Why HITH.... WHY?

[andyt513]

Fish can have hith for years before you will ever know it. Again hith is not a diesease and your fish does is not infected with hith (hith is a symptom, I'll explain in a minute)- it has a parastie, bad water, bad diet or a combo of all 3. hith is not the problem in itself it is merely a symptom of the problem. You need to figure out why it has hith, what exactly are your water params? Do you only feed it pellets and not other things? Does it have heximita(sp)? Here is what I mean by hith not being the disease alone. When you get a cold, you develope a cough as a symptom of the cold, hith works the same way. If you have HITH it is a symptom of something else such as bad water quality irritating the sensory system, allowing a parasite heximita which causes the symptom of hith. You can try to do water changes very ofen and keep your water prestine clean. You can treat it with Metronidazole, however I can't say that it will always work - it has in come cases and has not in others.

cool, i just learned something

 

[twk1]

Fish can have hith for years before you will ever know it. Again hith is not a diesease and your fish does is not infected with hith (hith is a symptom, I'll explain in a minute)- it has a parastie, bad water, bad diet or a combo of all 3. hith is not the problem in itself it is merely a symptom of the problem. You need to figure out why it has hith, what exactly are your water params? Do you only feed it pellets and not other things? Does it have heximita(sp)? Here is what I mean by hith not being the disease alone. When you get a cold, you develope a cough as a symptom of the cold, hith works the same way. If you have HITH it is a symptom of something else such as bad water quality irritating the sensory system, allowing a parasite heximita which causes the symptom of hith. You can try to do water changes very ofen and keep your water prestine clean. You can treat it with Metronidazole, however I can't say that it will always work - it has in come cases and has not in others.

Ash- here are my water parameters:
PH= 7.2
Nitrite= 0ppm
Nitrate= 10ppm
Ammonia= 0ppm

I mainly feed the bp NLS Thera-A Pellets and sometimes tiny pieces of market shrimp and krill. So i guess the only way to try to stop the hith is by doing even more frequent WC.
If i introduce another blood parrot or cichlid into the same tank, will the new fish catch the parasite or hith disease???

 

[ChileRelleno]

This is my standard canned reply to HITH/HLLE related issues with Oscars at www.oscarfish.com , simply adapt to your specific species diet/etc.

HITH/HLLE Treatment(s)

(1)Water Quality
Get your water quality/chemistry perfect, NH3-0, NO2-0, NO3- 0/20ppm,
check your filters & clean'em if necessary (reduces alot of NO3), gravel vac & PWC, do small PWC's (25%) every other day.
Just about everyone will agree that bad water chemistry and HITH go together like apple pie -n- ice cream...

(2)Diet
Feed a well balanced and varied diet* (See below).

(3)Vitamin Supplements
Add liquid vitamin supplements to all food and vary their diet.
Soak or load everything you feed the fish with vitamins until cured and watch your water.
Vitamins that you add to your tanks water are worthless (IMO).
We use "Vita Chem", our fish get it regularly.
This particular brand is available at most on-line retailers and at better LFS's (We get ours at BigAls).
http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/pro ... 911;pcid2=

(4) Supplementary treatment
I would add a dose of salt to the tank, this helps lower stress, encourages slime-coat production and gill function amongst other things.
Also a dose of Melafix and Pimafix, these have been known to help healing.

(5)Temperature
Gradually increase your tanks temp to aprox 80'-82'f.
Increased temp increases metabolism which can influence the immune system thus possibly speed healing.

(6)Medicate
Alot of folks blame Hexamita for HITH and thus treat for it with medications, BUT, studies have been done showing that Hex (and others) is/are a secondary infection/s (Whether or not Hexamita plays a key-role with HITH infections is controversial).
You need to do what "You" feel is right and correct after researching this for yourself, google "HITH causes prevention and cure" or some such, and visit Cichlid specific forums for more info.

Some folks also think that filter carbon dust plays a role...
Carbons role is controversial.

Some folks also think that stray electrical currents are to blame...
Stray electrical currents role is controversial at best.

It seems there are no absolutes as to the cause, but just like ICH there are many ways to treat it and proponenets/opponents of each treatment.

I say again though...
Perfect water quality and a varied nutritious diet supplemented with vitamins.

