Mysterious fish deaths are more common now (Flukes)

[ariannae]

Thanks so much for your reply! This definitely helps. I asked a LFS i use what I should do and they were saying to add copper, they didn't have prazipro. Not sure if copper will be enough here.

So sad because my emperor angelfish has one eye basically completely white, the other one just a bit 'cloudy' / covered. And they can do that right? I hope it's not too late for him! I worry he'll get permanently blind, right now he can barely see the food when I feed him. I'm surprised flukes don't get killed by the UV sterilizer! So weird.

I also think my clownfish trigger has flukes (some on his eye, more visible but not as bad as angel), and his fins are a little frayed too.

One thing I'm worried about is if I need to turn both UV and Skimmer off, that my stats are going to spike and affect the fish. So not sure if I should treat the tank separately while they're turned off, and have the fish taken to a QT in my LFS. A lot more complicated but possibly safer. So the treatment takes 24 hours? Your system didn't get too much of a shock when you turned both UV and Skimmer off?

Not to jinx myself or sound weird, but honestly this is the first parasitic /bacterial outbreak I've had in the tank that I've had to treat, since the UV always catches things and keeps it safe. Last time I had fish loss is because my silly cat turned off the power switch thus turning the whole tank off during a cold day and my clownfish and clown sweetlip (who was doing awesome!) died.

Again so glad I found this thread!

 

[my2rotties]

You can't use copper in the whole system. Try to phone around for the prazipro or find it online. I had difficulty finding it in Canada, but I see Americans have access to much more online then I do. I turned my skimmer on after 24 hours.

I worried about bombing my system without the UV, skimmer and carbon off but I was fine. I just checked my params three times a day to make myself feel better. The prazipro didn't even kill any bristle worms in my system and my pods were fine as well.

My puffer always had cloudy eyes and now his are crystal clear. The other fish have much more vibrant colours which I didn't know was even faded until after treatment.

I treated the entire system since if I QTed the fish they would just get it again, plus it would stress them out as well. The fish went through treatment very well and I had no real issues with them, just lots of pooping.

If I were you I would treat for flukes with prazipro and see what the end results will be. In my experience (which is not much), copper is hard on the fish and will kill every beneficial thing in your tank along with ich and such.

 

[cthetoy]

Copper will not kill flukes neither does UV. Flukes reproduce on the fish or through eggs thus making UV useless.

Prazipro can be found at fostersmith.com which ships worldwide if you have trouble finding it.

You can't use your skimmer, ozone or UV while dosing Prazipro. Just prepare to perform several large water change to compensate the temporary loss of the skimmer and/or carbon. Your fish/corals will appreciate the water change anyways.

 

[ariannae]

Thanks!! Ok no luck in finding prazipro and unfortunately timing is of the essence. So I bought Rally, which i heard is a pretty effective and safe medicine against flukes. Only need to remove skimmer and active carbon, can leave UV on. So that's pretty good! And it's reef safe. Some more info: http://www.rubyreefinc.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=13&Itemid=28

Thought I'd pass that long as well in case people want to try it out. LFS said it's pretty good. I'm going to start it tonight and see what happens. Hopefully i caught it in time without any permanent damage left. I was also told Amquil Plus is a good compensation while skimmer/carbon gone to help manage nitrate and avoid spikes. But I plan to do bigger water change after treatment of course anyways.

Thank you again for all your help guys! Please cross fingers, and I hope Rally helps. I may order Prazipro anyway for future use in case too. ...man parasites suck. And they're gross.

 

[my2rotties]

Good luck with the treatment. I also want to thank cthetoy for putting this post up in the first place. It was awful to lose my large Emperor and my baby Queen and Majestic angel due to flukes and the infection afterwards.

Keep me posted on how your course of treatment works for your guys. I think I might treat my tank again for flukes shortly since I have a feeling I did not quite get them all the first time. I notice a couple of fish are bumping of the rocks again. I just hope I am lucky enough to find the prazipro again. I found mine at the LFS on the bottom of a dusty shelf. They forgot that they even had it there...

Good luck!!! Any photobucket pictures of your tank by any chance?

 

[ariannae]

Yes thank you so much! This has really helped, and is an issue rather unknown.

Ok one more question, sorry. The directions for the Rally medicine state:

Remove all absorbent filtration materials (e.g., activated carbon).

