKE... next thing I am having to do water changes every 2 days, have white cloudy water and fish that are not liking it at all! Hence the white spot.

What fish did you inherit with the tank? Are they compatible with your Mollies? Also, the pictus will most deffinately be eating some if not alot of your molly babies. I made the mistake of putting 2 small pictus in one of my tank which had neons. I lost 14 in 3 days. Safe to say they had very big bellies afterwards. When the Pictus get bigger (if they arent already big) they pick on the mollies and any smaller fish. This is just what I have been told by my local fish store, but it somewhat makes sense after witnessing what they did to my neon population.

Yes unfortunately washing the filter out in tap water probably wasnt the best idea, but we all make mistakes! Do you have any filter media from another tank? Perhaps your molly tank? You can put that into the filter and that should help kick start the bacteria. Also what helped me was a handful of gravel from an established tank. Do you have a testing kit for testing ammonia's etc?

but its like you sort one thing out and then another thing comes along!

I know exactly how you feel. My partner just set up a 50L tank, and we were suffering with high ammonia levels then to top it off some of the fish got whitespot. The ammonia has finally been brought down, but needs to be brought down further and whitespot has almost all cleared up All part of learning.

 

[dfield]

We kept the molly babies in a little tank with 6 neon tetras, they are fine in there. I have 32 left and they are doing fine, some are still really tiny but the others have actually grown quite large, like 3/4 inch already and only 3 weeks old.

In the big tank 170L we have 2 Pictus Catfish, 2 Corydoras, 2 Platy, 2 Female Kribs, 4 Guppies, 1 Red Tail Shark (tiny), 2 Honey Dwarf Gourami, 1 Blue Gourami, 2 Clown Loach, the 2 female mollies and 1 female Albino Pleco. I made the mistake of trying my neons in the tank and the Kribs hunted them down!!! I managed to rescue them all but one has literally no tail or dorsal fin! It is growing back tho! The Kribs are my favourite, I have a snail problem in the small tank and have loads in there.. anyway I took some out and popped them in the big tank as I read Clown Loaches loved them.. well the loaches didnt get a look in, the kribs ate them, shells and all!

The pictus seem much happier today and are moving around.. there is still a lot of the fish flicking that didnt show any signs of white spot, but I am wondering if the meds I put in are irritating them?? Still debating about the Dwarf Gouramis, they did a little mating dance last night and so maybe it isnt bloat but getting ready to drop eggs? I am going to move them to a tank without all the moving water and see if they build a bubble nest.. it is all very interesting!

Yes I have all the testing kits, its not too bad at the moment, we seem to be stabilizing everything, but I think its just time.. I had this with the small tank 32L (molly babies and neons in that one) when I started but that is now crystal clear. I think the sand caused a lot of probs in the big tank.. the filter was absolutely clogged with it. It cant have been nice for the fish either since the pictus were constantly flicking the sand up and there was so much floating around in the water it surely must have caused eye and skin irritation for the fish.

I know I've gone a bit off topic, but have to say its a really fascinating hobby and I am enjoying it, even with all the hassle at the moment.

 

[Gidge]

Sorry I haven't replied for a while. Haven't had a computer on me.

In the big tank 170L we have 2 Pictus Catfish, 2 Corydoras, 2 Platy, 2 Female Kribs, 4 Guppies, 1 Red Tail Shark (tiny), 2 Honey Dwarf Gourami, 1 Blue Gourami, 2 Clown Loach, the 2 female mollies and 1 female Albino Pleco. I made the mistake of trying my neons in the tank and the Kribs hunted them down!!! I managed to rescue them all but one has literally no tail or dorsal fin! It is growing back tho! The Kribs are my favourite, I have a snail problem in the small tank and have loads in there.. anyway I took some out and popped them in the big tank as I read Clown Loaches loved them.. well the loaches didnt get a look in, the kribs ate them, shells and all!

I would be careful mixing the pitcus, guppies and platy's. As the pictus get bigger, they could make meals of them. So just keep a good eye on them
I hate snails haha. Luckily your Kribs got onto them!

