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hey guys,i wasnt sure where to post,but what colour should my cichlids poo be?

Dedends what its eating TBH, some feeds produce orange poo, others brown, some even a bit green. If the poo is coming through white with bubbles or very grey, check for parasites like protozoa and worms, or if occasionally its very dark red to black, it can be a sign of internal bleeding,and that means checking for parasites like tapeworm, and also bacteria and amoebic infections.

if it was worms,how do they contract them

Worms eggs get everywhere, and a fish may have worms from being a fry, literally roundworm eggs picked up from any substrate from almost the moment they are born. Initial souces of infection will be infected cagemates, tanks from breeders, warehouse holding facilities , dispatchers, the lfs, live food sources like midge larve, tubifex, feeder fish, used media and decor, old gravel that hasnt been washed too well, carried in adhered to plants, you name it! Animals and humans contracting internal parasites is an unavoidable situation. Because of regular coprophageous behaviours (eating poo!) fish pick up worms very easily. Even for humans its as easy as letting a dog or cat nuzzle or lick your face, stroking a pet, and then putting your fingers in your mouth and then eating, or the ultimate horror scenario, someone scratching their bum on the inside of their trousers, and making you a sandwich.Eeeek.. lol.

Very few people routinely deworm their fish, and most captive fish everywhere in the world carry at least roundworm, many living with them completely free of trouble. Its only when the worms growth or numbers increase for whatever reason that you get issues or even know they are there for sure. They could even have caught them from you! About 99 percent of all mammalian species including us carry numerous internal parasites most of the time, and so do our dogs and cats, rodents,horses, reptiles , amphibians and birds. Even 70% of the current human population will be currently carrying roundworm, and never be aware of it. Ignorance is bliss probably, if you really knew how many worms were out there and in how much of the population its enough to make you phobic lol. Just treat it as it comes up. There is some evidence to show that a small worm infestation can actually be beneficial to a host under normal circumstances, helping the animal to pass and digest cellulose, providing hormonal compounds that help with immune system, and certain worms and protozoa help keep a stomach lining thick, highly digestively efficient and free from damage, its just that occassionally things do get out of control and you do have to deworm your pets. Routine worming unless worried about certain trematodia cercariae, tapeworm, and blood carried monogeans is probably excessive, and might actually harm the average immune response and digestive efficiency in a fish population.

Its just one of those things you have to do if poo goes odd, stomachs swell, fish become unexplainably thin, or skinny with massively fat bellies who arent retaining eggs etc. Usually you just wait for the first symptom before you treat. Some worms are friends, some are foes, and sometimes the same species can be either depending on circumstances.

In the most basic explanation of contraction though, most worms are eaten by the fish as eggs or cysts. Either from the surrounding or in a few cases, eaten as adults or picked off cystic swelling from other fish. Most worms have developmental stages, often needing different animal types to mature and complete their lifecycle. Snails are a classic early host species, as indeed earthworms and shrimp can be,live tubifex are possitively evil for disease transmission, they are eaten by fish, then mature to the next stage, then a bird eats the fish, it grows to its largest stage and reproduces. Waterbird then craps lots of eggs back into the water, and the cycle of infestation continues as the scavenger species eat the poo, and pick up the eggs. Some worms are more direct than that, infecting whatever animal ingests the egg directly, and totally completing its life cycle in the same host, and these are often the most dangerous species to fish health, being that in a closed environment like an aquarium, they can reproduce freely. Tapeworm, roundworm, and flukes all have a selection of species that can infest fish directly, and self perpetuate and increase in number, and its with these worms you will see most problems happening. Trematodia usually need intermediary hosts.

sing along lol "fish got worms, I got worms, me dawg got worms, everybody got worms!"

Yuck.lol

United nations speech " Despite creed, colour, religion we can all get together on the foundation of unity that is ,.... we have worms and we are proud!"

Ok, that was demented. lol But if we can have algae lovers anonymous meetings, surely world peace through worms can be done?

well ill put some treatment throo just to be sure,can u recomend any lh

Depends which worms for which drugs, theres lots of wormers out there that can be used on fish, but being in aus I assume getting hold of them is as tricky as it is for us in the uk. Online ordering jungle labs antiparasite formula would seem to be the easiest all in one, kill most worm types method, but a vet might be able to furnish you with any number of wormers, like droncit, drontal, panacur(fenbendazol or oxfenbendazol) praziquantel etc, a decent vet might be able to offer you a compound drug safe enough with fish, but usually a vet will offer a solution that treats just roundworms, or just tapes, or just flukes.

Not being an aus resident I cant do the digging for you on that one, maybe frank and callatya etc might be able to tell you a little more about product sourcing.

mmm,i mite give the jungle labs a go,order it online,ive herd of heaps of people speaking very highly of this....thanx again lhyeah it is tricky sometimes getting hold of meds,i needed some metro once,after trying all the lfs in my area,i ended up getting some from my vet for $10,so that was cool,but yeah hard to get