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Thread: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

  1. #1
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    One of my discus has been sick for a while, and I have been treating it in vain... but this morning I've made some progress. He finally pooped something I could put under the microscope. I'll get through the questionnaire first;

    DISEASE QUESTIONNAIRE

    Problem

    1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?
    Acquire the fish in Dec 2018 (3") form a reputable supplier here. Did proper QT/deworming, etc. all other fish from that order has been growing very nicely. It’s a Red Melon, believe it or not. Over time he slowly ate less and less than the others. I figured he was just the runt of the batch, or bullied by the rest. But the other fish became nice and thick, where this one slowly became more emaciated, and hate less and less, loss colors, and gain peppering.

    2. Symptoms (i.e. turning dark, excess slime, not eating, clamped fins, flashing, darting, clamped gills, white/yellow/green poop, hiding, headstanding or tailstanding, white on tips of fins, rotting or fungus, blisters/white zits on fish, bloated, cloudy eyes, wounds).
    Very Emaciated, very pale, does not heat, hang out in the corner of the tank by himself, rarely eat. Rarely poop


    3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include the dosage and duration of treatment.
    Suspected intestinal parasites, ongoing for months.

    I moved him to a 10G QT (75-90% WC daily, except when noted otherwise)
    Progressively raised temp to 92F for 4 days, and back down to 86 over that 12 day period.
    On Day 1 Started a course of Prazipro (5 days, full dose every day after a water change)
    On Day 3 and on again Day10 did a course of Levamisole (78mg/10gallons (2ppm), 48hr no WC
    On Day 1 started on metronidazole, 400mg/10gallons (~10ppm) (10 days, full dose every day even on non-water change day).
    ON Day 11 did an epsom salt treatment (1 teaspon/10 gallon, for 4 hr).
    On day 12 he poops white mucus with I used for the scope image below.

    The fish did gain a bit of color when at 92F, and hate a bit of FDCBW (barely, not enough to hope to feed him medicated flake food, did not care for any other food).

    The levamisole was definitively tough on him, became very pale, and less interest in trying to eat (the picture of him is ton Day 12).

    Currently Day 12, at 86F in clean water, no meds


    Tank/Water
    4. Tank size and ages, numbers and sizes of fish.

    QT tank, 10 gallons, 86F (75-90% WC daily, except when noted otherwise)

    The main tank where he was before;
    - 200 gallons, bare bottom with sump
    - 22 Discus, varies 4" to 7"


    5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).
    Main tank: 80% twice a week


    6. How long has tank been running? Is it bare bottom? If you have substrate, what type and how deep is it?
    About 12 months
    Bare bottom
    30” deep

    7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.
    No aging, use a sponge setup during filling that prevents microbubble
    Water comes out the pipe at 30 ppm, super soft, I poor it at matching Tank temp of 83.5.
    During WC, tank pH goes to 7.2, and drops back to 6.8 within 3-4 hr, and then is usually over 6.7 rest of the time.


    8. What type/brand water conditioner do you use? Do you add it to the tank or aging barrel? How much do you use?
    It goes through a big blue canister with high-pressure Carbon block cartridge, which removes all the chlorine (there is no chloramine in the city water here).

    9. Parameters and water source;
    Note: Water Parameters are important in diagnosing problems within a tank. If you don't own test kits for the following information, you can purchase them, test your parameters and post this info as soon as possible.

    - temp 83.5
    - ph 6.7
    - ammonia reading 0
    - nitrite reading 0
    - nitrate reading 0-10 (0 after WC, 5, sometimes 10 before next WC)
    What type of water or combinations of water sources do you use? If it is an RO/tap/well water mix, please list percentages in the mix.
    - municipal water only

    10. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.
    No

    11. Please tell us what you feed your fish and how often. This can be critical information for solving the problem so be as specific as you can.
    Main diet FDCBW 4 cubes twice a day.
    Swapped for Frozen blood worm, Frozen brine shrimp, CBW pellet every now and then

    12. Include any pictures or videos you have which shows the symptoms. If you can't add them to this post, please provide a link to them.
    This is him.




    This is siblings from the same batch


    =====================

    I know there will be some hate about combining meds, but most of these meds can be combined just fine.
    It may be hard on the liver, but this guy is in rough shape, so I felt I had to push hard quick.

    Also, I know some would say give up, he will never grow big enough, etc.
    but as long as he is alive, and there is a scientific path to go with, I can’t really give up here IMO.

    He rarely poops, because he rarely eats, but maybe the epsom salt got him going, so I took a microscope picture and video of what I found.
    I’m showing 200x and 400x.

    This looks like a protozoan, but it is not Hexamita in my opinion (I’m seen Hex on my scope before, it’s not the same shape and you can usually see the long flagella, where here it’s a bunch of cilia all around… this move differently then Hex as well).
    After all I did treatment wise, I don’t think metro will do it (maybe double the dose, and go to 92C for longer?).

    under the micsrocope at 200x and 400x




    My best guess is Tetrahymena.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AACrVZzqOk
    And here is and Abstract on a proposed treatment
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20298452

    So I’m open to suggestions on what to do next, and help in the ID of this parasite and pick a treatment path.
    I obviously would like to treat the whole main tank if this we can fix this guy.
    Last edited by dandestroy; 08-18-2019 at 04:50 PM.
    FrancK
    2018 year of the big tank!!!.

