Bacterial or Parasite?

[IronSnake]

I need your collective advice. What does my G. Sveni have? At first I thought it was a fluke, but doing more research today, I’m leaning towards aeromonas bacterial infection. The reason I suspect this is because they are under week 2 of ich treatment with salt and 86F temp, so maybe a lesion got infected.

Only this one geo has it. Behavior is normal and active. Full of energy and voracious appetite as always.

I’m planning to hit the entire tank with kanaplex, furan-2, and metro+ together this weekend. I read that if it is a bacterial infection, high temps will make it virulent so I’m planning to also lower the temp back down to 78F and dose ich-x to complete the ich treatment for a 3rd week.

Should I stop adding the salt?

Is my plan solid or I need a different course of treatment?

Thank you very much.

 

[sikoko]

Make sure to do wc often to prevent secondary infection.

 

[kno4te]

I assume the area in question is the one behind the pectoral fin. Looks like a lymphocystis behind the pectoral fin. Would watch and see if it worsens.

 

[duanes]

I assume the area in question is the one behind the pectoral fin. Looks like a lymphocystis behind the pectoral fin. Would watch and see if it worsens.

I believe this may be the problem, and if it is, since Lymph is viral, what is needed is low stress, and lots of water changes.
Viruses are not treatable with meds. The immune system must fight it off on its own.
If these were recently shipped to you, Lymph is a common occurrence after the stress of being moved, because like the common cold is ubiquitous. And among other modes of contagion, is spread when fish touch each other.
The problem with many fish diseases, are many symptoms look similar.
If by chance it is bacterial, the high temps (any temp above 82'F) may make the bacteria more virulent.
The salt sometimes helps, yet may be stressful for Geo's (they usually prefer less osmotic pressure).
The high temps encourage ick to speed up its life cycle (so more easily killed), but also promote secondary infection by bacteria and viruses.

 

[IronSnake]

Thank you both, now I’m conflicted. I don’t want to stress them all more with new medication so what should I do? I’m going to definitely lower the temps back down to 78F tonight and 30% water changes daily, while keeping a darn close eye on the white node behind the pectoral fin. Should I keep up with the 3ppt salt to the tank to finish the ich treatment for week 3 or remove the salt and simply use malachite green/ich-x?

 

[kno4te]

Thank you both, now I’m conflicted. I don’t want to stress them all more with new medication so what should I do? I’m going to definitely lower the temps back down to 78F tonight and 30% water changes daily, while keeping a darn close eye on the white node behind the pectoral fin. Should I keep up with the 3ppt salt to the tank to finish the ich treatment for week 3 or remove the salt and simply use malachite green/ich-x?

Would cont with salt.

 

[IronSnake]

A happy update. The g. sveni is all healed up. It was most likely lymphocystis after all. However, I also hit the entire tank with a treatment of furan-2 and kanaplex since I bought the meds already.

I also decided to lower the stress in the tank by stopping the last week of ich heat treatment by reducing the temperature back down to 77-78 from 86F, and stop adding salt back in the water changes every 48hrs per furan-2 instructions. I dosed ich-x to finish off the 3rd week of ich treatment just in case.

Finally, lesson learned on this is that I was trying to be cheap and go with black blasting sand. I didn’t realize it was too abrasive. I spent all day yesterday draining and changing the entire sand out of the 300g tank with pool filter sand. The geos are back sifting sand thru their gills instead of just mouthing and throwing it back out.

Thank you everyone for your help! Now, I’m off to crack open a cold beer, nurse my back pain, and stare at the fishies.

 

[kno4te]

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