29 replies to this topic

[Mintox]

Hello,

 

Have recently lost some fish that were very dear to me. 

 

Cheers

[Delapool]

Sorry for your loss.

[chocky]

you should always quarantine new fish regardless of where you get them. ...

sucks but it happens

[sandgroper]

Run a UV.

[DFishkeeper]

So are you saying the fish were showing white spot symptoms when you bought them?

 

Or did they only show white spot symptoms after you put them in your tank at home?

 

Two very different scenarios here, and the difference between whether you brought the white spot home with the fish, or whether they developed it due to stress after going into your tank.

[Mintox]

Fish looked okay in the store, however, they were kept in temps above 29 degrees. I've had this tank setup without the introduction of new fish for 8 years at ~26 degrees.  One new arrival was gasping for air from the start and died after two days, I suspect its gills were hiding some passengers. I think it's up for debate whether Ich can survive in a tank for that long dormant. Heat treatment (30-31 degrees) plus salt hasn't eradicated the parasite after 10 days. Have gone with a Copper based treatment now.

 

I think it's sad that we have to invest in a quarantine tank to be 100% sure, lesson learned. 

[DFishkeeper]

My understanding is that white spot has two life stages, one where it is visible as small white spots on the fish, and another where it is either encased and reproducing somewhere in the tank, or in the water enroute to either stage. This is apparently why white spot can seem to have disappeared from your fish only to reappear a few days later and be much worse.

 

If the fish had no visible signs of white spot when you purchased them, it is possible that either :

 

(i) the fish did not have whitespot when purchased and subsequently developed whitespot due to stress from different water conditions in your tank and non-optimal acclimitisation.

 

(ii) if you added the water from the bags the fish came in to your own tanks, you may have brought the whitespot in that way.

 

(iii) the fish may not have whitespot and may be suffering from something else altogether eg flukes.

 

It may be sad, but 50 years fishkeeping experience has taught me that quarantining new fish is very wise.

[Bostave]

Ick protozoan that are freely swimming in the water are susceptible to temperature, salinity and pH. The ones in the gills aren't but are to copper sulphate provided that alkalinity is above 100 ppm.

[Delapool]

I've even had one case where I swear white spot came in from the water with plants. Now I'm a bit more careful on everything.

[chocky]

A QT is like a 10 gallon tank with a air stone and pump.
it doesnt have to be expensive.

if u have or buying expensive/hard to come by fish in particular.. its definitely worth quarantining.

Anyway hope your treatments work and you dont have anymore losses..

[bigjohnnofish]

white spot is a protozoan - meaning its a single celled parasite... it can survive in a tank dormant for up to 2 years (approx) and not have any effect on your fish - but something changes in your water chemistry/parameters that triggers off this protozoan to reproduce till they get to a level that effects your fish and they become infected and display white spots...  if treated quickly at the first sign of it - usually you can save all your fish.... let it go too long and it can be catastrophic wiping out everything...

if you successfully keep a tank free of whitespot for over 2 years with no new additions and sharing of nets etc you can say that tank is white spot free....

temperature changes in a tank with the protozoan present can set off reproduction to a level it starts to infect stressed , weak ,old fish first as a rule...

 

anyway back to your issue - if your tank has been clean for 8 years you will not have white spot present in your tank.....

therefore you can safely assume it came in with your new fish/water... 

you should go back to where you got the fish and tell them this.... if you dont get a good result perhaps its time to name and shame....facebook is a good place for that cause on here its deemed to be negative feedback and admin dont allow that

 

but at least give them the chance to fix things  

 

and as above its prob a good idea to keep a tank purely for quarantine... unless you 100% trust the source

[Bostave]

Ich outbreak is caused my sudden changes in water parameters and the physiological status of the fish. A shop cannot specifically be blamed unless this has been proven to happen on more occasions. We had inconsistent weather in the past few weeks. That might have triggered the outbreak. The ich protozoan has been know stay dormant or propagate without causing a outbreak and thus may have gone undetected. I have experienced ich in aquariums and big aquaculture ponds. It is preventable and can easily be treated.

[Ageofaquariums]

 

 

White spot, is a parasite that covers the entire globe, & there are few Aquarists that have not met it on one or more occasions. A sudden chilling of the fish, which can easily occur when they are being transported from the shop to one's home, is often sufficient to take the parasite from its latent state to the reproductive phase. An unchecked outbreak will bring about a heavy mortality rate, though it takes usually quite a number of days before such comes to pass, thus giving the Aquarist time to take remedial action.

White spot "Ich", is a ciliated parasite with a three stage life cycle. On the fish, the only part that we can easily observe, the form is termed a trophont, & causes the appearance that gives rise to the popular name of the condition, i.e. "White spot". As the trophont matures it eventually breaks through the skin (epithelial layer), & falls to the bottom of the tank, during which phase it can attach itself to any of the various materials that we use in our Aquaria, such as gravel, filters, airline tubing & more.

This part of the life cycle is called a tomont. How long it remains in this stage is a variable. Higher temperatures will accelerate its maturation, while colder water ensure a longer latency. For this reason many Aquarists use an elevated temperature to try and cause the parasite to mutate into the final re-infective form termed a theront .

