African newb, disease Q?

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oldcolony

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 24, 2008
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Hello everyone I recently coverted my 55 gallon central american tank over to african cichlids, my ph is 7.8, substrate is pool filter sand mixed with agronite, and I have tons of tuffa rock. My stock is yellow labs, acei, some peacocks, and a couple of haps, all fish are juvies totaling about 15 fish. I recently have had a few fish die. I have notice some fish swimming around with stringy poo and the most recent death the fish appeared that it had a wound around its mouth. What can I do? Ithought everything was fine as far as water quality I do weekly water changes. Is the stringy poo or wounded mout a sighn of some disease or parasite? Is there a common disease that frquent african cichlids? Please help

Thanks in advance
 
Hi,

pH alone is still inadequate. Could you please include your ammonia, nitrite and nitrate? What exactly are the results? Post the numbers as given to you by your test kit.

What brand of test kit do you use? This is also another important question as most test kits are grossly inaccurate and misleading. Some are also expired or tampered with that they are not reliable anymore. Test strips should be avoided as much as possible. API liquid drops are best advised for use if you can find this brand.

What do you feed your fish?
What is the temperature of your tank currently?
What is your filtration system?
How often do you perform water changes and how much water volume is replaced?

As far as white stringy poo is concerned, it may either be internal parasites or internal bacterial infection that is currently the issue. The trouble is internal parasites normally do not kill your fish quickly. They can linger for awhile and your fish will look like it is wasting away. Have your fish actually looked wasted away or skinny? The body should be rightly proportioned and not looked bony. The abdomen should not looked abnormally distended especially towards the anus or deflated. In this case, metronidazole, praziquantel, flubendazole or fenbendazole are your best choice of treatments. The whole tank must be treated.

For suspected internal bacterial infections, this is trickier to diagnose. Have you observed other symptoms? If so, what are they? Did the fish swim listlessly? Is it gasping to the surface? Are the fins clamped? Since it is not very easy to determine whether the bacteria being suspected is gram-positive or gram-negative, what we need is a broad spectrum antibiotic. A combination of Maracyn and Maracyn 2 in this case will do the trick. You do need to treat the whole tank. If possible, mix the combination of two Maracyns in their foods and add garlic to hit the internal bacterial infections directly by ingestion.

Have you observed any extreme outward aggression between the fish? When you found the wound on one's mouth, did you even isolate the fish imediately and treat it? Do you have a shot of the mouth? How severe is the damage? If you did not treat the wound, chances are good you are letting bacterial infection set in. Mouth is one of the most critical areas aside from the gills. If not treated immediately, secondary infections set in and can kill your fish almost immediately.
 
I use the API liquid test kit, I will get a new set of readings tomorrow. My tank temp is at 80 degrees.. filtration is a aquaclear 100 and a aquaclear 70... I feed the fish NLS pellets and brine shrimp and romaine lettuce occasionally... water changes are done weekly with about 30% of water replaced and i only use prime. I believe it may be an internal parasite... I dont know why but that is what my gut is telling me.

How do I raise my ph more but keep it at a consistent? Is there anything else i should be using to keep my fish healthy?

I will post my test results tomorrow and i would like to thank you for your timely response. I have kept fish for a few years but i appreciate any tips and tricks as i do not consider myself all knowing.
 
What are your KH (carbonate hardness) and GH (general hardness)? If your water is hard enough already, I would not alter it anymore especially the pH. pH is absolutely fine. You have tufa rocks and aragonite, both that indeed increase the pH and hardness levels although being that they are made mostly of calcium carbonate, the elevated pH is somewhat limited but 7.8 is nothing to be concerned about.

For better understanding on the hardness and their conversion table, please check this one.
http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/hardness.htm

What you can do right now is dose praziquantel. You may add it and then garlic on their foods to encourage the fish to eat well while battling suspected internal parasites.

For praziquantel dosing regimen, here it is.

Remove carbon.
Add 2.5 milligrams per liter of water.
If you are using the powdered version, it is difficult to dissolve. Predissolve in tank water by shaking it up in a small container.
Dosing
Day 1 -- remove carbon, perform water change with vacuuming, and add Prazi to tank
Day 2 -- add Prazi
Day 3 -- do nothing
Day 4 -- do nothing
Day 5 -- do nothing
Day 6 -- add Prazi
Day 7 -- add Prazi
Day 8 -- normal partial water change with vacuuming
Day 14 - normal partial water change, then add prazi
Day 21 - normal partial water change, then add prazi
Day 28 - normal partial water change, then add prazi
Day 35 - normal partial water change, add carbon, treatment is complete
 
My api test kit does not have kh and gh!!! Where do I get kh and gh readings from? My water before the tuffa and agronite 6ph.is prazi easy to find? I already have the garlic guard. Is prazi mela or primafix? Again I appreciate all the help. As you can see I need all of it I can get!!!
 
I want to say thank you you as i did treat the tank with Prazi today!!! hope all will be well but i did notice a slight change in increased acitvity since!!! Is the red sea testing kit good? i noticed that the red sea kit comes with kh and gh testing!!! i havent seen any API testing kits with that yet
 
The KH and GH by API are bought separately. Praziquantel is an entirely different treatment from Pimafix and Melafix. In my experience, praziquantel is hard to come by but is worth it. It is also expensive. I just obtain mine from veterinary clinics.

Sorry about delay of response.
 
Ok my fish appear to be getting better slowly but surely, but i would like to address my water parameters and not start a new thread. like i said i am new to keeping africans, I will list parameters below.. please let me know if they are correct

55 gallon hap/peacock with a few yellow labs
i use prime dechlorinater and and african rift lake salt.
substrate is pool filter sand mixed with agronite and lots of tufa rock in tank.

ammonia - 0
nitrite - 0
nitrate - 0 (not sure why)
ph - 8
kh - 107.4ppm (6 drops API test kit)
gh - alot (17 drops API test kit)

Is there anything i need to add? buffer? baking soda?
 
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