De-Worming Loaches -- Is It Really Necessary??

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Chromobotia

Fire Eel
MFK Member
Aug 12, 2008
1,136
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Southeastern PA
Hi All,

One of the most common comments I’ve seen in the Loach section is “quarantine and de-worm”. I agree with the quarantine part as I have had to battle ICH with new loaches before but I have never de-wormed before. I know I’m going against MFK gospel here but is de-worming really necessary? Or is it just that it is better to be cautious? How do you know they have worms? In the back of my mind, I’ve been thinking this could be some sort of an urban legend. The reason I’m posting this is I have 10 Clowns that I’ve had 3 years now. I’ve never de-wormed them and they seem healthy to me. What do you think? I took these pictures this morning.

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De-worming is usually done on NEW clown loaches. If your clowns are fat, dark poop, and healthy no need to deworm. I usually have to deworm new clown loaches since the loaches I get are usually very unhealthy. IMO and IME no need to deworm.
 
Nice looking loaches... the deworming thing might be a good idea. Word on the street is prazipro is a good med... I am going to try some with my clowns as I suspect at least one of them has the skinnies, if you wish to wait until I have done this, I will let you know how it works. Fish can have parasites and still live a long time as long as they are kept in good conditions.

BTW, you might want to think about replacing your gravel with sand. Your loaches will LOVE it.
 
None of my loaches look skinny to me. The large ones have put on girth in the last 6 months. I have a few smaller ones that have grown but what seems a slower pace than the others. These smaller ones aren't what I would call skinny, they look slim to me but still healthy. I contribute their seemly slower growth to being not as aggressive at feeding time as the others. I recently started to become concerned about possible internal paracites on these smaller ones but I'm reluctant to put in meds at this point for fear of doing something wrong and loosing all the fish.


aclockworkorange;4495618; said:
BTW, you might want to think about replacing your gravel with sand. Your loaches will LOVE it.
Click to expand...


These fish are in my 150 until I finish setting up my 500. I have peace river gravel from caribsea for the 500. It's a very fine gravel. I had the tank up and running last winter but had to take it down in June because of a stand issue. You can see pics of it in the below link. I hope to have the loaches back in there in the next few months. After that, my 150 will become my Q-tank for new additions into the 500.

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=273105
 
Always deworm fish during their initial quarantine period, and every few months if you feed nasties like live tubifex.

Those loaches look great, though, and I wouldn't worry unless you see white poo or other signs. Really great loach pile.
 
Necessary? That's a tough call--a $2 Tbarb/oscar/tetra/whatever probably doesn't need an expensive & time consuming deworming process, but at $10+ each, my loaches always get dewormed. Skinny or not. Heck, they're already in QT, so why not? Besides, everybody likes garlic.

Agreed with above...Your CL's look spectacular & I see no reason to deworm them at this point. Of course, they will LOVE you if you supplement them with some Garlic Xtreme from the LFS. They go ballistic as soon as it hits the water.
 
JakeH;4496896; said:
Of course, they will LOVE you if you supplement them with some Garlic Xtreme from the LFS. They go ballistic as soon as it hits the water.
Click to expand...

What is Garlic Xtreme? Is that a brand? I'll have to look into this because if this is something that the Loaches will like then I'm more than willing to give it a try.
 
I feel like there are quite a few diseases and parasites that can make it out of the quarentine tank stage. How do you best treat these. Could someone please outline how to treat a new batch of fish in a quarentine tank in a preemptive fashion. I have a 110 Gallon with a G. tile and always worry about introducing fish to it thinking they will cary something that I didn't get rid of. If he catches something that is game over I can't really treat him without removing all the fish and raising the salinity (hes in pure fresh) I have no way to do that, no where to put 110 Gs of fish. Is there some kind of fish delausing we can preform in addition to the conventional solitary treatment?
 
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