What now???

[fishblahblah]

I just recently (within the last 2 weeks) moved my fish from my established 125 to a new 180 gallon aquarium. I used the same plants, driftwood, filters, everything except for the substrate and a couple new aquariums decorations. The day I moved them, I noticed what looked like camallanus worms hanging from my yellow acaras butt. I treated, lost 2 clown loaches and 2 one spot barbs in the process. Everyone else has become more active and are eating regularly now. I have to do another treatment in a week.
I stopped past my lfs yesterday and picked up some ghost shrimp to further entice my fish to eat and become more comfortable in their new home. Everything seemed fine last night and this morning. I took a quick nitrate reading to check (ammonia and nitrite read 0) and since it was 40ppm, I decided to do a water change. While filling the tank back up, I noticed my electric blue acara looked like she had something in her mouth. After looking closer, it looks like her mouth is swollen open and both eyes have white meat bulging out around the perimeters. Her colors look kind of blotchy and washed out and she has one suddenly (like in the last 30 minutes) ragged pectoral fin. She is staying towards the bottom of the tank but will move if bothered. It almost looks like an allergic reaction but I have always given them ghost shrimp sporadically and nothing else has changed. I use prime to treat the new water and the temp is the same as in the tank.
I'm beginning to wonder if I should have changed tanks at all. There's a new issue every time I turn around.
Does this look like anything identifiable to you?

 

[tlindsey]

I just recently (within the last 2 weeks) moved my fish from my established 125 to a new 180 gallon aquarium. I used the same plants, driftwood, filters, everything except for the substrate and a couple new aquariums decorations. The day I moved them, I noticed what looked like camallanus worms hanging from my yellow acaras butt. I treated, lost 2 clown loaches and 2 one spot barbs in the process. Everyone else has become more active and are eating regularly now. I have to do another treatment in a week.
I stopped past my lfs yesterday and picked up some ghost shrimp to further entice my fish to eat and become more comfortable in their new home. Everything seemed fine last night and this morning. I took a quick nitrate reading to check (ammonia and nitrite read 0) and since it was 40ppm, I decided to do a water change. While filling the tank back up, I noticed my electric blue acara looked like she had something in her mouth. After looking closer, it looks like her mouth is swollen open and both eyes have white meat bulging out around the perimeters. Her colors look kind of blotchy and washed out and she has one suddenly (like in the last 30 minutes) ragged pectoral fin. She is staying towards the bottom of the tank but will move if bothered. It almost looks like an allergic reaction but I have always given them ghost shrimp sporadically and nothing else has changed. I use prime to treat the new water and the temp is the same as in the tank.
I'm beginning to wonder if I should have changed tanks at all. There's a new issue every time I turn around.
Does this look like anything identifiable to you?
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Its hard to really see but the way the lips look possibly Collumnaris aka duck lip disease. I will let someone else chime in I'm at work atm.
kno4te
S skjl47
Drstrangelove
duanes

 

[kno4te]

What did you use to treat the callamanus worms?

 

[fishblahblah]

Levamisole hcl. The powdered form.

 

[fishblahblah]

Its hard to really see but the way the lips look possibly Collumnaris aka duck lip disease. I will let someone else chime in I'm at work atm.
kno4te
S skjl47
Drstrangelove
duanes

I had an outbreak of columnaris in my 125 years ago and it wiped out at least half of my tank. I brought a school of gold barbs home and that was all it took. Their lips were stuck out but looked like they had lipstick on and it quickly spread. I tried different types of antibiotics to treat but it seemed to only stop as I started culling infected fish at the first sign of illness. I ended up being able to save one tiger barb that had been infected but the bacteria had eaten away the upper half of his lip. He lived for a year after that but was the only fish that had actually had the illness that I was able to save.
I removed the eb acara and so far there are no signs of improvement. Everyone else is actively swimming.

 

[duanes]

When I first had a cichlid with columnaris, i thought the fish had dislocated its jaw.
A Petania splendida had dislocated one in my tank before, and I was able to snap the jaw back in place.
With columnaris, this is not possible, the jaw had atrophied from the bacterial infection so much it was frozen in the open position.
It is possible that the bacteria that causes colummnaris could hitch ride into your tank on ghost shrimp, whether bought at a LFS or from the wild.
I'd need to see a more clear photo to even venture a guess the likelihood of columnaris though.
Here is how one of my beanii looked with columnaris infection, it dies a few days later.

columnaris can be especially virulent if water temps are at 82'F and above.
By the way, an antibiotic effective against gram neg bacteria would be needed to fight it, the bacteria laughs gram + antibiotics off.
a little later on in the infection

 

[kno4te]

Doubt it's a medication reaction.

Like duanes mentioned could be duck lips and if you can provide better pics it'll help.

Kanamycin and furan should convert gram neg aerobic bacteria like columnaris. Not sure if that's what's going on but a concern for sure.

 

[fishblahblah]

The first time my tank had the infection I bought a big jar of "Triple Sulfa" along with a bunch of other types of antibiotics to try. The last thing I tried was the triple sulfa along with immediately removing fish that showed signs of infection.

The eb acara died the next day and no other fish have shown any signs of any illness. Although her lips did seem to open and puckered, her eyes were also bulging which I hadn't seen in previous columnaris infections. I'm keepin a close eye on my tank and just completed another water change today.
As always, thanks for all your input.