MYXOSOMA CEREBRALIS, THE WORST DISEASE

[discusmurderer]

Hi to all, I have no more discus!, all are gone to make way for more that are free from this weird disease. This disease have fooled me for years and had me thinking that i was the problem, i could never get my fish old enough to spawn cause they were all freaking out and dying before time, i was always buying from this breeder because he was cheap and when i bought from other people and add them to what i had they would all be contaminated, and all this is a period of 18 years of trying. The early years were deaths of high nitrites, temp,chlorine and over feeding beef heart, oh! also the occasional digging in the rivers for tubifex worms which killed off a lot. Today i have learnt a lot from simply discus if i had just took the time years ago to read from this forum i would be much wiser but the thing is i don't know if simply was around 18 yrs ago, but thanks to u guys and all the info that is here i can now say i am ready to buy my new fish ( I JUST DON'T KNOW HOW TO CLEAN MY DISEASED TANK AND FILTER ) Should i burn it or through rubbing alcohol in it and wipe it down LOL!!!! And next , am i to stand at the next breeder and wait to see if a fish is going to dart around and swirl around ? how the hell am i to know if they have (whirling) its only when they get startled they display the whirling behavior or maybe a drastic change in temp brings on the darting and locked bodies. I believe this disease may be at all the breeders homes and they don't know off it. but there's one guy who imports all his own fish and that's the guy i am going to buy my new stock from. So wish me luck, or for those who are religious ( pray for me ), choosing Discus i now more difficult than having kids. lol!!!! bye for now!

[mathao]

not an expert but you have to disinfect everything, first of you want to bleach everything before you buy more discus, after bleaching everything pp everything then bleach everything again just to make sure it's all clean, remember to rinse, rinse, rinse, then fill tank with water and use some type of good dechlor, then empty and refill, now with the sponge and filtre's you could just boil it. i saw the sponge filter in another post, where did you get the sponges from? most of the sponge products out there are not fish safe, so you have to find some that are fish safe, saves one hell of a headache later on. hope this helps you out a little bit.
others will come on and give more idea's soon.

P.S. don't buy any discus yet until you get your tanks and equipment clean and sterilelized first.

[DiscusKeeper403]

You have been going to the same breeder for 18 years, and your fish have all been dying the whole time!?!? I don't know how he could keep his stock if all the Discus are sick with this disease and die???

[brewmaster15]

Sorry all Just saw this thread... (I posted this in the disease board also)

That disease ,whirling disease, MYXOSOMA CEREBRALIS, is generally a disease that affects coldwater fish.... like trout. I don't even know if its ever been diagnosed in warmwater fish...but from what I have read it requires an intermediary host ...tubifex worms( tubifex tubifex)..So if theres no live tubifex are present...theres no way that it can even infect new fish even if the existing fish is infected.

These symptoms may seem like whirling disease but that doesn't mean that it is.
Thats the problem with making a diagnosis from symptoms....many things cause the same symptoms.

I have no clue what your fish had... but Ireally don't think it was whirling disease unless you some how infected them them with the tubifexworms you collected..but again...even if you had... Any new stock you added would not get infected just by being added tothe tank....unless infected tubifex were again fed.

It is possible however that you had a fungal infection..Ichthyosporidium hoferi we have had at least one member here that had a fish autopsied and this fish had it...Its symptoms were crazy swimming as well.

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=61044

hth,
al

[Dkarc@Aol.com]

It is absolutely impossible to definitively tell what exact disease you have (had) by symptoms alone. I agree with Al, that Whirling disease is typically a cold water type disease and I have never heard of any reports affecting discus especially. Only way to positively identify it is by necropsy by a credible fish pathologist/vet.

-Ryan

[discusmurderer]

You have been going to the same breeder for 18 years, and your fish have all been dying the whole time!?!? I don't know how he could keep his stock if all the Discus are sick with this disease and die??? I realised that if they are kept in a quiet area and the fish are calm and no sudden spikes in temp they will even reach a mature age and breed, he has a fish room and no one goes in there, compared to me i have five kids running up and down and the tank is in the walkway, so i believe they can live long but with the right conditions.


Sorry all Just saw this thread... (I posted this in the disease board also)

That disease ,whirling disease, MYXOSOMA CEREBRALIS, is generally a disease that affects coldwater fish.... like trout. I don't even know if its ever been diagnosed in warmwater fish...but from what I have read it requires an intermediary host ...tubifex worms( tubifex tubifex)..So if theres no live tubifex are present...theres no way that it can even infect new fish even if the existing fish is infected.

These symptoms may seem like whirling disease but that doesn't mean that it is.
Thats the problem with making a diagnosis from symptoms....many things cause the same symptoms.

I have no clue what your fish had... but Ireally don't think it was whirling disease unless you some how infected them them with the tubifexworms you collected..but again...even if you had... Any new stock you added would not get infected just by being added tothe tank....unless infected tubifex were again fed.

It is possible however that you had a fungal infection..Ichthyosporidium hoferi we have had at least one member here that had a fish autopsied and this fish had it...Its symptoms were crazy swimming as well.