Here's a good article on HITH available here at Oscarfish,
http://www.oscarfish.com/cms_view_article.php?aid=3
For more simply Google, 'HITH'.

DIET
A quality cichlid pellet or stick should make up 75-80% of your O's diet.
These are my primary foods...
Pellets, Carnivore sticks, freezedried krill, algae wafers, fresh nightcrawlers, fresh/freezedried earthworm (Any worms are great foods!), fresh crickets, fresh mealworms, almost any insect I catch (Insects from outside do pose a risk of insecticides which can harm your fish, be careful.).

I rotate store bought nightcrawlers, crickets and mealworms about monthly on the menu.
I feed my 10"+ O probably 4-6 large crickets, 6-10 mealworms or 1-2 large nightcrawlers per feeding and he'll get'em every 2-3 days.

I feed or have fed my O all of these foods...
Raw/cooked shrimp, small bits of raw cut fish, beefheart, bitesize bits of fruits-n-veggies (zucchini, carrot, shelled peas, shelled corn, apple, orange, pear, papya and etc...), small tree/grass frogs (NO toads, and know which frog species your feeding as some can be toxic too.) and properly quarantined or raised feeder fish, these should be fed sparingly and rotated as snacks or dessert.
Do not feed unquarantined feeder fish from LFS/LPS, do not feed mammalian flesh (Animal fats from mammals and fowl are very bad for most fish).

I supplement his nutrition by soaking his pellets 4-5 times a week in a liquid vitamin.
I use Vita-Chem, available at some LFS's and on-line retailers, I get mine at BigAl's, http://www.bigalsonline.com/BigAlsUS/ct ... shwater4oz
Alot of different types and brands are used, Liquid Centrum for example, but you could reasonably use any quality L. vitamin.

 

[twk1]

Okay... i have two tanks with blood parrots in both, one tank has 2 bp's... and the other tank has only 1 bp. These 3 bp's were together in a different tank before.

Now.... the tank that has 1 bp in it has good water parameters as listed above in post #12... but that 1 bp HAS HITH!

Now... the tank that has 2 bp's is the tank that is not as well taken cared of and the water parameters aren't as good, they DONT have HITH.... wtf??!! I feed them all the same food.

So can someone please tell me wth is happening?

 

[jgallagher1980]

could you post a pic, this would help me and i am sure others know what to look for

 

[evojoey]

Nobody really knows what it is. It could be genetic, from poor diet or from bad water. Everybody says that it is caused by feeder fish. I disagree because all I ever fed my oscars was feeder fish. Oscars seem to get it more than any other fish. They would eat 50 rosies and 50 small goldfish every 3-4 days. They never developed HITH. I think it is more of a genetic thing. Maybe from too much inbreeding or something like that. It's kind of like DE in arowana's. I had 2 silver aro's. One of them got DE in 1 eye. The other aro never got it. Same tank, same food. It's hit or miss. Whatever causes it, it sucks. A lot of nice fish die because of something that can't be explained.

 

[twk1]

Okay... i have two tanks with blood parrots in both, one tank has 2 bp's... and the other tank has only 1 bp. These 3 bp's were together in a different tank before.

Now.... the tank that has 1 bp in it has good water parameters as listed above in post #12... but that 1 bp HAS HITH!

Now... the tank that has 2 bp's is the tank that is not as well taken cared of and the water parameters aren't as good, they DONT have HITH.... wtf??!! I feed them all the same food.

So can someone please tell me wth is happening?

Can someone please help me on this and tell me why or whats going on???

 

[Cichlaholics Anonymous]

is it considered consensus that hexamita is not related to HITH?

 

[twk1]

Ok.... so what causes this hexamita? What am i doin wrong?? Here is a pic of my bp.

 

[pcfriedrich]

is it considered consensus that hexamita is not related to HITH?

my understanding is that hexamita doesn't directly cause HITH. as ash said, it is a symptom. hexamita damages (sometimes permanately) the digestive tract of the fish, making it much less efficient of absorbing nutrients.

if a fish is damaged badly enough by the infection, it may never again absorb a sufficient amount of nutrients, regardless of diet. this can lead to HITH.

that's my understanding, and it makes sense, but i cant remember where I got that info so I could be mistaken.