The current state of S. gigantea - acclimation and antibiotic treatment

[OrionN]

.......
Keep in mind also, that we are currently treating 250mg/10g regardless of size OR type of specimen. We don't have any specific guidelines in place based on size or kind of nem, it's just a sweeping "get the water to this concentration".

The total fluid volume of an average size human is about 10 gal. This is very rough calculation on my part. Assuming that the medication we use have a complete distribution to all water volume in a human, given a single dose for human use in 10 gal should get the concentration to where the medication is effective to treat the infection.
Factors that increase or decreased concentration in certain area due to barrier we have in our body (not all the medication are absorbed, Medication does not get into some of the cavities well like joints or to the brain because of blood brain barrier, medication are concentrated to the kidney and bladder because it is actively eliminate into urine....)

In land animal the volume of distribution of the medication is limited to the water volume of the animal. That is the reason why dose of medication depends on the size of the animal. In the fish tank, on the other hand, the volume of of distribution of the medication is the tank volume therefore the recommended does depends on the water volume of the treatment tank.

I have tried the medication dose for my anemone first to see if there is any clear cut problem before I recommended it. In case that I guess and not used that dose before personally, I try to mention that this is the case.

I would like to beg of you who treat with antibiotics - please dump your water change water and don't reintroduce it to the water supply.

In both ciprofloxacin and trime/sulfa, in human use, our body excreted the medication unchanged into the urine thus into the sewage system. Both medication are photo degraded and get broken down by sunlight. I assume that in animal use, they eliminated thought the urine into the environment, and there it get degraded by the Sun.

 

[Amoo]

Minh,

I understand where you get your volume calculation from and honestly have no issues with it. The one area though where I feel it may be revised eventually (or may not) is dosage via species. As we can see in some of the studies I link and others that are out there a plant is not a plant is not a plant. Many show different tolerances to some of these drugs and I'm wondering if Nem species are the same.

 

[OrionN]

I am hoping that the needed concentration is not anywhere near the toxic concentration. The information we need is what species and the sensitivity of the pathogens.

 

[taylor t]

(I'll attempt humor once more, last time it came out as disaster, I'm sorry...)
(humor here)
I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I'm, ok with that. I'd rather have fun. Clearly, all the health care professionals understand it much more clearer, all I'm reading (humor here, remember )is "bla bla bla gram negative bla bla gig". But, is it possible, (humor) that once you find out the "patient" has hepatitis "c", even giving it the proper medication and the proper grams, still doesn't address the issue that they walked into the ER with a plastic bag stuck down it's throat? or has bad sun burn with pealing skin that needs something more than a band aid? Or ate too much the night before and went straight to bed? (all humor here)




(ok, end of humor)
I don't know a lot of things. But just looking back on my own share of gigs I've killed, I've realized a lot of things I wish I did differently now. I think there's a LOT of other things that kill them as well, and I think meds are looked at as the "skapegoat" as mentioned before. Even DSF kills their share, and they're doctors! No disrespect to anyone, as it's a requirement to start with a good one first... We all have understood this for a while now. No one can save one that's already internally decided to die. Finding out if it's positive or negative or neutral, may help a few, but most likely not the majority, still. I still think there is some luck in getting one that hasn't "checked out" already, which could take a month or longer sometimes to do so, no matter how many water changes are done. D-Nak's an accomplished reefer, and he was able to save 1 of 4. He has YEARS of gig experience too. Luck of the draw sometimes. Gigs don't travel well.

I look at the difference of flow with them, and, let's say a BTA. You blast a BTA with flow(I've done it), and they will move away, usually. I blast a gig, it stretches TOWARDS flow, again, usually. Always an exception. Is it possible, that it's not an infection, but a structural difference inside we just don't know or understand? Maybe gigs can't move water internally on their own, fast enough, (which requires high flow to move it around for them), and maybe a BTA can, or doesn't need as much as fast because it's "metabolism" is slower?. Maybe some slow current early upon receiving a gig, so the gig can "understand (if you can appease me a moment) when they first get there that it's ok to inflate, then slowly ramp it up to what it really needs long term? (HUMOR) before they start getting light headed (maybe I'm the one that's light headed, I don't know). Maybe it's in dire need of some blasting to get "the ol' pipes moving again". Maybe dead zoox clogs it's internal "pipes" upstream internally at times. Just a thought, we've all been constipated if you're honest.

