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Required info:
Tank size 55 Gallon planted. Cycled
0ppm Amonia, 0ppm Nitrite, 20ppm NitrAte.
KH 4, PH 7.2.
6 koi angelfish
4 platies
7 flame tetras

Recently I had an outbreak of what might have been camallanus. You may remember this post about it. After the two sick fish died in quarenteen I treated the tank with Jungle Labs Parasite Clear. This is a medication that you add to the tank, not a medicated food.

Well yesterday I noticed my smallest flame tetra floating at the bottom of the tank. He looked as if he was starved to death. I didn't notice anything wrong with it. No fin rot or ich. I check it's vent, but how can you tell if a flame tetra 's vent is red?

So while feeding last night I noticed one of my platies (female) seemed to have a red swollen vent and looked quite stressed. She also looks prego not that that's a suprise. I was shocked by how similar it looked to my angel before she passed away. I looked at my filter pad and noticed it had charcoal in it. So my assumption was the medication didn't work because it was absorbed by the charcoal.

I called around looking for a medicated food and nobody has it locally. The quickest I can get some will be next tuesday as I will be out of town. I can get more of the parasite clear however. And I did remove the charcoal from my filter pads.

I'm looking for opinions on how to handle this.

Option #1 is treat the tank with the external meds again (without the charcoal) and repeat the treatment an extra time (package says can be repeated up to three times).

Option #2 is treat the tank with the external meds again and follow that up with some medicated food when I get back.

Option #3 is wait till I get back and just treat with medicated food.

There's no way of knowing for sure if worms are the problem...

Some fish have internal problems due to other diseases so just guessing is not good enough.

Take a razor blade and slit open the dead fish's belly and look for worms.

If they're there you can dose the med now and when you return. If not, look for other causes.

--garyroland.

I tried for about an hour to find the body of the tetra in the plant I burried it in. I had no luck. After about an hour sitting on the floor digging through dirt, I realized that I must look insane. Good thing the wife wasn't home before I cleaned the mess.

So far I have not added any medication or medicated food. The platy doesn't look stressed, but she still has the same red swollen vent.

I don't leave until tomorrow night. So I still have some time to decide what to do about it.

You can dose some parasite med now and later when you return.

--garyroland.

More tank watching last night. I noticed some of my tetras look like they have balls in their belies that move. I have some external medicine (same kind used before) and was thinking of dosing it now and when I get back following it up with the medicated fish food (should be in stock by then).

I was planning on doing a WC before I left, dosing the meds (this time without carbon in my filter ) and doing a WC when I get back and putting the carbon back in my filter. Does this sound like a good idea?

Thanks again for the help gary.