Wow! Glad you caught that!
I had a sneaking suspicion that some of my discus had tapeworms, some of them would always eat but weren't putting on any weight. I had dosed my tanks with levamisole before but 2 days ago I decided to dose the whole system with prazipro. I dosed 75 milliliters in my 300 gallon system and this popped out just a few moments ago. NASTY!!!
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Wow! Glad you caught that!
wow mate, that's no joke! Is prazipro a 1 time kills all dose?
No, with worms you almost always need a few follow-ups. It's also never guaranteed that you're rid of them so it's not a bad idea to de-worm regularly. We do it for mammals, right?
Your discus are talking to you....are you listening
Regular basis no, but it is a good idea to do a follow up dose in 2-4 weeks for any eggs that hatch.
I would follow up with at least one more dose of Prazi in a few weeks since you had tape worms just in case but the vast majority of tapeworms require a secondary host to continue their life cycle. The can't reinfect your fish directly like nematodes do when fish ingest their eggs. If you got all the tapeworms first shot(very likely).. You probably wont see them again unless you introduce an intermediary host like found in live foods.
Just so you know, Levamisole is not effective against Tape worms.. it works on most other worms.Prazi is the med of choice for tapes.
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Liz,
Its hard to say because its likely multiple species of Tapeworms we are seeing.Typical intermediary hosts are thought to be snails, invertebrates like shrimp ,bloodworms, copepods etc.Possibly even smaller species of fish.
I also " think" its possible raw fish and shrimp could potentially carry in parasites though I dont know about tapeworms.
Be nice to know definitively though.
al
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There was a recent news article about a guy who brought a long tapeworm (5 ft?) he wrapped up on a toilet paper roll (get the picture!) to the doctor's office. The most likley culprit was raw salmon from the sushi he at on a regular basis.
Found the story:
http://time.com/5110153/sushi-lover-five-foot-tapeworm/
Nice discus...glad you figured out the problem!
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I eat the meat of the fish not the parts in the guts. I don't care if the fish has a huge tape worm as long as the sushi is good,
Mama Bear
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http://www.simplydiscus.com/library/...es_intro.shtml
CESTODES
Cestodes, also called tapeworms, are found in a wide variety of animals, including fish ( Figure 23 ). The life cycle of Cestodes is extremely varied with fish used as the primary or intermediate host. Cestodes infect the alimentary tract, muscle or other internal organs. Larval Cestodes called plerocercoids are some of the most damaging parasites to freshwater fish. Plerocercoids decrease carcass value if present in muscle, and impair reproduction when they infect gonadal tissue. Problems also occur when the cestode damages vital organs such as the brain, eye or heart.
Figure 23: A close-up of a tapeworm.
One of the most serious adult Cestodes that affect fish is the Asian tapeworm, Bothriocephalus acheilognathi . It has been introduced to the United States with grass carp and has caused serious problems with bait minnow producers.
Praziquantel at 2 -- 10 mg/L for 1 to 3 hours in a bath is effective in treating adult cestode infections in ornamental fish. At this time, there is no treatment that can be used for food fish. Also, there is no successful treatment for plerocercoids. Ponds can be disinfected to eradicate the intermediate host, the copepod.
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