The beginning of the end? Raykeepers nightmare.

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Just read the whole thread... so sorry to hear you are going through this. I pray you and your rays make it through this, I think we've all lost rays but losing multiple rays or even a whole system has got to be emotionally devastating, especially with all the hard work we put into ray keeping. As far as UV's go I just picked up one of these
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Terrible pic but I'm not home to take a pic of my actual sterilizer. It's an Aquafine DW-300, 800GPH. I have yet to set it up though because I'm still looking for a pump.
 
Just read the whole thread... so sorry to hear you are going through this. I pray you and your rays make it through this, I think we've all lost rays but losing multiple rays or even a whole system has got to be emotionally devastating, especially with all the hard work we put into ray keeping. As far as UV's go I just picked up one of these
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Terrible pic but I'm not home to take a pic of my actual sterilizer. It's an Aquafine DW-300, 800GPH. I have yet to set it up though because I'm still looking for a pump.
 
Yes...It's Electrical Conductivity... so anything that's in the water increases E.C.... so E.C. won't tell you what;'s in the water...but if you know what your target or baseline E.C. is, then you know if you are keeping up with water changes (drip rate). And in the case of salinity... I think you'd have to have the drip-rate set to maintain all other params first (as you likely do)...then stop the drip, add the salt and measure to get your new base E.C... then keep adding salt to maintain that new E.C. reading. Salt content can fluctuate a bit...not as important as PH stability and what-not.

Am I making sense?

Mike
 
Well I have some updates. None good.

Blackworms showed up. Rays spazzed and ran from them. 4 of my nicest female Marbles didn't want anything to do with them. The rest fine and eating normal food.

The female with from the pics witht he cloudy eyes seems to be the only one to improve. She's accepting normal food again.

I experience "something" tonight. No clue WTF it is but take a look for yourself. I'm not even gonna speculate. Friggin sick. Came out of a female that was supposed to be giving birth in the near future. My girl saw it happen. I know I saw movement on this girl but the recent Marbles that had litters here seem to go through a stage at the end where there isn't much movement. The you start worrying then a few weeks later bam, pup. All I know I've seen about all I want to see after this ordeal.

All the non eating females seem to exhibit fraking out, backwards swimming, and just general twichiness. Have seen some pretty ugly freak out sessions.

There's a pic of a small sore type wound on the lightbased girl. She seeems to be one of the worst off.

All of them seem to exhibit the same cloudy crap on thier eyes. Greyish slime on the 3 in the 750. The eye stuff seems to be one thing common in all the pics including the ones of the male that died.

The Pearl that was in the juvie tank that went down to the 750 looks good as ever. Very vibrant. Unfortunately he will not lay off the male Hen that's almost double his size so he had to be moved to the pond. This Pearl has the devil in it. Never seen such an aurnry ray. He seems unaffected in any way shape or form. He was doing some odd lifting of the disc when he first went intot he 750 but after a few days it seemed he was just showing off as he soon began waving his claspers around along with the disc lifting.

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Wow that is very strange man does it seem like poop? Or a miscarriage it is kind of hard to even guess from the pictures

I wish I could be of more help but the best I can do is say that I really do feel for you and I hope it works out for the best
 
That's messed up Al. I haven't post on this thread but just been reading every time I log on to see how everything was going, all that ur doing is wat I would be doing, but that pic looks like maybe a fetus miscarriage.... I think anyways. Maybe zoo diver can validate it....gl man
 
Sorry to hear. If you think the discus introduced something, why not step up to stronger meds? Might be worth a shot at this point. Us discus guys rarely use Prazipro just because it isn't effective (although some use Praziquantel). Metronidazole, Kanamycin, Levamisole, Flubendazole, etc etc. Also, haven't seen anybody mention Epsom Salt. This works as a laxative of sorts and can help purge any bugs out. Regular salt isn't going to do much IMO. All of these are used with great success on discus when dealing with internal bugs. BUT, I have no knowledge whatsoever on how this will work on rays. Also, consider sending feces or dead rays off to a lab to get tested. It will cost you a couple hundred bucks, but it might be worth it to know what's really causing the problem. Discus folks have done this. One popular discus breeder culled tens of thousands of dollars of fish that were acting strange. When the diagnosis came back from the lab, he found out it was a bacterial infection in the brain, which may have been treated with readily available meds. I think you're at a state of emergency where you should consider any and all options.
 
8 pages of advice before this suggestion comes up......

Let's say it IS a bacterial infection in the brain. How the hell is a typical hobbyists supposed to ID this? I'll tell you how, stand by watching the rays die while giving them the same pristine water they live in everyday. After they all die you get the ol wallet out and pay someone for an accurate ID on what killed of your giant 5 year piggybank.

This is the ONLY reason I have held back on expensive rays. This excruciating protocol has NOT changed since I began keeping rays.

People's rays get sick and learn to live with what they have and bam, the miracle of curing all these ailments with "good" water when in reality it might just be a sad fact that we can lie to orselves enough to think we actually cured something and then it's back to normal life for us.

Taking this point of view and looking at ray keeping seems no different then a trip to the casino through the eyes of someone who finds gambling hard to justify due to how much work goes into making that money.

Thank god there's gaurdian angels out there who visit MFK from time to time. Hopefully these rays will be here as proof of that in a few weeks, and proof of so much more.
 
DB,

I left you a PM and posted a ways back on bacterial infecctions and my similar experience with rays and Discus. There is no mention or recognition of my postings or a reply to my PM. Use Metronidiazole - that's what I used and it worked. I think you have a bacterial infection form either the discus or the new rays. That is the primary infection that weakens the ray. Then they get secondary infections from things they normally can fight off. Treating for the secondary infection or giving pristine water conditions will not cure the bacterial problem. UV will not cure it if it is internal. I may be new to MFK, but I've been keeping rays since 2008.

SEE POST 62
 
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