"Boring" worms - how to treat?

I found a cardinal a few weeks ago with a growth on the side. Inside was a squigly line of some sort. The LFS said it was a boring worm and to treat the tank. I dosed the manufacturer dose listed on the PraziPro bottle. After a week I did a massive water change, and dosed again for a week. I had a couple weeks of "clean", no medication, water.

The problem is, two more cardinals had them when I looked again today. It's generally hard to really get a good look at them in a school since they won't exactly sit still which is why I never noticed the original problem until it had progressed as far as it had. They were culled immediately and I've dosed the tank with PraziPro ( liquid in bottle ) at 3 TSP per 45Gallons. ( this might be too much ) The only recent additions to the tank have been some ember tetras but these were in QT for 4-6 weeks and I have not seen any issues with them. It also only seems to be the "old" cardinals that are getting this. The "new" batch of them doesn't get this, but they also don't seem to have the same coloration as the old ones. The new ones have darker blotches on the sides which makes me wonder if they have something else.

The ottos seem fine, nothing on the corys, the two glolites, the ember tetras, or the three discus. All seem well rounded and eating well. I'm not sure if that's a case of they're well fed, or maybe something else is wrong. Other than the blotchy cardinals I can't really see anything obviously wrong. I've also added some aeration to the tank since I lost a couple cardinals initially when dosing due to what seems like poor O2 levels. Overall things "seem" better in the tank since the discus seem to be more active and such.

Longer dosing to try and nail the full lifecycle? Different meds? I have no idea what these things even are as I don't really see anything like these in the usual disease checklists. I've added two photos, one showing the "blotchy" patches on one of the "new" cardinals with and "old" cardinal in the background without the dark blotch, the other showing the lump ( poor quality photos, sorry, the cardinals wouldn't sit still ) with the worm in it. You can kind of see the worm as a white line on top of the red. The growth was extreme enough to push the pectoral fin downward.

I'll see if I can get a photo off one of the culled fish tonight.

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S

I have no idea what a boring worm is. I have never heard the phrase before.

However if it is an external worm type critter then prazi is useless. Flubendazole in water may work and is possibly safer for cardinals. Cardinals are notoriously difficult to treat being intolerant of most meds.

If it were me I would remove ALL of the cardinals and humanely destroy them and watch the rest of the fish like a hawk.

Someone kindly posted a link to another site where someone else seems to be having the same issue. I'm trying the LFS suggestion of the Jungle Anti Parasite food for now on a couple that had the worms. I haven't seen any worms on them lately, but the tank is on the floor and hard to get to.

Here's the link.

http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum...ad.php?t=55925

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S

Usually using medication bombs is kinda 50/50. Especially if you think that this problem may be more well developed than you think. I'd medicate for longer than what the directions say to make sure you completely get rid of an advanced infestation/infection. Or you could just get rid of them as previously mentioned, hard to do if your attached to them though ;-)

Anti parasite food isn't likely to help with external parasites. As Paul said, the external parasite meds aren't well tolerated by Cardinals, and flubendazol, one of the mildest dewormers, isn't readily available in the US.
I'd cull them.

Kacey