FishProfiles.com Message Forums

Its not just me noticing is it?

Ive never seen disease rates like ive seen over the new year. Everyone, everywhere, every stockist, every importer is palming off sick fish everywhere I go, on every site I go, and seriously , the kind of hours im putting in giving out disease advice is just crazy, I could go full time, im getting 70 mails a day plus on the really nasty stuff alone.

Not just fungus and finrot or flexibacter, hardcore stuff, viruses no-one knows how to treat, mycobacterium, NTD, obscure protozoa, blood flukes, dinoflaggelates, marine ich and freshwater whitespot everywhere, oodinium, hexamita everywhere, even metacarcariae , just everywhere. American fish with asian diseases, and vice versa, african fish dying through cichlids to cats all getting lumps them deaths, ever rainbows I have always personally found to be almost unkillable, looking like hell everywhere I go.Resistant ich, resistant oodinium, fungus you can try 4 meds on before you find one that will work, fish dying from what I can tell is overmedication prior to even being bought..fish showing symptoms of heavy metal exposure, lymphocystis, you hardly ever used to see it, now in 6 shops near me...marines showing the kind of spots you get from arsenic poisoning, what the hell is going on?

Koi goldfish, tetras, gouramis, cichlids, livebearers... just about every one of the most commonly captive bred fish showing immuno suppression, many unsavable..

I literally just decided to close my collection off, I seriously dont think ill buy another fish this year, or even a plant for that matter. Im thinking big systems and UV isnt working out there, quarantine is just nil, and whole stockists, importers and shops now have system wide infections. Drugs like dimetridazole hitting the mainstream, signs are not good.

Im really not panicking when I say ive never seen things this bad. Not in 30 years.

Anyone else starting to notice?

Well, in my 16 years of fishkeeping on a small scale, this is my first and very stubborn case of fungus.

I agree that there are meds out there now that I've never encountered before. Powerful stuff that shouldn't just be used at random. Yet there must be a need, or it wouldn't be filling the shelves.

I vote! Do you?

Could it all be water related and poor house keeping profits before fish.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

I am not sure about other parts of the world but i seriously think the quality of the water here in australia has massively declined, which could be a result of the recent drought.

I seem to do water changes and the next thing i know im seeing spots, fungus and popeye which ive not had too much of a problem with in the past.

Ive also noticed the quality of fish you get at LFS is quite poor regardless of where you go. We recently got 3 new bronze cories only to see them come down with some skin disease that we are currently treating and winning the battle i might add!

---

Truth doesn't always win friends but it influences them

Depending where you are in NSW could vary with your water supply.

In my part of Vic I have been informed to only take the hot water from hot water service and store it for a week. It is also recommended to add a PH buffer to the water as you change it.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

Hey git ,
Not that I'm any kind of expert with any kind of formal training or education ( other than high school bio.)...
but yeah, have seen and experienced some oddities lately, in aquaria and in the outdoors.... with the aquaria -just wonder if its the cross-combination of hundreds of thousands of generations of our fish being inbred at the fish farms where ever they all may be...I can only imagine that such a limited gene-pool would lead to a genetically weakened species vulnerable to something it used to be able to stave off with its natural immune system- and as previously noted, more and more "exotic-new" meds are becoming available OTC, it seems to combat more and more of these "med-resistant" nasties.
Maybe the nasties are evolving to survive themselves.. I mean the world-wide climate condition is changing, seems gradual and barely noticeable in some areas, other regions feel the change hard from year-to-year... pollution, global warming.. whatever the cause...
A few years ago started noticing the colors on rainbow trout.. no where as vibrant as they should be... not even silvery... just bland-gray....every so often a few with ick and or velvet (oodinium) .... always thought salmonids were resistant to those buggs... maybe not....
Have collected large mouth bass with hex..... I agree, things just aren't right..... Also, the contamination of native waters with tropical fish and tropical waters contaminated with non native fish, whether it be accidental or intentional,that does not help matters at all....

What can be done ??

I don't know if I'm just lucky, but I haven't seen this happening...

--------------------------------------------
The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

This time of year is bad for buying fish- if you're going to, you have to be careful. Commercial breeders can get rid of all their bad/disease e stock at this time of year and blame shipping in the cold. It doesn't really hurt them since sales are low anyhow at this time of year, and if everybody is doing it, then it's not hard to blame the customer for over-use of medication as well. My guess is that this sort of thing will continue to get worse in correspondence with a certain economic "bump" that will not be named here.

LHG - I totally hear ya and I'll throw in a couple thoughts.

I watched a special recently on the (general) water supply.
I sat their shocked when I saw some of the stuff that cannot be totally removed from the water treatment processes.

This one stuck out... PREscriptION PILLS and chemical compounds from them that the body passes. Birth control pills was specifically mentioned as a specific concern as the presence of such chems are climbing. What about depression drugs or nuclear drugs used in chemo ? SCARY... Anyone on town water, drinks the drugs everyone else is taking. Even if you're on a well some of this stuff may find it's way into the water table as well as the chems in acid rain. It'd have to, eventually.

All in all, no matter our water source, water quality is deteriorating everywhere, slowly but surely. I'm sure even in 'pristine' environments.

Now add the increasing amount of water treatment chems that have to be used to keep the drinking water 'safe' and your water pipes 'clean'. Of course this info wouldn't ALL be disclosed.

I don't blame you for quarantining your tank to new additions until the whole scene improves at least with the storebought fish. I do encourage the use of domestic breeders, thru fishclubs, local buy and sell sites etc.
If everyone did that, the fishstores/importers/farms etc would have to smarten up as well as reduce the chance of us supporting the extinction of wild stock.

Also a coincidence to go side by side with increased fish problems is increased use of growth/color hormones at fishfarms. What you get is a 'healthy' fish until the hormone runs out.

'Superbugs' aren't new but yes the frequency of them lately is outright freaky. Fish get medicated feed at the farms etc and people med their fish more often. This leads to fish / diseases / parasites building up resistance to meds but having weakened immune systems at the same time. I first heard the term 'super-ick' about 4 years ago. A local aquarist bought fish from a large chain store and in thanks got a 'super-parasite' of unknown type that kept recurring like a nightmare over a 4 month period, almost every med was used in succession. That just happened recently.





The Amazon Nut...