Help! All My Fish Are Dieing!

[DaveyG]

Hi

I've posted on here a couple of times over the past few months about some of my fish dieing and it seems it's now got a lot worse.

I've lose track of how each fish has died but I'll try to explain as best I can.

All water stats are ok (Ammonia - 0, Nitrite - 0, Nitrate - 20ppm). 200L with plants.

A few months ago a new batch of female guppies I got started developing bent spines and weird wriggling instead of effortless swimming.
They all started to die off and so did a couple of my mollies.

I treated with a general tonic.

Then a couple more of my guppies (male & female) suddenly had their tails shredded and died. One also had a bent spine again.

I treated for internal parasites (camallanus worms) but I'm still losing fish.

Scarcely a day goes by where I'm not having to pull a dead fish out now. And each seems to have different symptoms. Some look absolutely fine and then overnight are almost dead, some look as if they are on their last legs for a good few days or even a week.

If I had to list of ALL the symptoms (not all the fish experience these) then it would be:

bent spine
lethargic swimming
stringy white poo
shredded tails
skinny
scales look very worn
flicking off ornaments and gravel (this is probably the longest standing symptom)

Also all my plants have stopped growing and seem to be dieing as well (I assume this could be because of the treatments).

The tank consists of guppies (1 left), mollies (2 left), platies (4 left), tetras and 1 dwarf gourmis. Think in total I have lost 8 guppies, 5 mollies, 3 or 4 platies and a couple of tetras.

I am starting to wonder if I am going to have (or even if it would be better) to start again with the tank. Wait for the remaining few fish to die and then bleach the tank or something like that? Would that be a good idea (and if so how do you go about ensuring you get rid of all traces of disease?)

Your thoughts and help would be greatly appreciated, I am starting to get a bit upset/annoyed as most of these fish I've had for a while and I don't like watching them suffer.

 

[KittyKat]

Are all the fish who are dyeing guppies? Because it sounds similar to most of the genetic related problems they normally have. You realise that many (not all) farmed guppies are inbred for 100s of generations to get the colours/keep the colours? Are the fish shop bought? Or home bred?

 

[DaveyG]

Hey,

they're not only guppies that are dying. I've lost about 8 guppies, 5 mollies, 3 or 4 platies and a couple of tetras.

I do realise that about guppies (these are store bought), and knew that they would be susceptible to genetic diseases, but this is happening to the whole tank it seems.

 

[aly_starh]

Obvious question, was the tank cycled before you put the fish in, have you got carbon in the filter (this will remove meds as soon as you out it in the tank)

 

[KittyKat]

Ok, this is probably quite unlikely, but there is a very tiny, almost insignificant chance that it might be Fish TB. Please, do not jump to conclusions as this is VERY rare, but be aware that you should maybe be extra careful yourself.

Please post a full list of stock, when what was added and when it died. What do you feed them / have fed them in the past? What is your maintenance routine?

 

[DaveyG]

@betta_246 - yes tank has been cycled months and months ago, and there is no carbon in the filter.

@Kitty Kat - I was afraid someone was going to mention that!.

Ok, please bare with me as I am going to try and construct a kind of timeline of events:

stock:
4 male guppies, 6 female guppies, 6 female mollies, 5 platies, 6 tetras

added 5 female guppies, 3 mollies

all of these died over a period of maybe 3 or 4 weeks, taking with them a couple of other female mollies that were already there. They seemed to have bent spines, shredded tails (guppies) and the female mollies just disappeared.

I put this down to new tank syndrome and stress and bought some additional platies.

Shortly after this the male guppies started dieing, leaving me with 2 male guppies and 4 or 5 female guppies. They had shredded tails and some had bent spines again. one of the tetra's died as well, struggled to swim (had swim bladder symptoms).

This is when I started treatment with a general tonic. 1 of the male guppies had a bent spine but was swimming quite happily.

Nothing happened for a couple of weeks, so I assumed the tonic worked and added the 2 dwarf gourami's.

Then my female guppies started to go. Some disappeared, some developed a bent spine, some just got thin with worn scales and their tails eventually went, before they died. Also the male guppy with a bent spine disappeared.

As well as this I lost a platy (no symptoms apart from worn scales) and another female molly disappeared.

I treated with internal parasite medicine.