  2. #2
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    i had an infestation once with a protazoa like that .
    under the microscope i could see them once in a while burst open and swarmer calls would be expelled .
    i treated it with metronidasol in the water and food .
    fortunately they were still eating some food , you can try soaking cubes of freeze dried australian black worms .
    they might take that , in combination with long term baths .
    i achieved complete cure and have not seen anything in a year .

  3. #3
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    I did a lot reading and metro is likely still the best bet. if that fails I could try niclosamide as suggested in that paper.

    I doubled the dose of metro in the water to 800mg/10gal.

    I've ordered a feeding needle and will try to force feed (50mg/kg?, Maybe more). Should arrive tomorrow. I'll try to film the process.

  4. #4
    Administrator and MVP Dec.2015 Second Hand Pat's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    I tried to force feed a heckel once and it was an exercise in futility. Discus have a small mouth and guessing an small entry point to the gut. I ended up squirting the meds etc thru the gills and effectively killed the fish. So be prepared for that outcome.
    Pat
    Your discus are talking to you....are you listening


  5. #5

    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    You are not treating your water to remove chlorine, chloromines during water changes,

    Jeanne

  6. #6
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Thanks for the heads up Pat. That does seem like the pattern for most. This guy is smallish so it will be pretty challenging, but I will have to euthanized him anyways if i can't get these meds in him.

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    Administrator jeep's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Try these. They have several sizes and worked for me https://www.michaels.com/plastic-pip.../10212997.html

    They were pretty jagged on the ends but i smoothed them out with a fingernail file...

  8. #8
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish! - with force feeding video

    Force Feeding with medication

    I decided to go with a dose of 100mg/Kg.
    I weighed the fish to 20g.
    Therefore I need to dose 2mg

    I made a stock solution of metronidazole HLC by measuring 500mg and dissolving it in 50 ml of warm water (so final concentration of 10mg/ml). I did a second 1:10 dilution (5ml of the 10mg/ml stock + 45 ml H2O), which gives me a final concentration of 1mg/ml.

    I grinned some California black worm pellet to powder, and added a bunch to my mixture.

    I use a bird feeding syringe
    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
    One of the needle is soft plastic, with a soft/round end, and two whole a mm from the tip.

    I took 5ml of my mixture, with a plan to force feed a total of 2ml to the fish, which will result in 2mg dose total.

    Here is what I did
    1. Catch the fish and place him on a wet towel, cover with a second towel to block him from moving.
    2. Mesure on top of him how far the soft needle need to go to be in his stomach. The stomach is right after the pectoral fin.
    3. Push the needle slowly until you hit resistance, wiggle the needle to get trough the stomach.
    4. Depress the plunger 2 ml slowly.

    The stomach got bigger as I pushed the liquid in, and eventually a bit came out by the mouth (so 2 ml was the volume in this case).

    Overall, it went quite well.

    Just need to repeat everyday for 5 days.


    Last edited by dandestroy; 08-20-2019 at 10:47 PM.

  9. #9
    Moderator Team LizStreithorst's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    What did you end up using. I used a tom cat catheter which got into the stomach, but I ended up euthanizing the fish anyway.
    Mama Bear

  10. #10
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    This
    LILYS PET Reuseable Young Birds Feeding Syringe,Plastic and Perspex Material,Feeding Milk for Young Birds or Feeding Medicine for Sick Birds (10ml and 2+2.5+3mm Hose) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01J7WCI8S/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_wxExDbX95TBMY

  11. #11
    Moderator Team LizStreithorst's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Quote Originally Posted by dandestroy View Post
    This
    LILYS PET Reuseable Young Birds Feeding Syringe,Plastic and Perspex Material,Feeding Milk for Young Birds or Feeding Medicine for Sick Birds (10ml and 2+2.5+3mm Hose) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01J7WCI8S..._wxExDbX95TBMY
    I don't know about that feeding syringe. A tom catheter is flexible, like what he used. It needs to bend so you can get it into the Discus' stomach.
    Mama Bear

  12. #12
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Yes, this is flexible as well, not too soft, not to hard.

  13. #13
    Moderator Team LizStreithorst's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    I see. It is perfect. You did it in the video just like I did. Measured the length it needed to go in, and once it was there slowly introduce the food. I may have missed this but what food did you use. I can't remember what I used. It was years ago.

    My fish didn't get better because it had Crypotboia...a deadly parasite with no cure. Please keep us up to date. I'm pulling for it.
    Mama Bear

  14. #14
    Registered Member dandestroy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Quote Originally Posted by Sturiosoma View Post
    You are not treating your water to remove chlorine, chloromines during water changes,

    Jeanne
    sorry missed that. Yes my water goes through a carbon block filter unti that remove all of the Chlorine (and chloramine if there was any, but there is none here).
    FrancK
    2018 year of the big tank!!!.

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    Default Re: Help me ID this protozoan that's killing my fish!

    Quote Originally Posted by dandestroy View Post
    sorry missed that. Yes my water goes through a carbon block filter unti that remove all of the Chlorine (and chloramine if there was any, but there is none here).
    Carbon's not really that effective at removing chlorine. It only works if flow rates are very low and dwell time is very long.

    Most chlorine tests aren't sensitive enough to detect the low levels that are toxic to fish. They also go bad quickly when exposed to oxygen.


    I've had my fish tube-fed by a vet before but always under anesthesia.

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