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=61044

hth,
al Thanks for the reply al, i just had to tell u that they were never sluggish or off balance neither did they have any sores and they ate well, In the site that was given about this ( ich-hoferi ) it said that they would display these symptoms and they never showed any signs of any problems until they freak out , these fish would seem like very healthy fish and all of a sudden just freak out that's why i said in another thread its a weird sickness. If i ever have another death like this i will carry it to be checked by a vet. Did u ever have any cases like these Al ?


It is absolutely impossible to definitively tell what exact disease you have (had) by symptoms alone. I agree with Al, that Whirling disease is typically a cold water type disease and I have never heard of any reports affecting discus especially. Only way to positively identify it is by necropsy by a credible fish pathologist/vet.

-Ryan I'll be sure to do some check at a vet's clinic if this ever happens again, but maybe this is affecting fish in my region , i put in guppies and a clown loach,Chinese algae eater in the same water that the discus was in and nothing is wrong with any of these fish,it seems to be affecting the discus only!


not an expert but you have to disinfect everything, first of you want to bleach everything before you buy more discus, after bleaching everything pp everything then bleach everything again just to make sure it's all clean, remember to rinse, rinse, rinse, then fill tank with water and use some type of good dechlor, then empty and refill, now with the sponge and filtre's you could just boil it. i saw the sponge filter in another post, where did you get the sponges from? most of the sponge products out there are not fish safe, so you have to find some that are fish safe, saves one hell of a headache later on. hope this helps you out a little bit.
others will come on and give more idea's soon.

P.S. don't buy any discus yet until you get your tanks and equipment clean and sterilelized first. Thanks for the reply Mathao, i am about to start my clean up effort and i am treating it like an epidemic has just pass through my house, i am going to buy a gal. of bleach just for the occasion, i have already dumped all of the sponge in the outside filters and i just have the inside to get rid of. u asked about the sponge = it is bed sponge, and Eddie told me that the bed sponge has anti flaming agents and can affect the fish I HOPE THAT WAS NOT THE PROBLEM!!!! because i would be the biggest fool around knowing that eddie was telling me about that i i did not listen. i am going to try other filter media and do a fishless cycle, thanks for the info .

[Disgirl]

Good luck with it Daryl! I hope the next batch will be healthy for you. You certainly deserve some good and healthy fish after all you have been through. And I want you to get a breeding pair so they can use the cone you have now. Is it possible to put your tank somewhere out of the kid's pathway? 5 kids running around would make even me nervous :D. Best wishes!
Barb

[brewmaster15]

u asked about the sponge = it is bed sponge, and Eddie told me that the bed sponge has anti flaming agents and can affect the fish I HOPE THAT WAS NOT THE PROBLEM!!!!

I agree with Eddie...that sponge material could have been leaching poisons into the tank....always use aquarium safe filtration...You would not be the first that poisoned their fish like this.

-al

[mmorris]

I poisoned a pair and all the fry with a cushion sponge. Someone else had recommended it and within a few hours the fry were on the bottom of the tank and dying. The parents took much longer to die. It was a very sad experience and I will never again use anything not meant for fish. That said, they didn't whirl. Symptoms would depend on what was in the material, how long it was in the tank, and how it affected the fish.

[discusmurderer]

I poisoned a pair and all the fry with a cushion sponge. Someone else had recommended it and within a few hours the fry were on the bottom of the tank and dying. The parents took much longer to die. It was a very sad experience and I will never again use anything not meant for fish. That said, they didn't whirl. Symptoms would depend on what was in the material, how long it was in the tank, and how it affected the fish.

Hi mmorris, the sponge was in the tank for two months and still is with all the guppies and blue rams and neons and nothing is wrong with them, no signs of poisoning. The discus however were good for two months and never showed signs until last week when my daughter came in at the back door with a big piece of Styrofoam and one got startled and took off like lightening and then swimming in circles with a locked body and the fins were extended fully out and the colors on the body was enhanced, i never saw them so highly colored before and all bars were pronounced. This has to be whirling and not the sponge cause all the other fish that i put in after i got rid of the discus are still living and its the same water, i did not even make a water change. i am getting some new fish imported from the far east tomorrow, they came in as (greens with red spots ) and i will let u all know of their progress, i cleaned out the small 24x18x18 to put them in, if they die as soon as i put them in its because of to much Clorox bleach when i disinfected it.

[April]

good luck. chlorox dissipates if you let it dry out completely. hope to hear good results from you.

[discusmurderer]

good luck. chlorox dissipates if you let it dry out completely. hope to hear good results from you.

Hi April, I am ready to go again! i did all the bleaching and washed out all filters and i got my new stock, i just don't know what kind they are. I will post them on a new thread.

[nc0gnet0]

Cut down on all the traffic by the tanks...............Stress kills too

[discusmurderer]

Cut down on all the traffic by the tanks...............Stress kills too

Thats about the hardest thing to do because i live in a small house and its ram cram with stuff all over, the only way to cut down on traffic is to get a new house. Wont they get accustomed to us in the house? look at the discus in pet stores, they acclimatized with people up and down. And i only have five monkeys running around!lol!!!

[nc0gnet0]

:) People don't tend to run through fish stores........... plenty of people is fine, plenty of sudden movements is not.

[discusmurderer]

:) People don't tend to run through fish stores........... plenty of people is fine, plenty of sudden movements is not.

You are perfectly right , i didn't look at it that way. I got to keep the family calmly walking through my room.