Still losing fish though, the remaining platies, mollies and guppies all look like they are struggling.

Current stock as it stands right now:

1 male guppy - not himself anymore, not very active but looks ok. Has been flicking himself for a month or so.

2 female black mollies - both fine until this morning, now one of them looks as if she is having difficulty swimming and spends a lot of time at the surface.

8 platies (male & female) - varying degrees of being completely fine, hiding away at the bottom, swimming funny, constantly at the surface and flicking.

2 baby platies (maybe 2 months old) - seem fine, saw one of them flicking a while ago.

5 blue tetras - all fine!

2 dwarf gourami's . They seem ok.

1 plec (not sure about the specific type) - he seems fine, just does what he normally does.

So I think that's about right!

I do hope it's not TB!

What do you feed them / have fed them in the past? What is your maintenance routine?

Normal feeding is once a day or once every 2 days and is usually flakes. Sometimes they get boiled peas, and dried bloodworm. Sometimes they get live food, but not very often and not for a long time.

Maintenance is usually once a week 20% water change, although with the treatments I've been following that.

 

[aly_starh]

Are all these fish from the SAME LFS?
If so, id say there stock is not very healthy.

 

[WILDER]

Sorry davey.

What med did you use. Did you retreat the med. Also did you back up with a bacterial med.

Going to leave a link to fish tb. It hard to say fish tb without tests being done on a fish.

Your fish are showing some signs of fish tb.
Being skinny.
Bent spine.
Scales loosing and falling off.
Fins falling apart.

http/www.torrens.org.uk/NatHist/Aqua/disease/tb.html

 

[DaveyG]

Hmm so I'm not sure what my options are really!

The med I used was SERA Nematol Camallanus Roundworm Discus.

Only used that, didn't back up with another med. It's pretty expensive stuff so I assumed 1 full treatment would work!

I think one of my options is to bleach the tank, throw out everything in it (including filter media?) and start again?

 

[WILDER]

I will go and check when you redose the sera med.

Instruction.
3 weeks later you redose.


Sera Nematol


Sera Nematol is a very effective remedy against nematodes such as Camallanus, roundworms (Capillaria) and discus pinworms (oxyurids) for fresh and salt water fish. A sensational R & D success: sera med Professional Nematol is the first ornamental fish treatment against Nematodes that may be sold freely. It is based on a patented Emamectin/solvent complex, highly effective and easy to dose. sera med Professional Nematol is particularly effective against Camallanus and round worms of the genus Capillaria, which mainly occur in angelfish and discus. It can also be optimally used against pinworms (Oxyurida), dreaded by discus keepers. At the same time it combats the small copepods that Camallanus uses as intermediate hosts. Result: With sera Nematol a well tolerated and highly effective ornamental fish treatment that can be sold freely is now available for the first time! It is a liquid and therefore can be dosed easily and precisely.



Dosage for sera Nematol:

Add 1 ml sea Nematol per each 40 litres of aquarium water. Distribute the treatment on the watrer surface from the dosage cup while stirring it into the water with a spoon or staff. Aerate the aquarium well during the treatment, switch off UV-lamps and do not filter through active carbon. A water change of at least 80% must be carried out after two days (or during the treatment if the water gets cloudy). You can combat larvae that have hatched from the eggs in the meantime with a second application of sera Nematol three weeks later.



From £12.99

 

[DaveyG]

Oh sorry you mean the 2nd dosage, yeah that is next weekend, I have it marked on the calendar

 

[WILDER]

I would carry out the second dose.

If things are still bad after that it could be the med not worked or your fish have fish tb.

Also you are meant to back up with a bacterial med after the parasite med.

 

[DaveyG]

ok I'll carry out the 2nd dose this weekend instead.

What do I do if the fish have TB? Are they all infected? Do I have to clean the tank and start again?

 

[WILDER]

Antibiotics for fish tb and vitamin b.
Get you a link.

http/www.fishyfarmacy.com/articles/mycobacteriosis.html

 

[KittyKat]

Hmm, what decor have you got? For the moment, cut out all live and frozen food as that could have caused the problem in the first place (this probably won't solve it though). It is odd that only the livebearers are affected, I would put the tetra down to a one off as the rest seem fine. Could be some sort of virus which the livebearers are susceptible to...