Does that also mean turn off UV sterilizer I assume? I did first day of treatment with it on but I can turn it off today on 2nd day.

I also ordered Prazipro (thanks again) JUST in case. Was it fast acting for you? Did you see a pretty fast reaction of flukes dropping off them, similar to what happens in a FW? And when I finish the Rally treatment in 2 days should I also FW dip some of the fish or do you guys think this will add undue stress?

And now of course I go to work hoping everything is ok. Get so worried. But the fish are still eating which is good. I noticed an increase in flicking, not sure if that is because of the medication, like they're trying even harder to get the flukes off.

Thanks!

 

[my2rotties]

Yes you need to shut off the carbon and UV.

My fish reacted right away to the treatment. They started head flicking and pooping buckets. I was scared to death watching my corals, anemones, inverts and everything else in terror... for no reason at all. Everybody pulled through just fine. I did see seasame seed sized flukes floating around the water in the power heads for the first few hours. The last few days were uneventful, but I saw my fish get more bright in color.

I did notice on the second day the fish did not have much of an appetite. I added garlic and selcon to their food to get them to eat. They sort of picked at it the second day. The third day they were eating like pigs.

The fish will be fine, just check your params to make yourself feel better.

Diana

 

[ariannae]

Thanks! Aw man I kept the UV on coz the fish stores are saying thats fine. I just finished 3 days of treatment but I'm supposed to wait another 4 until changing the water so maybe I should just turn off UV now. Just worried I get something else if I turn it off. Why what happens if UV remains on? Is that why I'm not seeing an immediate result? I'm also using different medicine. This weekend I plan to do a FW dip as supplement treatment. I am still waiting to receive Prazipro, it's currently in transit since had to order online...

Francesca

 

[ariannae]

Thanks! Aw man I kept the UV on coz the fish stores are saying thats fine. I just finished 3 days of treatment but I'm supposed to wait another 4 until changing the water so maybe I should just turn off UV now. Just worried I get something else if I turn it off. Why what happens if UV remains on? Is that why I'm not seeing an immediate result? I'm also using different medicine. This weekend I plan to do a FW dip as supplement treatment. I am still waiting to receive Prazipro, it's currently in transit since had to order online...

Francesca

 

[cthetoy]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14656591#post14656591 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ariannae
Thanks! Aw man I kept the UV on coz the fish stores are saying thats fine. I just finished 3 days of treatment but I'm supposed to wait another 4 until changing the water so maybe I should just turn off UV now. Just worried I get something else if I turn it off. Why what happens if UV remains on? Is that why I'm not seeing an immediate result? I'm also using different medicine. This weekend I plan to do a FW dip as supplement treatment. I am still waiting to receive Prazipro, it's currently in transit since had to order online...

Francesca

First off UV alone does NOT cure ich, flukes or velvet. UV should be used when your tank is healthy without any medications. Why we should not use UV during medications? Because the medication may weaken or worse yet make the medication toxic. For example Cupramine (a popular copper medication) will become 10x toxic if used with UV. It happened to me before

 

[tankslave]

I just found this thread the day after I brought home a Regal Angel from BlueZoo. He's been twitching every now and then, and I suspect it's some gill flukes. I started treating with PraziPro (Tong's had it, if anyone's still looking for it).

cthetoy,
you mentioned you wait till your QT fish starts eating before treatment? I'd imagine that if a fish has some gill flukes, or other, that they probably wont have much of an appetite, and treating for flukes ASAP would be the first priority.

Obviously my Regal isnt eating yet, but I tend to suspect this has a lot to do with flukes, or possibly some other infection. He looks healthy and fat, but isnt exhibiting any foraging behavior at this point. He's got a bunch of LR with plenty of sponges to pick at, but isnt even show any interest at this point.

I'm just wondering how many needless fish deaths we've gone through due to this, blaming ourselves when it might not have ever been our fault. I'm also wondering what other diseases have gone under the radar. A lot of fish that have been deemed "difficult" may not warranted, with the proper knowledge of diseases and treatment. Why is it that so many "difficult" fish usually live for years in captivity, if they survive. the first month? I'm just saying we have been kicking ourselves for too long. It almost angers me that this treatment is not used on a REGLUAR basis by wholesalers/importers/LFS.

