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I may have TB in my 25 gallon planted tank, last night I took readings and here they are:
pH 7.2
NO3 20 ppm
KH 120 ppm
PO4 0.5 ppm
Temp 80 F today

I recently changed the lights from one 24" 20 watt bulb to one 24" 65 bulb and added CO2, the bubble rate is pretty slow but I think I am getting 12 ppm CO2.

Only two fish seem to be affected, I have lost one oto, but it showed no symptoms of anything other than stress. I recently treated the tank for ich, I had 2 barbs with one spot each and am now clearing the ich medicine out if the water, the tank has been cleaned 3 times in the last 4 days, dying plants removed (water sprite was killed by the anti-ich med, go med!) I really hope this isn't TB, but if I suspect it should I euthanize the 2 fish I suspect of having it? The barb is very emaciated, laboring to breath, has problems eating, the danio just has a bent back right now, belly looks nice and full, maybe too full? I will try and get some close-ups.

Thanks in advance.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Sadly if the fish is losing weight and one has a bent spine it does sound like fish tb, the only antibiotic that good for treating tb is mincocyline.
I would also advise that you wear gloves when going into the tank to protect your self, might be best to end the fish that are suffering, as you don't wan't the other fish pecking at there bodies.

I have removed the barb, the danio I am still on the fence about though. He's not always bent, which from what I just read could mean that he is reacting to the water quality, which is good, but has been undergoing changes, I am going to do another water change and remove the carbon, it has done it's job by now.
All the equipment that goes into the tank, nets, the gravel vac etc will be washed in bleach so as to be disinfected, the rest of the tank I will let be for now, I am doing a major overhaul in the spring and will disinfect the tank and equipment then, as best as I can, I don't want to have to re-cycle the tank, then I may lose the fish that are healthy!

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Got a bit of experience with mycobacterium with having so many rainbows, post a pic and I might be able to tell.

Thats not the tank with that rather beautiful Krib or yours in it.. is it?

LHG, I'll get a pic of the barb as soon as he passes, he has been removed from the tank and is now in a water pitcher with an airstone, I really don't expect him to last the night. Yes it was the tank with the krib, she seems to be fine though, all nicely colored up. I decided to do the water change and rinse the filter media, should have done the filter before this, it was full of a thick almost black gunk, it had totally clogged the sponge, so I rinsed it out, replaced the peat, left the carbon for a couple more days and will replace the sponge in a week. Though, I may decide to leave the carbon for a week and change the sponge in a couple of days. It really hasn't been that long since the last filter maintenance was done, I do it every month! I think it was the water sprite and moss, the WS has been slowly dying and the moss gets stuck in the filter uptake all the time. So now I'll watch for improvement in the danio, like I said it's not always bent and doesn't seem to impair him/her in any way, so it could have been the bunked up filter. The barb though will be gone soon, I don't think better water will save him and I'm not risking the other fish.

Here is the picture.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Yeah that barbs bodyposture is a bit odd through the vertical plane, a danio is more likely to bend sideways incidentally. Fish TB generally causes kinking in the spine along paths of least resistance, barbs have support because of their chubbiness, so the fish is likely to bend from top to bottom. The weight isnt shocking, and the colour isnt that off, even for a fish post mortem. Was the barb that chubby along the points where the stomach and intestine are in life, or is this just occuring since hes been dead? It looks like he has a little swelling roughly where his intestine should be, now that could just be gas, but I have a feeling whatever killed him hit the intestines. The area around the gills doesnt look that bad (its a small piccy though).

All in all its inconclusive,the symptoms arent definitive visually on that fish, I could probably only tell if I opened it up. Id probably give the tank the metronidazole and melafix combo, you may have a compound bacterial and flagellate protozoan problem there.Metro tends to make an impact on mycobacterium too, just in case Im wrong. Neither treatment should affect your filter or other fish species badly, so everyones a winner.

Unless you added more fish recently I actually doubt its TB,it tends not to just spring up from nowhere, its much more easily transmitted between fish.

The fish that seemed most affected were relatively new, I got them about a month or so ago. The barb was very skinny near the end, flat on the bottom rather than round the way barbs are, he was a chubby little guy at first, The rest of my barbs are nice and full bellied. The danio seems to have come around, he was bending from the back not to the side, and his belly seems slightly swollen, though only on the white part, no pine-cone appearance or anything like that so I guess it could have been what you said, rather than TB, whew! I will get some metro and do what you said to be sure, I just treated for ich but the med should be all cleared out by now.

Also I did find and clear out all that gunk and do a water change to get any nasties out. The rest of the fish all look good, everyone's eating well and no-one is hiding.