Then there's light. Could be the patient gets sunburned really easy, on day one, out of the truck container. Who knows what it was getting before? Was it under a ledge, up against some tall grass only getting 5 hours of direct light, or on a rock getting 14 hours??? Blast too much early, sunburn and shrink. Not enough, it will kill the zoox it already has, if it's not in the process of clearing the dead zoox already... Uh oh, here comes constipation again... Then fast ramp up of intensity, then sun burn again... "Why is it shrinking???" ..."I don't know?".... Sounds like a Brian Regan comedy show. (We have lots of laughs in our family, if you haven't grasped that yet! I will try to contain myself from here on out).

Then there's water. Could be it's too drastic of an elevation change, (PH) like going from Florida sea level, to Colorado overnight, or to a smog air filled city, and then asked to go jogging like the day before. We'd all deflate too.

The above are just some silly (and some real) thoughts. No disrespect to anyone.. Maybe something I've said will spark some thought in the guys that understand biology better than me, I'm not schooled (I earn money turning screwdrivers). Even figuring out what virus they get, who's to say one comes with bird flu, one with common cold, and the next shipment comes with cancer from the beach they were living on that dumps toxic chemicals in the water a mile away. TOOOOOO many variables with all of this. I think it would be more productive to show what a thriving gig looks like, what they all seem to like when they are thriving, and for those with gigs to explain their own journey how their particular gig made it "over the hump", and struggles they have had to overcome, I know I've had mine. EVERYONE has issues at times. Even Minh has had to treat his purple after being in captivity for so long, and he's the treatment pioneer! I may need to treat one of mine again in the future too. My green 210 gig was treated 4 months ago, for probably the tenth (who knows) time in captivity, I'm the third reefer to treat it. I've found they all are a little different initially. Bottom line, gigs are a TOUGH anemone to acclimate... Gosh, I've said too much, I can't believe I'm posting this.... Grace please. Best of luck to everyone.

 

[D-Nak]

I should've been more specific when I introduced the thread. The assumption here is that the gigs we're dealing with are newly imported and sick, from what we don't know for sure, but going on the assumption that the gig has a bacterial infection. In other words, we don't mean to use the infection as a scapegoat for not properly acclimating an otherwise healthy gig, but that we need to figure out a new way to treat gigs that are obviously sick. Yes, there are a lot of variables to contend with, and not only is it going to take a lot of time, but we'll also some luck to figure this out.

I completely agree with you when it comes to flow, lighting, and water. These are variables that we need to study. While we frequently have gigs in our tanks literally blasted with water, most of the photos I see of gigs in the wild are in lagoons with minimal flow. Many times, these same photos show the gigs exposed to the sun during low tide. This causes us to assume that gigs can be blasted with light. However, during the collection, export, import, and final sale, we don't know what conditions the gigs are in. To cause bad bleaching like we've seen, we're assuming that the gigs are without light or are in low light environments for a long time. Regarding water quality, again referring to the photos of gigs in the wild, many are in turbid water, which we can assume is nutrient rich.

But, these are photos of healthy gigs. So, we need to determine what constitutes optimal conditions for a SICK gig. Water quality is easy -- we just start with clean water. Flow is a bit more difficult to determine, as you pointed out. I completely agree with you that sick gigs need enough flow to help them purge the dead zoox ("rat poop") but not too much flow where they are using energy to fight a current to remain upright or attached. Constipation is the same word I would use, and have used, to describe that it looks like the gig is experiencing. Healthy gigs don't expel rat poop. Regarding lighting -- this is a tough one. Not enough light, and the remaining zoox could die. Too much light and the gig could react negatively. For example, IME many gigs deflate during the later part of the day, after they've received an ample amount of light. This leads me to think that the zoox population's fuel tank is full so to speak, and to stop the process, the gig deflates. However, this doesn't happen 100% of the time. My last few gigs were deflated in the morning, then inflated with lights on.

So, in short, while getting to the root of the issue in terms of the sickness itself is important, I agree that we also need to study environmental conditions. Just another piece of the puzzle. And yes... too many variables!