As I said, I had to drive up to Tong's to get PraziPro, which is an hour out of my way. I got a great big "Huh?" from my LFS guy when I asked for some PraziPro. Makes me think they just want you to buy more fish (big shocker).

 

[cthetoy]

What Regal do you have? The yellow belly (Red Sea) or the Indo (grey belly)? The Red Sea are sought and more expesive after because they do better in captivity than the Indo one. Nevertheless there are success stories with the Indo ones though. I always try to see if the Regal is eating at the LFS before purchasing since Regals are generally hard to get them to ear perpared food. Some Regals will take a week or more to eat using these foods: raw clams on the half shell, mysis, live brine, Red Nori, Green nori, NLS pellets, flakes - floating and sinking.

As for flukes I strongly suspect the Regal has flukes but for it not to eat because of flukes is a slim chance since the Regal is quite new. If I had a fish that was eating for some time and stopped a few days later then I would suspect the fish might have flukes.

You could try a freshwater dip to get rid of the larger adult flukes. Look at the dip after 5 minutes to see if flukes did fall off (small, white opaque sesame seed sized flukes). Once the Regal is eating then you could treat it with Prazipro.

There is a long great Regal thread on the Reef Fish forum if you want to read more about Regal Angels.

 

[tankslave]

Yeah, it is the Red Sea one. I did not have much choice (only one they had) or any chance to see if he was eating at the store (BlueZoo is online only), but the guy told me over the phone that he was eating. They are a reputable distributor, from what I've heard, so I took a chance with it. The fish turned out to be quite plump and in good (visible) condition.

I have all the above foods mentioned, and am trying them one by one. I read through the whole Regal thread before the purchase.

It's just hard to tell if he's not eating because, well, it's a Regal, or if it's because there's something bothering him. He is twitching now and then, so something is irritating him. He was at the facility for about a week (I was told) and he's still pretty fat, but maybe he picked something up during that time. I guess it's just that feeling that I should do something...

 

[WhiteShark1]

Does anyone know if flukes have a natural predator that we can add to our tank rather than adding medication? I seem to have a fluke infestation as well in my display tank. I'm afraid to add medication b/c its a reef tank but I'm having a heck of a time catching the fish to do fresh water dips. I was curious if cleaner wrasses or neon gobies will eat flukes or something along those lines. Does anyone know?

 

[michealprater]

I will be receiving a new Regal Angel here in the next couple of days. Should I acclimate him first, then freshwater dip? Or Dip straight out of the bag?

 

[cthetoy]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14770032#post14770032 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by michealprater
I will be receiving a new Regal Angel here in the next couple of days. Should I acclimate him first, then freshwater dip? Or Dip straight out of the bag?

When I FW diip new fish I wil acclimate the Regal in a bucket or bag. When you about to release the Regal in the quarantine or main tank FW dip the Regal for 5 minutes and then release it.

 

[michealprater]

That is what I thought, just wanted to verify. Thanks!

 

[paulthomas]

Thanks for the link to this thread cthetoy. I just lost my Majestic that was in QT for ~ two months. Everything looked good, I skipped a day of feeding due to time constraints and the next day I found the fish dead. I had gotten rid of an ich infestation a few weeks ago, temp was ~ 78, ammonia/nitrates were 0, nitrates were ~ 40 ppm and salinity was ~ 1.021. It looked healthy, was very active, friendly, playful and eating very well. Then boom, dead. I'm thinking flukes.

I noticed that my Mystery wrasse, which is in another QT, shaking its head every once in awhile. Time to get me some PraziPro.

Thanks,
Paul

 

[michealprater]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14770191#post14770191 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by cthetoy
When I FW diip new fish I wil acclimate the Regal in a bucket or bag. When you about to release the Regal in the quarantine or main tank FW dip the Regal for 5 minutes and then release it.

I have heard from others that it is dangerous to fresh dip a fish that is under the stress of just being shipped. Is that true? Should I just put it in QT and watch for symptoms?

 

[IFbettas]

My fish had been getting really skinny from some sort of internal parasite, and a couple of my anthias had flukes, so I dosed prazi pro on Saturday. My fish still look the same as before I dosed, and the damsels poo is still white. I'm wondering how long it takes for the prazi to take effect. How do I know if it worked on the fish or not? Does the white poo mean it didn't, or does it just take a while for the fish to regain "healthy" color poo.