Thanks a lot for all your help!

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Given that you say all the fish seem swollen it might be worth treating for roundworm as well as protozoa, see if they deflate a little after the metro, if not, go for some wormer too. A protozoan infection and roundworm together will cause a big energy drain on the fish. Its actually more common to get compound problems than just singular issues.

Hiya, let us know how things are going.

Hi there, I ordered the metro, it will be here tomorrow or the day after, I can't make it into the city right now, snow storm, after all the balmy then really cold weather we finally have snow when I want to go buy meds for my fish! No more deaths, I have been maintaining the tank, I replaced the bunked up sponge today, added two new plants, and have been messing with the CO2 system. Now everything should go back to normal. Some of the fish are flashing, which from what I've read means either external parasite, like the Ich, pH wrong, the Co2 system is new and it's been down for 24 hrs, so that makes sense, anything else? Then we have the bellies, some that were swollen are now sunken a bit, especially near the head, could it be worms?What do I need for dewormer? Will Hagen cat and dog liquid dewormer work? I actually have some on hand, it's old though, may not be any good anymore. The metro will be here soon and I will dose the tank. The metro is for protozoans right? Anything I need to know before hand? Should I raise/lower the temp? It has been 82F throughout though I usually keep it at 75F. Thanks for all your help!

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

I wouldnt use old stock to worm the fish, and I dont know what the concentration or chemical suspension of that drug is. Confer with a vet by telephone to be sure, although when you have a chance you should be able to find something suitable from your LFS, and roundworm issues are rarely that pressing , so it can wait a few days. A bit of grated garlic might cause a purge in the meantime if youre worried. Protozoans cause flickking too, so thats to be expected, although if your co2 just gave out there will be a minor change in water chemistry ( not neccesarily a harmful one) so again a little flicking from the changing conditions is to be expected. It could be ich if bacterial levels and parasite levels are up, but wait for the first spots to appear before worrying about that. Just keep testing the water occassionally on the offchance something spikes.

Metronidazole is primarily for the protozoans , but it also has antibiotic properties. The melafix is just to bump off bacterial nasties in the water, between the two you should manage to kill most of the harmful gut bacteria and a lot of protozoan parasites.Ive found it to be a fairly safe combination for knocking a wide range of stomach infections on the head.

The only thing I would do is give things a quick gravel clean and water change before the meds go in, if there is a risk of your tank crashing then doing this will moderate the reaction from the bacteria in the water by thinning them out a bit and making less impact on the filter with the temporary increase in ammonia by- products from the death of harmful bacteria. Its just taking the pressure off the filter a bit really.

Dont mess around with the temperature, its worked out well coincidentally. Keep it at that 82f for a week or two and it will help make the treatments more effective by forcing bacteria and protozoans to reproduce rapidly, thusly increasing the chance of catching the next generation with the meds. The fish have already experienced a change of conditions and will appreciate the chance to level out anyway. After the treatments are done return the temps to normal do a few large water changes and treat for worms, you dont need the tank warm for that because roundworm have longer breeding cycles, and often produce eggs almost continually anyway irrelevant of temperature. Just remember the repeat treatment of dewormer in two or three weeks. I'd leave the co2 off for the treatments.

Hope all goes well .

The CO2 is basically DIY, there's no off switch and I just made a new batch! Actually I made 2 See "DIY CO2 Canister" for more details, in Technical Tinkering, if you're interested. I'm using the Hagen Natural Plant Grow CO2 System, as close to DIY without the hassle. So should I add an airstone or just dump the batch and redo it when the med is done? Both are technically feasible. I hate to lose the whole batch, but I didn't pay for it really, I had the yeast and sugar on hand, and I also have spare airstones on hand as well.

So a water change, then metro and mela-fix, then if needed the wormer after that is done. How many doses should I expect to have to do at the most? Or should I say how long to continue treatment if the first dose doesn't seem to do the trick. You're the only fish doc I have contact with, the vets here don't do fish.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

LOL, im hardly a fish doc even though I spent a few years in animal rescue and have animal care qualifications!

Id be tempted to not use co2, since bacteria have a nasty habit of producing the stuff when dying anyway, but you'd probably get away with keeping on using it . I was erring on the side of caution is all ( assuming you could just turn it off) . Treatments of metronidazole can run to 14 days, but that has more to do with catching reinfections than actually killing the first wave of infection which usually happents in 2-4 days, technically you could use the treatment for 5-7 days, give it a break for 48 hours and then use it for another week, theres a little room for choice in there, especially if the fish are so ill it pays to give them a rest between courses.

