Celestial Pearl Danio With Extremely Swollen...

[eschaton]

anus!

Hello all. I've been having issues in my 55-gallon planted tank for awhile. I like to keep a lot of little fishes, instead of a few larger fishes, and between that and how heavily planted the tank is I pretty routinely have fish just go missing on me. Water chemistry has been perfect for awhile (aside from one nasty CO2 spike awhile back), but I still get periodic losses, and I'm thinking either have a low-level fish TB breakout in the aquarium, or some sort of intestinal parasite being passed around the tank.

Anyway, tonight I noticed one of my celestials had a hugely swollen ass. the area around his vent was puffed up to around the size of a BB. It was mostly whitish/the proper color, though there was some red near the center. I saw no worms coming out of her butt. Overall color of the fish isn't pale. Aside from some sluggish swimming, behavior seems normal. I've isolated her in a QT tank, and am attempting to feed her anti-parasite pellets.

Any ideas?

 

[WILDER]

Signs of internal parasites are.
long white stringy poo, or clear mucas poo.
Red inflamed anus to enlarged anus.
Being thin or bloated.
Sometimes bent spine.

 

[eschaton]

Signs of internal parasites are.
long white stringy poo, or clear mucas poo.
Red inflamed anus to enlarged anus.
Being thin or bloated.
Sometimes bent spine.

Yep, this sounds like a parasite, and it would fit a lot of the deaths I've had in my main tank as well over the past year.

The question I have is, how do I treat the entire tank safely. I have a huge breeding colony of cherry shrimp in there. I don't want to kill them, and I understand most anti-parasite meds wreak havoc on inverts.

 

[WILDER]

You would have to buy a tank from the lfs for the strimp as you can't medicate the whole tank with them in.
You can get some good deals at the lfs even if its a plastic tank.

 

[eschaton]

I have a spare 40-gallon in the basement. I could swap out the filter and all the fish, and leave my tank fish-free for awhile. The only issue with that is that the basement tank has been a place for breeding apple snails. Still, it's easier to pluck them out of an almost-empty tank than to attempt and find every single shrimp (not to mention the hundreds of Malaysian trumpet snails hanging out in the substrate).

I guess two questions spring from that.

1. How long would I have to leave my display tank fish-free before I was sure the parasites were dead?

2. Which anti-parasite medication should I try?

 

[WILDER]

Not sure to be honest.
There jungle meds in the united states that treat internal parasites.
http/www.drsfostersmith.com/product/add_...fm?pCatId=12794

 

[eschaton]

I have isolated all of my fish now in a QT tank, (except for one Oto I can't seem to catch, but none of my Otocinclus have died in awhile, so I doubt he's affected. Used the anti-parasite fizzy once, and I'm trying to get them to eat the medicated food. Not going well. They are little nuggets as hard as a rock, and they tend to fall to the bottom well before they get soft enough to nosh on. I think I'll have to pre-soak the food and maybe mash it up some.

Noticed another celestial with a swollen bum. The first one looks just as poor as before, though I guess it says something that he hasn't died.

 

[WILDER]

Not sure if you can treat the tank and feed parasite med foods.