Can someone confirm my observation?

[jwcarlson]

Today is the last day of my big metro dose and low temp on my whirling discus. She's been at 5 grams/10 gallons (in QT) and temperature down to 76/77 for three doses. Bringing temp back up on her now. The story there is she "flipped out" out of nowhere about a month or so ago and didn't have another instance of it for nearly a month. Figuring it was a one off/panic event, I left her with her peers. So I'm going to feed the main clan after work tonight and the solid torquoise came zooming off, but wasn't using is right pectoral fin. So I put my hand up to the glass to get him to back up a bit and he used it, then stopped. Got him to use it again and then he stopped. Then he started using it, but started listing, twitching, and in general acting quite strange. At this point, I saw his jumbo poop. He carried on acting really strange for several minutes. He was completely sideways at the top of the water a number of times, stress bars showed a little, but not too bad. In general he was in control, but was tipping over on his side and then the other discus started pecking at him, which isn't normal. Anyway, this carries on... fish never looks particularly panicked and does not slam into anything, turn in tight circles, or anything like that. His fins were a bit clamped.

He eventually dropped the, um, payload... twitched a few more times, swam to the other end of the tank, and that was the end of it. Stopped clamping, stopped tilting, etc.
Do you think I'm assessing the situation correctly here? Or is this something I should be concerned about a spread in whirling? I can move him to QT if needed, but the sudden relief of the symptoms seemed to be the switch that shut it off.

[brewmaster15]

Jacob,
Sorry if this was posted elsewhere but I missed it if was.. Is there a thread that came before all this? Honestly Im reading this and dont understand.. low temp? High metro and whirling disease? Apologies if you went over this elsewhere.

Al

[jwcarlson]

Meant to link this and forgot:
http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showth...ng-and-darting

The treatment of this other one was recommended by Stu Serchuk, Brian said I should contact him for what he's done.

Sorry this got confusing without some context. Basically one started whirling 5ish weeks ago, no other occurrences noticed until about 10 days ago or so. Talked with Stu and got QT emptied out and did his protocol.

This is a totally separate fish. Been watching him on/off the rest of the night he has been normal. Eating, etc.

[captainandy]

I’m surprised the fish survived at that temperature and that concentration of metro, despite already being I’ll.

[jwcarlson]

I’m surprised the fish survived at that temperature and that concentration of metro, despite already being I’ll.

She didn't seem remotely bothered by it.
This linked video is a different fish, to be clear.

[brewmaster15]

Hi Jacob,
Im afraid I have zero experience with this "treatment". So I can't really comment on your observations here. I personally would not treat my fish like this. In order for a medication to work at any dose the target organism needs to be identified as susceptible....but before that happens it needs to be identified. To my knowledge that has not happened with what ever causes whirling and darting in discus. There is also the low temperature used which goes counter to what discus are used to.Theres many speculations out there on the causes but they are just speculations. I lean more towards it being caused by different things much like happens with alot of discus illness when treated symptomatically. Its possible the cause could be related to dissolved gasses and "gas bubble disease" in some cases. I am glad your fish survived the treatment but encourage you to send a fish to a lab if this is ongoing so a positive diagnosis can be made and the best treatment made known based on the science. Sorry I can't be of more help here.

Al

[jwcarlson]

I have clearly muddied the waters greatly. My tangent about the 'treatment' of my whirling fish was simply to note that one of my fish has been whirling... For background.
The fish in the video has not shown any symptoms and has not been treated. This was something he was doing (have not seen it before) and he stopped as soon as he passed the feces. Mainly curious if anyone has noticed similar behavior in "backed up" fish? Or could this possibly be the beginnings of another whirl-er.

As for my tangent, I understand it isn't something standard. Maybe I shouldn't have even mentioned Stu, hopefully there's no one with pitchforks waiting for him. I'd heard yebhad successfully treated whirling so I asked what he had done. This fish of mine was going to bash its brain in or worse (injure another fish as well), so I decided to take Stu's experience and give it a go for mine. I understand it wasn't standard temperature and whatnot. But I don't think 93 and salt is standard either, is it?
In any event, we shall see what happens with the whirler and I will keep my eye on this flachen... Hopefully this was just a constipation situation.

