Ich during Prazi-treatment

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tender
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Ich during Prazi-treatment

Post by tender » Thu Aug 28, 2008 4:49 pm

Hi!
I really need your advice now.
I have 2 clowns, 1 yo-yo, 5 Histrionicas (+ 3 Guppyes) which at the moment are in a Q-tank beeing treated with Dactymor (Praziquantel) against suspected skinny disease. (The Guppys are in the tank for another reason)
Of course the clowns have developed whitespot (today). None of the others have contracted it, yet. My options are to cancel the Prazicure and start ich treatment. Either with the heat-cure or medicines. Or to continue the Prazi-cure and at the same time start the ich-treatment. I`m worried about the heat-cure because of the Guppys, but also it says on the Prazi-medicine that it can`t be combined with other medicines.

What would you do guys??

Kind regards
Marius Podolski

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Emma Turner
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Post by Emma Turner » Thu Aug 28, 2008 9:11 pm

Hi Marius,

Sorry to hear about your clowns. Unfortunately I am not familiar with the treatment you are using, but hopefully somebody else who has experience with it will be along to help soon. I think if the bottle says it cannot be combined with other meds, I would be inclined to run some activated carbon on the tank to remove the first med, then do a partial water change and start on the whitespot treatment. With the seemingly more virulent strains of whitespot about of late, I don't think you want to delay treating it.

Good luck,

Emma
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Diana
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Post by Diana » Thu Aug 28, 2008 10:19 pm

Ditto Emma: Cancel the Prazi, begin treating Ich. The fish cannot survive the Ich as long as they can whatever is causing the 'skinny' symptoms.

Do as many gravel vacs as you can during whatever treatment you use. Part of the life cycle of the Ich organism is to fall to the floor of the tank and reproduce. I have heard of treating with only water changes this way, in a bare bottom tank. It sure helps reduce the re-infection rate!
38 tanks, 2 ponds over 4000 liters of water to keep clean and fresh.

Happy fish keeping!

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chefkeith
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Post by chefkeith » Fri Aug 29, 2008 3:46 am

Are any of these new fish you just got? I'm just wondering how and why they got ich?

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tender
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Post by tender » Fri Aug 29, 2008 10:00 am

Hi !
Thanks for the response. I decided to treat them for ich first. Did a huge water change and started turning the temperature up. (I know there are different opinions about heat or meds but they have been exposed to so much medication lately, that I have decided to use heat).

Chefkeith: They are not new to the tank. The reason for the ich is this (I suspect): I saw that the 2 clowns (and 1 yo-yo) was beginning to get thinner. I suspected skinny disease (of some sort) and treated the main tank with Flubenol. It didn`t seem to have an effect. I then moved them to my q-tank and started treating with Praziquantel. I made a HUGE mistake: I didn`t add oxygen. The third day they were all gasping for air like crazy. Did a big water change, and started dosing Prazi again. This time with lots of oxygen added. So they have been through a lot of stress (meds,beeing moved, lack of oxygen etc) + the fact that they probably have skinny. I`m quite sure thats the reason for the ich.

Kind regards
Marius

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chefkeith
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Post by chefkeith » Fri Aug 29, 2008 11:17 am

What was used to treat the ich before?

Have you added new fish since last treating for ich?

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tender
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Post by tender » Fri Aug 29, 2008 11:29 am

I havent had ich before.

Marius

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chefkeith
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Post by chefkeith » Fri Aug 29, 2008 11:59 am

Back in March you posted that the clowns did have ich. :?
tender wrote: Hi!
I`m from Norway and I`m new on this great forum!
I have 5 clowns in my tank and two of them of course developed ich. This is now cured, and none of the other inhabitants got the parasite..........
http://forums.loaches.com/viewtopic.php ... ht=#118813

Are these different clowns then?

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tender
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Post by tender » Fri Aug 29, 2008 1:22 pm

Hi!
That turned out not to be ich (drew conclusions a bit fast). It was simply small spots which was more like "scratch"-wounds, if you know what I mean. (the medication I used when I thought it was ich was Sera Costapur)

Besides, that was a different tank.

Marius

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chefkeith
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Post by chefkeith » Sun Aug 31, 2008 9:06 am

How are the clowns doing?

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tender
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Post by tender » Sun Aug 31, 2008 12:33 pm

Hi!
Things are pretty much status quo. The one clown is very active and eating well. The other seems to be struggling a bit more (hiding more than it used to.) Funnily enough, it`s the one with the most spots that is doing best, but he is also bigger (don`t know if that counts) This is the second day of the heat-tratment. No more spots, but not much less either. The Histrionicas and the yo-yo seem to be doing fine. Very active an ich-free, so far...

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tender
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Post by tender » Fri Sep 05, 2008 6:07 pm

Hi again!
Unfortunately I had to Euthanize one of the clowns yesterday :(
It had trouble swimming, but despite that he tried to eat sandsnails, but it couldn`t manage to stay afloat. What annoys me the most is that this was my mistake. The moving from the main tank, my mistake with Prazi and then the ich seemed to be to much for the little chap. However. the other clown is ich-free, so I have my hopes...

I think that the heat-cure was not a good idea. (the heat was 33C almost 6 days before the spots went away). Next time I`ll try medicine... Do you think that ich is more difficult to get rid of, on Loaches, because they are scale-free? I imagine that the parasite can get a better "hold" on the fish, because of this? Maybe thats why Cory`s seldom gets ich...

Anyway.. I have learned my lesson the hard way, and will try to do better next time.

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