The parasite is at its most vulnerable while in the free swimming theront form before it encysts as a trophont. Various chemical therapies are effective, such as Malachite green, or Malachite green with formalin. The Theront stage is very sensitive to higher temperatures, which is the reason that many skilled Aquarists often try eliminating an outbreak, purely by increasing the temperature by some 5-8⁰F while the infestation is endemic.

 

 

http://fishvet.com/Freshwater_ich.htm

 

As above, not much a lfs can do when fish come in with hidden white spot cysts on them.

I hate quarantine tanks too, but they are a good way to stop this annoying disease, as well as many other more serious ones.

[Mintox]

 one can never be 100% with these things.This is my second outbreak of Ich in 20 years, I should count myself lucky as I never once quarantined new arrivals. 

[Buccal]

Any one or any shop, that has the thermostat to deliberately run 30'c is telling a bit of a story,,, I've heard of instances where the system just can't be made to work correctly due to lack of knowledge or overboard in cost cut to set up,, disease runs strong after the system becomes mature,,,, the trick is, to provide a environment that favors beneficial bacteria and is less favorable for gram negative bacterias.
For anyone that can't create this balance and things are fine very long term, then they jagged it,,,, but classically once bad health and disease occurs in systems that aren't set or running correctly, the fish fall like flies,,,, certain little tricks can be done to cheat, but fish remain weaker, and the change that is fairly big going into another persons tank is drastic in every situation except for back into the same situation,,, because no one else keeps water like that.

Keeping water at 30'c is to keep high disease counts at bay, or to a minimum, as a generalized precaution measure,,, also this setting is used to speed up the life cycles of parasites so they spend themselves out of existence or skip faster into a stage where a certain treatment is designed to hit that point of time..............
Thing is, water at that temp means you can't keep a lot of fish in your tank, because water that warm holds less oxygen the warmer it gets,, after 29'c the oxygen transference into water is reduced greatly,,, If this is ignored, the fish will be slowly starved of oxygen as they stunt and try to grow, but enevitibly disease will set in anyway as the fish further weaken.

So your right mate,,, 26-27'c is perfect temp and your fishes metabolism will be working at its correct healthy best.
Water at 30'c would speed up metabolism in fish and make fish poo all the time, more poo ready to eat sooner, dirtier filters and system all the time,,,, it's one big revolting circle.

Knowing the sciences are important when keeping sheer masses of fish,,,,

Edited by Buccal, 31 August 2016 - 10:03 PM.

[Mintox]

Well said Buccal. Will continue to keep my fish at 26 degrees regardless of the opinion of a fish shop.

[bigjohnnofish]

which ever way people want to look at - the fish was carrying the parasite when you got it... whether the person who sold you the fish knew it or not is another argument....

 

if you've had your tank 8 years free of white spot then you donot have the parasite present full stop..... in a dormant state the parasite does not survive past approx 2 years without a host... and quite clearly you have had 8 years without whitespot....

 

in breeding some very hard fish to breed i will often induce massive temp drops from 30 degrees down to 20 degrees.... and guess what -> never get whitespot.... so people who like to blame whitespot problems simply on temperature drops clearly donot understand the problem...  the problem is the presence of the parasite...  if you dont have the parasite your not going to get whitespot... 

 

this is a very clear and cut case... if you want to throw doubt into peoples minds and skew the given information then shame on you... the shop that sold you the fish is solely responsible for giving you whitespot... 

[Buccal]

There are measures that the fish keeper can do, so the new fish wether it has dormant white spots with it or not, will not break out.
But a fishkeeper/client should not have to do that or even know that,,,, because only 10% of clients are like us that go to a further extreme level of moderate knowledge or more.

In these situations, if there's fish you want, but it's not in a system that you trust, then buy fish and take bucket for fish, but no air stone because adding extra oxygen makes toxins in water enter the fish by toxin molecules hitching a ride on oxygen molecules, toxins for one example is ammonia.
So simply adding oxygen to the bucket can kill your fish or weeken them on the way home, it can still happen in bags with lots of air trapped above....
(in fact ammonia/nitrite/nitrate held at bay using additives like prime and so on actually promotes higher levels of these toxins, lazy mans method so to speak, but more like not knowing or both,,,, these higher levels of rendered toxins actually promote aggressive gram negative bacterias which can work scarily fast, much like flesh eating bacterias, big holes appearing and blowing sides of fish out almost over night).

It's not best for a breeder having a perfect sterile environment, as fish are naturally made weak this way, when they do come to mid levels of stress in shop and finally the buyer, minor issues can arise,,,, it's good for fish to be moderately toughened and raised on a variety foods and foods shapes like flake and pellet.

Think of the next person in line and do right in the prep work for them, then everything would be much better,,,,, not just converting profit figures and pushing through the door, there needs to be some level of profession.

Edited by Buccal, 01 September 2016 - 05:24 AM.

[Ageofaquariums]

Any shop running their tanks at 30degC long term will likely be wiped out by one of the Flavobacterium columnare so prevalent in the hobby. Choosing to go high is a calculated risk, and most lfs will not do it lightly due to increased costs and decreased stocking levels. Whitespot is the most convenient of the fish diseases, there are certainly far far worse things lurking out there.

[Mattia]

White spot is so Common in the fish trade, a simple shop shouldn't be blamed for.... Take it easy boys....
This is a hobby, don't forget!