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It's just been a week since I started my aquarium after a break of 6 months. The aquarium currently has 2 golden, 1 opaline, and 2 red dwarf gouramis, and one live plant.

A couple of days ago I saw one of the dwarf being rather shy. I'm generally quite easily scared, and since then I started monitoring that fish very carefully.

Now that dwarf seems to be fine, instead, one of my golden gourami had a 4 cm white string hanging from it. I thought this had something to do with internal parasites, and all I've done so far is soak some blood worms in garlic juice and feed them to the fish. The string is no longer there but the fish is sitting at the bottom, not very active.

Any suggestions? Are there any "natural cures" for this disease?

Thanks alot.

I was wrong. The string is very much there and the gourami refuses to eat. The other golden gourami is being quite nasty, and as a result my sick gourami is sitting at the bottom behind a rock.

I'm thinking of removing the plant, and doing a water change. I can't really understand what to do.

Any advice?

Thanks

Warrion

This could be way out and wrong. Could it be a piece of cotton thread?

I would try some fresh cooked peas. If you can place the fish in a small keeper net this way it will be safe from otheres and you can keep an eye on it easly.

You could treat the tank for parasites as if it is, it could pass to the other fish in the tank.

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Keith

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I've isolated that golden gourami, and I did treat the tank for parasites. But yesterday my opaline gourami went crazy. It was quite stationary and then suddenly started jumping. I isolated that one as well, but I couldn't do anything and at the end of it the opaline gourami just sank to the bottom and died.

The golden one is still alive though.

It sounds like intestinal flagellates, the best treament for it (generic name) is Metronidazole. I would treat the whole tank with it, it's fairly harmless stuff with little to no risk of harming the other fish. Also, if one fish has flagellates there's a very good chance the others do too so you'll want to treat them all. I'm not sure if metronidazole is available to you but I would definitely try to find it, it is also used as an antibiotic for people so you may be able to get it from a pharmacy depending on local laws.

If you absolutely cannot get metronidazole, you can try adding garlic to their food. This is an old time remedy for flagellates, has some success but isn't nearly as good as metronidazole. With garlic, you just add the fresh juice of it to the food. I either cut the clove and rub the end of it on the food or crush the clove and add the juice and/or pulp to the food. Garlic is a natural antiparasitic and appetite stimulant in fish. Peas won't do much for you, you'll want to feed them high protein foods like frozen bloodworm.

If you do get the metronidazole, I would use garlic with it. The fish will be more likely to eat food with garlic on it (I don't know why but they like it) and it will have the added benefit of helping rid the fish of parasites.

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Garlic will help to purge some worms, but it doesnt affect all species, or worms too large to pass through the intestines. Garlic is really an irritant to worms , but cannot be considered an effective extermination technique. You cant assume that garlic has beaten the worm infestation, or has done anything to break the life cycle of the parasite, since infestations usually require an intemediary host( snails, shrimp, worms etc),which may still be present in the tank or in the food source. Those species with a direct reinfestation cycle may immediately reinfest your fish.Purged worms even when dead may contain literally thousands of eggs and their bodies might a feeding temptation to fish. Tapeworm in particular actually depends on the flushing of its bodyparts as a part of its regular breeding cycle.

Many worms can actually cause abrasion to gut walls, internal sores and bleeding. When things have got this far its often too late for the fish anyway, as maldigestion is a given under those circumstances.

A more appropriate treatment would be a drug like fenbendazole- this is probably most widely available as the trade name panacur, and with a bit of ingenuity from you, a feeding schedule involving the drug suspended in gelatin with normal foods (get the precise dosage from a vet) you could even treat fish with a minimal impact on any inverts you have.Panacur is one of those drugs that works in conjunction with the anatomy of the fish to produce a toxin that kills the worms, and is not necessarily toxic on its own. Obviously drugs like ivermectim would kill any inverts in the aquarium indescriminately.

Unless treated most aquarium fish will carry a parasite of some sort, its other factors like stress and other illnesses that trigger any given worm infestation to become life threatening, your best defence against them is to clean regularly, particularly substrates, and not feed the fish live foods or keep them in with inverts that act as intemediary hosts in te aquarium. Almost all wormers will kill a certain amount of the fish they come into contact with, so prevention is better than cure,but if you have to treat, use a safer wormer like fenbendazole first.


Metronidazole is a good broad spectrum treatment for protozoans that most wormers wont touch, so if you fear that you cannot identify the specific parasite in time to save the fish's life, treat with fenbendazole first (as roundworms are likely) then metronidazole ( as protozoans are the second most likely) then the few cases of infection that remain are the ones that will require more risky treatments ( like ivomec ) and perhaps some consultation with a vet to determine the causes and the risks.

you might find this site makes relevant and interesting reading.

http://members.optushome.com.au/chelmon/Worms.htm

Last edited by longhairedgit at 11-Oct-2005 17:24

i have a similar thing with one of my small tanks, can anyone suggest a cure i can get in the uk?

anyone any advice?

Yes,
often white stringy waste is a sign of intestinal
parasites.
Any quality anti-parasitic medicated food will
work, so will metronidazole or levamisole.


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Since the tank in question had only been set up for a week when this started I think it's more likely that the fish has been suffering from stress, and all this isolation and treatment of the tank has just made things worse.

Also, it sounds to me like you may have poisoned your Opaline Gourami with whatever you decided to dump in the tank to "treat" the parasites. It has been my experience that these fish are rather tough and hard to kill, and tend to waste away for ages and ages rather than just start jumping around and then die.....

A string of fecal matter that does not fall off on it's own can also be a sign of constipation. If the fish is really stressed (new tank, and a bully for a mate sound familiar?) then it's not eating to keep things moving through it's system.

Gouramis love to have plants to hide in and prefer to have backgrounds on their tanks so they feel safe at least on one side. They don't really like bright lights either. You may want to keep the Gold one isolated and give it lots of peace and quiet as well as stop feeding it for a few days. Follow this fast with some really attractive food (ie. frozen bloodworms) and watch to see how it reacts. If it's still not eating then it may indeed be too late for it, but parasites usually take quite a while to kill a fish off so don't panic...

Good luck,
L.

ok, mine is a more established tank (8 months) but what meds can i get in the uk?