Sorry for the hub-bub!

[seanyuki]

Are there any scientific studies of whirling disease on discus, could not find anything on Goggle scholar .

[jwcarlson]

I've really made a mess of my question here. haha

I really just want to know if someone has seen their discus do the weird stuff in the video as a result of having a pooping problem.

The whirling was simply for background. Regarding the treatment of the OTHER fish and ONLY the other fish (not the one in the video), he was QT'd and treated separately... she was getting to the point of multiple whirls per day and that happened rapidly. I'd heard that Stu had successfully treated his discus and made the whirling seemingly "go away". No one has made any claims as to knowing what or why... and for what I'm doing here... I don't really care. Either I watch her bash her brains out, I bash her brains out myself, or I throw Stu's hail mary. He has tried it three times and two of the treated fish didn't whirl again and the third went months before whirling again.

As far as the genesis of the heavy metro and cool temperatures... Stu said it was a random suggestion that he'd seen somewhere. Thought it sounded wild, but... being in the same position as I am with this one fish... he figured why not and it seems to have worked at least a little bit for him.
Personally, I don't need to know the how or why in something like this, and I am not too concerned with the details. Perhaps that is controversial... and if so, I apologize for bringing it up.

Unfortunately, I missed the edit window on the original post here. Just trying to figure out if I should be concerned or if I just have a weird pooper.

If this discus goes some months or a year without whirling, I'll gladly donate her to science. I've just got a sneaking suspicion that there's not a lot of money in studying or curing whirling.

[brewmaster15]

Jacob,
About the behavior.. its normal and does happen.That fish of yours probably has Blue Diamond in its genetics some how.. You didn't mention if you used Epsom salt on him, but next time around you can to help it pass that junk. If you can imagine its probably not a pleasant sensation for the fish, hence the different behavior. Also the behavior of the other fish picking at its side is normal also.. In the wild, they would do that to try and pick off parasites. when a discus (and alot of other fish are irritated) they will often flutter like that and almost turn to the side to let the other fish pick at them, I think thats what you are seeing.

I do not believe that this is the precursor to whirling disease outbreak if that helps.

al

[jeep]

That does look like what a Blue Diamond is capable of excreting, but I'd think you would have seen it before this. I would add a little epsom salts as well...

[jwcarlson]

Jacob,
About the behavior.. its normal and does happen.That fish of yours probably has Blue Diamond in its genetics some how.. You didn't mention if you used Epsom salt on him, but next time around you can to help it pass that junk. If you can imagine its probably not a pleasant sensation for the fish, hence the different behavior. Also the behavior of the other fish picking at its side is normal also.. In the wild, they would do that to try and pick off parasites. when a discus (and alot of other fish are irritated) they will often flutter like that and almost turn to the side to let the other fish pick at them, I think thats what you are seeing.

I do not believe that this is the precursor to whirling disease outbreak if that helps.

al

That would make sense (the BD), I do have one BD... pretty well always big poops, but never acts weird as a result. That makes sense, Al, thank you! Just bad timing with this whirling one that I'd pulled and then this one doing this yesterday got me really worried. I've heard of some people having whirling kind of move one-by-one through a group or at least through a few of them.

That does look like what a Blue Diamond is capable of excreting, but I'd think you would have seen it before this. I would add a little epsom salts as well...

This guy hasn't had them before, that I've seen. I think I am going to add some spinach powder or something to the next batch of beefheart when I cut it up. Will have to do some research on that.

I have used epsom in the tank when worming, but don't use it as a matter of course. I think I'll see how this guy plays out.



Sorry for the confusion of my original post, I see how it's really confusing now that I look back at it. Especially without the context of which fish I'm talking about. It does read like I bombed my main tank with metro and turned the temp down to 76. Which is quite far from the reality.