Help - Discus

[petronej]

We have a discus that's about a year old. He recently stated showing signs of starvation. He keeps eating. We feed (frozen bloodworms & brine as well as discus formula. He is getting skinnier. On one side we can see a black bulge inside him. We're wondering if he has a tapeworm. We did intro a few fish about a month ago that we not doing well in another tank.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Joe

 

[Yoda1]

It does sound like some sort of worm.
Do you ever deworm your fish? A lot of Discus keepers deworm their fish on a regular basis. Especially when they introduce new ones to the tank.

 

[big brock]

yes he has worms worm him and he should be ok you may need to worm him again in 2 weeks again and keep up the water chainges

 

[ryansmith83]

For tapeworm you can try Praziquantel. The common form used by fishkeepers is PraziPro. If it has tapeworms, you will see them being expelled after one treatment. It's best to do this in a bare-bottom tank, so maybe you should quarantine the fish. Here is a link explaining the dosages and the length of time:

http://www.simplydiscus.com/library/disease_medications/internal/tapeworms.shtml

If the fish does not have tapeworms, you can also try for roundworms.

Diagnosis: http://www.simplydiscus.com/library/disease_medications/internal/nematodes5.shtml

Treatment: http://www.simplydiscus.com/library/disease_medications/internal/nematodes6.shtml

I have always used the Levamisole treatment for this. The one I use is a sheep dewormer called Levasole, but I'm told this one is no longer being manufactured. I treat the tank, let the medication stay for 24 hours, then do a large (90%+) water change to remove it from the water. This gets repeated 1 to 2 weeks later. If you do find Levasole, it's a yellow tablet that dissolves and makes a powdery mess on everything in the tank... another good reason to do this in a quarantine tank!

 

[dp.71]

PRAZI PRO!