How to treat 'super spot'?

[wilkinss77]

Can anyone advise how to treat so called 'super spot'? Looks like white spot but the spots are bigger & it's more rapidly lethal, killing in a matter of days & the spots link together into squarish patches before the fish dies. It isn't Ichthyopthirius, & doesn't respond to white spot treatments. The only cure I know of is Sterazin at high doses, but it's no longer made. I'm told that super spot must therefore be a crustacean parasite of some kind because Sterazin is a crustaceocide. Can anyone help?

 

[Colin_T]

need pictures because I have never heard of super spot.

also need water quality results (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH).

how long have you had the fish?
how long has the tank been set up?
how often do you do water changes and how much do you change?
etc?

 

[Abaddon]

Agree with @Colin_T, pictures would be helpful. Tbh I find it hard to believe that an external parasite would result in death so rapidly and consistently... Have you considered that it might be epistylis or another protozoan infection?

I looked up Sterazin and I couldn't find any info on it being specifically for crustacean parasites - mostly just gill & body flukes, which wouldn't typically cause such severe symptoms...?

 

[Colin_T]

Waterlife Protozin is better for protozoan infections but don't treat with anything until you know what the problem is.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Waterlife Protozin is better for protozoan infections but don't treat with anything until you know what the problem is.

Hi Colin.

Been a while.

Waterlife went out of business a few months back. You can still find old stock for sale, but they they will disappear once they run out.

 

[GaryE]

Epistylis sometimes doesn't kill, so I can't see it being the culprit here. I tried a search on super spot, as 6 decades of fishkeeping and a while working with an importer never brought anything with that name to my attention.
Then again, I remember the first time someone mentioned Camallanus nematodes to me, and look how they've spread. I'm sure there are parasites and pathogens just waiting to make their appearance in our hobby.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Bear in mind that the below comes from the Google AI.

Sterazin's active ingredients are Formaldehyde, Malachite Green, piperazine citrate, and Acriflavine Hydrochloride. It is a fish medication designed to treat gill and body flukes, as well as internal parasites like roundworms and intestinal worms.

Here are the ingredients in detail:

• Formaldehyde: A chemical used as a disinfectant.
• Malachite Green: A chemical compound sometimes used in aquaculture for its antifungal and antiparasitic properties.
• Piperazine Citrate: An anthelmintic, or deworming, medication used to treat internal parasitic worm infections.
• Acriflavine Hydrochloride: A type of acridine dye with antiseptic and antimicrobial properties

The primary treatment for Ich for a long time has been Malachite Green and Formaldehyde. Clearly Sterazin is designed to treat multiple things which are very different. It doesn;t sound like your problem is internal, "Anthelmintics are medicines that kill worm-like parasites such as flukes, roundworms, and tapeworms." There are other meds that do this effectively.

The question I would ask, assuming your report that Starazin works on what you have, which of the ingredients is doing the trick. I know you can buy meds with the first two ingredients and you can get one with Acriflavine. But there are different types of worms and so different meds for dealing with them.

Acriflavine is a treatment and a preventative for Oodinium or better known as Velvet infection in marine fish as well as freshwater fish. It’s also used for the treatment of aquarium fish that have external fungal infections.

from https://www.macsenlab.com/blog/acriflavine-for-fish-treatment-uses-side-effects/
Macsen makes and sell Acriflavine.

I would be inclined to try an Ich med which contains Malachite Green and Formalehyde, They should also work on velvet mentioned re Acriflavin.

While I agree in general that it is not a good idea to use a medication if you are unsure of the thing it is being used to treat. However, there is a reasonable seituation where one may need to ignore this rule. If one's fish are dying fast, it is better to take your best shot at a treatment rather than to do nothing and just watch the fish continue dying. If what you choose in such a case is actual fatal to the fish I doubt they can be killed twice. On the other hand, your best shot may be what saves the fish,

 

[wilkinss77]

need pictures because I have never heard of super spot.

also need water quality results (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH).

how long have you had the fish?
how long has the tank been set up?
how often do you do water changes and how much do you change?
etc?