(I'll attempt humor once more, last time it came out as disaster, I'm sorry...)
(humor here)
I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I'm, ok with that. I'd rather have fun. Clearly, all the health care professionals understand it much more clearer, all I'm reading (humor here, remember )is "bla bla bla gram negative bla bla gig". But, is it possible, (humor) that once you find out the "patient" has hepatitis "c", even giving it the proper medication and the proper grams, still doesn't address the issue that they walked into the ER with a plastic bag stuck down it's throat? or has bad sun burn with pealing skin that needs something more than a band aid? Or ate too much the night before and went straight to bed? (all humor here)




(ok, end of humor)
I don't know a lot of things. But just looking back on my own share of gigs I've killed, I've realized a lot of things I wish I did differently now. I think there's a LOT of other things that kill them as well, and I think meds are looked at as the "skapegoat" as mentioned before. Even DSF kills their share, and they're doctors! No disrespect to anyone, as it's a requirement to start with a good one first... We all have understood this for a while now. No one can save one that's already internally decided to die. Finding out if it's positive or negative or neutral, may help a few, but most likely not the majority, still. I still think there is some luck in getting one that hasn't "checked out" already, which could take a month or longer sometimes to do so, no matter how many water changes are done. D-Nak's an accomplished reefer, and he was able to save 1 of 4. He has YEARS of gig experience too. Luck of the draw sometimes. Gigs don't travel well.

I look at the difference of flow with them, and, let's say a BTA. You blast a BTA with flow(I've done it), and they will move away, usually. I blast a gig, it stretches TOWARDS flow, again, usually. Always an exception. Is it possible, that it's not an infection, but a structural difference inside we just don't know or understand? Maybe gigs can't move water internally on their own, fast enough, (which requires high flow to move it around for them), and maybe a BTA can, or doesn't need as much as fast because it's "metabolism" is slower?. Maybe some slow current early upon receiving a gig, so the gig can "understand (if you can appease me a moment) when they first get there that it's ok to inflate, then slowly ramp it up to what it really needs long term? (HUMOR) before they start getting light headed (maybe I'm the one that's light headed, I don't know). Maybe it's in dire need of some blasting to get "the ol' pipes moving again". Maybe dead zoox clogs it's internal "pipes" upstream internally at times. Just a thought, we've all been constipated if you're honest.

Then there's light. Could be the patient gets sunburned really easy, on day one, out of the truck container. Who knows what it was getting before? Was it under a ledge, up against some tall grass only getting 5 hours of direct light, or on a rock getting 14 hours??? Blast too much early, sunburn and shrink. Not enough, it will kill the zoox it already has, if it's not in the process of clearing the dead zoox already... Uh oh, here comes constipation again... Then fast ramp up of intensity, then sun burn again... "Why is it shrinking???" ..."I don't know?".... Sounds like a Brian Regan comedy show. (We have lots of laughs in our family, if you haven't grasped that yet! I will try to contain myself from here on out).

Then there's water. Could be it's too drastic of an elevation change, (PH) like going from Florida sea level, to Colorado overnight, or to a smog air filled city, and then asked to go jogging like the day before. We'd all deflate too.

The above are just some silly (and some real) thoughts. No disrespect to anyone.. Maybe something I've said will spark some thought in the guys that understand biology better than me, I'm not schooled (I earn money turning screwdrivers). Even figuring out what virus they get, who's to say one comes with bird flu, one with common cold, and the next shipment comes with cancer from the beach they were living on that dumps toxic chemicals in the water a mile away. TOOOOOO many variables with all of this. I think it would be more productive to show what a thriving gig looks like, what they all seem to like when they are thriving, and for those with gigs to explain their own journey how their particular gig made it "over the hump", and struggles they have had to overcome, I know I've had mine. EVERYONE has issues at times. Even Minh has had to treat his purple after being in captivity for so long, and he's the treatment pioneer! I may need to treat one of mine again in the future too. My green 210 gig was treated 4 months ago, for probably the tenth (who knows) time in captivity, I'm the third reefer to treat it. I've found they all are a little different initially. Bottom line, gigs are a TOUGH anemone to acclimate... Gosh, I've said too much, I can't believe I'm posting this.... Grace please. Best of luck to everyone.

 

[taylor t]

Ok. Suppose a gig has everything it needs to thrive. Acceptable water, flow, temp, and light. It continues to go downhill in the exact same water quality a healthy gig is stabilized in. Someone who understands biology may be able to answer this. If a medical person was to take a swab from the deteriorating anemone, by swabbing the gaping mouth, find out what the bacteria was living inside, advise on the appropriate antibiotic, I'm wondering. IF, that deteriorating anemone DID NOT have an infection of sorts, (and had internal structural issues in it's handling, or respiratory issues from lack of "x,y, or z" for some time), and antibiotic "x" was dosed because the bacteria inside was needed for the anemone to live. It would kill the anemone. Right? Maybe a swab of a good, healthy anemone should be done to see what is living at "ground zero", so there's some sort of baseline that you DON'T want to kill. Then, find a deteriorating anemone to swab, and compare, no?