On the worming front a simple solution is jungle labs antiparasite clear, it contains praziquantel, (for tapes and roundworm) and metronidazole for the protozoans,but this doesnt help you if you cant get it , or your fish wont eat it.

On the vetinary wormers front , Raw praziquantel and fenbendazole need to be ingested, so fish might not take it even if you disguise it in other foods, but levamisol can be added to water, dosages are usually worked out against water volume, but how much you should put in depends on the concentration of the medicine. Get some in liquid form if you can , and we'll find a way to work out the dosage once we know the concentration.

I just checked Big Al's online for the Jungle Labs anti parasite, they have 100 fizz tabs for $49.95 CDN, yikes! I will have a go with the metro and mela-fix first, should I start them together or can I dose the mela-fix before the metro gets here? The danios seem to be the only ones suffering, and only the leopards, the zebras are fine as far as I can tell. Could it be just them or would it be a good idea to dose just to prevent anything from happening? I don't have a QT or HT, I dose in the display tank, and it has never really had a good preventative dose of anything in it, who knows what's in there waiting for my fish to feel poorly.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Put the melafix in whenever you wish, as soon as possible is probably wise. It wont affect the metro one way or another.The fish in this tank have been exposed to this infection for several days now, and since most protozoa can breed in 24 hours to every fortnight, its entirely possible they all have the infection, even if none are showing symptoms. You dont want fish to be quarantined, cured, and then go back into a tank with fish that may be acting as carriers even if they do look otherwise healthy and never become sick themselves. Id treat the whole tank, and all the fish in situ and do as much as possible to help preserve the filter. Just go easy on the dosages for the corys sakes.

if it is TB, you might want to read the following:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-07/sp/feature/index.php


See my profile (link below) for fish and setup.

Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.

Thanks, I think I read that in another thread, I'm pretty sure now that it's not TB, no lesions or other definitive symptoms. I'm still waiting on my metro to clear up any protozoans, and will be starting mela-fix soon as well. The barbs decided to breed, they went nuts all over the tank while we were all sleeping, in the morning my really fat (momma) barb was much more svelte than I've seen her in a long time. The rest all seemed pretty satisfied so I didn't look for eggs, I don't think they even landed!
The metro should be here today, so I'll do a water change and then start dosing. I've been waiting on the mela-fix as the danio doesn't seem to be getting worse, not better either, and wanted to give the tank a chance to settle down, then the barbs got frisky and I had to wait another day. So hopefully it will be tonight. Worst case the whole tank goes down in a blaze of glory, best case I save them all with timely water changes and miracle medicine. BTW I have had another oto die, unknown causes, no symptoms of anything. I did change the sponge recently and removed the carbon from the filter, it should have cleared all the ich medicine out in a weeks time. I have another for after the metro-mela-fix round.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

That sounds like good preparation to me , and some excellent safety precautions. The use of carbon, adding meds one at a time , sequenced water changes etc, is all good stuff, the only possible change I might make is if the fish start dropping like flies anyway, its probably better to risk the mix of medicines than wait if a condition is particularly aggressive.

But if everyone took a leaf out of luvmykribs book , I suspect more of their fish would survive.

Aww Thanks Git!

I have added mela-fix and pima-fix tonight, the metro still hasn't got here and the fish are all flashing. The danio I was worried about passed on sometime yesterday. He became very skinny in the end and was struggling to breathe. The temp has been climbing though I've been setting it lower to bring it back to 80F, it was almost 86F! If it is malfunctioning I will have to replace it tomorrow. When the metro gets here I will definitely begin dosing immediately, maybe between the three meds, I'll have everything cleared up.

In my other tank, I lost two panda cories, the two remaining cories are showing white around the mouth. I used Jungle Labs Fungus eliminator after 2 rounds of mela-fix, is this mouth fungus? Should I double dose mela and pima fix (by double I mean both at the same time) and maybe some metro in that tank as well when it gets here? It is due for a water change, tomorrow, then I could begin dosing right after. I feel like my tanks are under an invasion of some sort. They both got sick at the same time, with different organisms, at least I thought they were different, ich in the 25 and fungus in the 10.

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Thats not altogether strange, sometimes the quality of tapwater will vary and the vector for transmission will be there, fluctuatiing temps will affect fish too, a lot of people find theyre fish get ill seasonally, and if you get a dose of protozoa the immune system will drop and it just depends what the prevailing aggressive agent in the tank happens to be. In one tank there may by ich waiting to take hold, in another it might be fungus spores ready and waiting.

Its kind of an immune system drop, then waiting to see what hits you first. Its like people with aids, some get cancer , some get kidney infections, some die from a common cold. Its whatever aggressive infection gets to you first.