The pictus seem much happier today and are moving around.. there is still a lot of the fish flicking that didnt show any signs of white spot, but I am wondering if the meds I put in are irritating them?? Still debating about the Dwarf Gouramis, they did a little mating dance last night and so maybe it isnt bloat but getting ready to drop eggs? I am going to move them to a tank without all the moving water and see if they build a bubble nest.. it is all very interesting!

I am unsure about the flicking. But since it has been a few days since I've spoken to you, what are you currently doing with medications? Has the whitespot completely cleared up? Good luck with the Gourami's. I have a couple and would love to seem them build a bubble nest, would be amazing to watch!

Glad you're enjoying fishkeeping. It can be a bit tedious at times, but is well worth it when you get it right!

 

[dfield]

Hi

Thanks for your replies...

we were very stuck with the pictus (though beautiful), we inherited them with the tank, but if they get a problem I will find a new home for them... its the guppies actually being a pain they are hounding the female platy! Actually they are a bit of a nuisance because they are sex mad! Glad I dont have any female guppies.

The fish with the flicking have not got any sign of Ich at all?? Bizzarly they are flicking in the same spot in the middle of the gravel in the front of the tank. Even different species of fish?? Weird but doesnt seem to be because of Ich.

One Pictus is clear of the Ich, the other has double! And also one of the clown loaches still has it - he's hard to check as he spends most of the time holed up in an ornamental head! I have turned up the temp, but despite having the biggest interpet heater, it wont get the temp above 80F gahh.. I do have another one.. could I put 2 on at the same time?

Now I have another problem.. my ammonia is reading 2ppm, and Nitrite 2ppm. Nitrates are ok and PH is ok, but those two are a real problem

I am on day 2 of the second dose of the ICH treatment... if I do a water change to help the ammonia and nitrites, should I re-dose the Ich treatment or should I leave the water, add some chemicals to help it and wait the 2 days before doing another water change and my next treatment of ich.. I am at a loss as if I change the water now, will it render the treatment I just did innefective or cause a problem if I cant add the next dose for another 2 days (the bottle says dont re-apply until 4 days. Any ideas???

There is just so much to learn and because I inherited these fish I am needing to fast track all that to make sure I dont do anything (more) wrong.

 

[Gidge]

I recently just had an outbreak of Ich with high ammonia levels. The advice given to me was to do to 90% water changes every day, re-dosing the ich treatement after EVERY water change. You need to get that ammonia down! The flicking could be because of the high ammonia levels.

You could use two heaters. I dont see why you couldnt. Just make sure you keep an eye on the temp.

 

[dfield]

thank you, I guess I know what I will be doing this evening you're so right about the ammonia potentially causing the flicking, I hadn't even thought of that.

 

[dfield]

Ok, change now done, will take the readings a little later on and keep doing the changes. Catfish now seem clear, so fingers crossed the meds are working, but the clown loach is covered. The loach spends most of his time in an ornamental head and is relatively immobile during the day, my theory is when the ich is dropping off its actually falling to the bottom of the head and so re-finding a host after its free swimming stage is easy. I have loaded the bottom of the head with aquarium salt!!! The loach doesnt seem worried about it as he is still in the head, but hopefully those pesky ich will die!!!

Anyway, I guess we'll see in a few days.

I treated my Gourami (bloated one) to an epsom salts bath and he's looking great today.. he did loads of poop in the bath and I wonder if i just scared it Sh**tless so it cleared its system or the epsom salts did its job... lol either way he's looking miles better today.

My other half asked if there was a forum for "fish widows" last night haha. I think he's feeling a little unloved since I've lavished all my attention on the fish.

 

[Gidge]

Good work, keep up with those water changes! As for your clown loach, they are very hard to treat due to having skin not scales.

Good to hear that your gourami is doing better!

'fish widows' haha. Just think how great your tank is going to look when it's all done!

My partner's 50L tank cracked last night (2am)So he's feeling a bit fed up with it all at the moment haha.

Keep me posted!

 

[dfield]

OMG poor him, what a nightmare! Hope the fishes are all ok.