And, just throwing this out there, maybe way out I don't know... It could also be possible that there is a structural "issue" that causes gigs to degrade from lack of something, whether it's flow or light, or build up of x,y,or z for too many hours. There could be just a natural process of accelerated decomposition internally, because of the nature of salt water, no? When we see them in nature, they are in calm pools, yes. But, it's a constant taking away of "waste water" away from the anemone, where they don't get that benefit in our little glass boxes. Maybe that's why they do so well with high flow in our tanks, they can't handle a waste product they are excreting. When I kill flow to my tanks, they puff up and look beautiful, for a time. Too long with no flow, they go down, whether it's an hour or a day(s) (in our tanks I'm talking). About 2 weeks ago, my green 210 gig went flat, for a couple days. I almost pulled it, but decided to "hammer" it with flow. It had gaping mouth and flappy. It was getting good flow on most of it, but had one side that was tucked up in the rocks with almost no flow for the last couple months, tents were short on the back of the nem, shorter than the flowing front area. That's what got me thinking, maybe there's a structural issue they have with not being able to "pump" water around inside themselves, like other anemone's. (In the animal kingdom, some species have differences between groups, right?) So I left it, added 2 more power heads next to it, raised it up so the foot got blasted and the part that didn't get flow was flapping in the flow, and with in a couple hours, it was back to where it was. I was shocked how fast it inflated, after being floppy so long. I really thought it was going to need meds agian, all the baby clowns were rubbing it for a day or two while it was flat. After flow was added, it went back to normal. Not sure of the relevance of all this, just throwing it out there. Maybe we're looking for a structural difference, or a bacterial difference, or both. BUT, IF, there IS a bacterial issue, wouldn't we need a "ground zero" starting point we DON'T want to upset? We may be looking at 2 issues, and that's why we struggle, we're looking at the problem as 1 issue. Just a thought.

 

[taylor t]

And to add, if gigs can't move water by themselves, because the internal "pump" isn't working, could that add to the problem that some don't respond to antibiotics? Because they aren't getting the drugs inside them to do the job?

 

[raythepilot]

Here's a Cipro study actually related to aquatic plants:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/...bably do not have an effective dose of Cipro.

 

[Amoo]

This is interesting!
In this study, the EC50s for D. subspicatus was 8,042 µg/L for ciprofloxacin which corresponds to about 30 mg/gal.
This is very close to the recommended dosage of 25 mg/gal. which may account for the variable results found by some people.

Based on this report, cipro should not be used above 3 mg/gal unless you can tolerate some algae death.

This confirms my opinion that if you do not have bleaching, you probably do not have an effective dose of Cipro.

...facepalm

 

[taylor t]

Now, for the slow kid in class, does this mean, most of my gigs have not been treated properly, and nothing more than a fresh saltwater purging is what made them better??? That most of what we've treated for, was just saltwater changes with a dab of selective strain strengthening? (because nothing really died?)

This would mean, we're right back at square one, with the exception, we've learned they have difficulty purging all the old water inside when we first get them.

 

[DasCamel]

And to add, if gigs can't move water by themselves, because the internal "pump" isn't working, could that add to the problem that some don't respond to antibiotics? Because they aren't getting the drugs inside them to do the job?

I give all my sick Nems massages until they inflate and can expel/move fluids on their own. Circulation of fluid is definitely a factor. Using a turkey baster to blast them a bit also works.

 

[taylor t]

raythepilot, are you saying, you have better survival rates with BTA's by using cipro, and bleaching them, than not? Now I'm wondering, if much of the "success" we've seen, or unsuccess we've seen, has been determined by the amount of, and process of water changing alone, or lack there of. With exception to the anemone's that have bleached, only making their recovery more drawn out than it needs to be? Then I further wonder, if establishments that are using Cipro, are actually creating more problems, ADDING to the equation drug resistant pathogens. Thoughts?

 

[raythepilot]

I am not sure about mags or any other species but here is what I know from long years of experience with BTA.
Water is the first thing. If any of my nems look sick I do lots of water changes. I am very careful about how I make my water. It has to be 35.0 ppt +/_ 0.1 ppt before I use it and it has to be within +/-0.2C of the ambient tank temp before I add it to the nem tank.
I regularly do 2 x 50% water changes per week and more if anything doesn't look right.
This is my baseline and when ever I check parameters they are dead on.

Recently when bifurcating the animals, some got infected and displayed the typical symptoms of nem decline. I've successfully treated these with cipro at 25 mg./gal. but they bleach.

I reseeded these anemone with flora from some healthy anemone and they recovered in about 2 weeks. One of these was in the pair that recombined in my post on the subject.

 

[taylor t]

Thanks raythepilot. I appreciate your insight.

 

[Amoo]

Now, for the slow kid in class, does this mean, most of my gigs have not been treated properly, and nothing more than a fresh saltwater purging is what made them better??? That most of what we've treated for, was just saltwater changes with a dab of selective strain strengthening? (because nothing really died?)

This would mean, we're right back at square one, with the exception, we've learned they have difficulty purging all the old water inside when we first get them.

Not necessarily, honestly we just don't know. The part he quoted was for a green FW alagae. That same article talks about the toxicity level of Cyano to the same drugs and they are more sensitive.

All we know is that Cipro has a photosynthesis inhibition component. Every plant/algae...etc that has been tested shows different results in regards to toxicity. We know that the nem itself is a "marine plant" and they have a symbiotic relationship with their Zoox. Ironically we believe but don't know that different species of Nems don't infect each other, but they MAY have chemical warfare.

All of these things would lead me to ask if the Zoox inside a BTA is the same as a Zoox inside a Gig as inside a Mag...etc. The answer here is we don't know. It is entirely possible that the Zoox inside a BTA has a different toxicity level then the zoox in a Gig. BTAs may be more susceptible to FQs then Gigs...etc. I believe raythepilot has bleached every BTA he has treated. I also believe I didn't bleach the 8" one I treated (or the Mag). I use the same dosage he does and I have a medical grade Cipro so I know the dosage is spot on. Was there a different in our flow, temperature, lighting that could have an effect on the bleaching? My guess would be yes. Could those factors combined with a photosynthesis inhibitor cause his to bleach and mine not to? Absolutely.


The important thing here is we are treating the bacterial infection and trying our best to do as little harm as possible to the Nem, kind of like Chemo in a way. The important thing is we administer a high enough dose to kill the bacteria while doing as little harm as possible to the Nem (none ideally, but we can see from bleaching that isn't always the case).

PilotRay seems to treat a lot, he is in a better situation then most of us to experiment with lowering his dosage to see if he can still kill the bacteria and not bleach the nem. Move down to 20 or 15 or 10...etc. Again though I firmly believe 5-10 years from now when we have a more clear picture of what's going on, we're going to find we have different dosages for different species.

 

[clorox]

We need to set up a Kickstater campaign to sponsor the study and rehabilitation of anemones

 

[OrionN]

I have been reading some papers on culture bacteria from sea anemones. The problem is that the normally acceptable method of culture result in death of the anemone.
In one study, the anemone was washed in steril salt water then a 1cm2 of the endodem was aseptically removed, pulverized. The result liquid then was cultured.

Anyone know of any method of culture bacterial from anemone? I am thinking of deep mouth swab or aspirated with a steril syrine.

 

[clorox]

I have been reading some papers on culture bacteria from sea anemones. The problem is that the normally acceptable method of culture result in death of the anemone.
In one study, the anemone was washed in steril salt water then a 1cm2 of the endodem was aseptically removed, pulverized. The result liquid then was cultured.

Anyone know of any method of culture bacterial from anemone? I am thinking of deep mouth swab or aspirated with a steril syrine.

Did you look at this?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18405113

It doesn't describe the methodology, but from it you might be able to trace papers that might.

 

[TinManx]

I have been reading some papers on culture bacteria from sea anemones. The problem is that the normally acceptable method of culture result in death of the anemone.
In one study, the anemone was washed in steril salt water then a 1cm2 of the endodem was aseptically removed, pulverized. The result liquid then was cultured.

Anyone know of any method of culture bacterial from anemone? I am thinking of deep mouth swab or aspirated with a steril syrine.

A model system would come in handy .... lol

 

[OrionN]

A model system would come in handy .... lol

How can a model system help tel us what bacteria infect Gigantea or Magnifica?