Ammonia 0, nitrite 0, pH 7.5, don't know about nitrate. this is a long established planted set up several years old.
Here are some pics from the last lethal infection from a few years ago that killed half of my fish after failed attempts at treatment with 3 different whitespot cures. Then I realised it must have been super spot, bought some Sterazin & that cured it. There's been other attacks since, but I treated them on time with Sterazin. I learnt of super spot in the 80s when one of my local shops, The Fishey Business in Southend, told me about it & that it can't be protozoan because it responds only to Sterazin. John Cowlin who owned the shop said he threw everything he could at it in desperation as it was decimating his stock. Then he tried Sterazin & it worked.
The spots are twice as big as normal whitespot,
they link up to form rectangular patches in the terminal stage,
it kills in days,
it's resistant to all protozoan treatments.
John Cowlin thought it must be some kind of microscopic crustacean parasite because it succumbs to Sterazin.

 

[wilkinss77]

Bear in mind that the below comes from the Google AI.

Sterazin's active ingredients are Formaldehyde, Malachite Green, piperazine citrate, and Acriflavine Hydrochloride. It is a fish medication designed to treat gill and body flukes, as well as internal parasites like roundworms and intestinal worms.

Here are the ingredients in detail:

• Formaldehyde: A chemical used as a disinfectant.
• Malachite Green: A chemical compound sometimes used in aquaculture for its antifungal and antiparasitic properties.
• Piperazine Citrate: An anthelmintic, or deworming, medication used to treat internal parasitic worm infections.
• Acriflavine Hydrochloride: A type of acridine dye with antiseptic and antimicrobial properties

The primary treatment for Ich for a long time has been Malachite Green and Formaldehyde. Clearly Sterazin is designed to treat multiple things which are very different. It doesn;t sound like your problem is internal, "Anthelmintics are medicines that kill worm-like parasites such as flukes, roundworms, and tapeworms." There are other meds that do this effectively.

The question I would ask, assuming your report that Starazin works on what you have, which of the ingredients is doing the trick. I know you can buy meds with the first two ingredients and you can get one with Acriflavine. But there are different types of worms and so different meds for dealing with them.


from https://www.macsenlab.com/blog/acriflavine-for-fish-treatment-uses-side-effects/
Macsen makes and sell Acriflavine.

I would be inclined to try an Ich med which contains Malachite Green and Formalehyde, They should also work on velvet mentioned re Acriflavin.

While I agree in general that it is not a good idea to use a medication if you are unsure of the thing it is being used to treat. However, there is a reasonable seituation where one may need to ignore this rule. If one's fish are dying fast, it is better to take your best shot at a treatment rather than to do nothing and just watch the fish continue dying. If what you choose in such a case is actual fatal to the fish I doubt they can be killed twice. On the other hand, your best shot may be what saves the fish,

As I explained in my first post, none of the standard protozoan treatments work, I've tried them all. the parasite only succumbs to Sterazin at daily high doses. It then vanishes in 3-4 days.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

And what that suggests is if you can get the other ingredients it might be reasonable to assume that they could work at a higher dosing one higher than are used in the Sterazin. Especially if done as a bath at a high dose.

 

[Abaddon]

Maybe compare the ingredients in Sterazin with the ones in the meds you used previously, figure out the missing X factor and try to find something else that contains it...?

 

[Colin_T]

Malachite Green (aka Victoria Green) kills external protozoan infections (white spot, velvet, Costia, Chilodonella, Trichodina), so does copper. Malachite Green is found in Waterlife Protozin and Sterazin.

Piperazine citrate treats round worms in the digestive tract. This isn't caused by intestinal worms.

It could be a drug resistant form of white spot, which responds when you use a higher dose. You might be under dosing if you aren't working out the exact volume of water in the tank, a higher dose could be compensating for this.

To work out the volume of water in the tank:
measure length x width x height in cm.
divide by 1000.
= volume in litres.

When you measure the height, measure from the top of the substrate to the top of the water level.

If you have big rocks or driftwood in the tank, remove these before measuring the height of the water level so you get a more accurate water volume.

You can use a permanent marker to draw a line on the tank at the water level and put down how many litres are in the tank at that level.

There is a calculator/ converter in the "FishForum.net Calculator" under "Useful Links" at the top right of this page that will let you convert litres to gallons if you need it.

Calculator

Remove carbon from the filter before treating with chemicals or it will adsorb the medication and stop it working. You do not need to remove the carbon if you use salt.

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You mention the problem has popped up several times over the last few years.
Does the problem recur in the same tank or other tanks?
If it keeps popping up in the same tank then it's either not a disease, or it's not being treated completely, or it's being reintroduced.

Some of the fish in the pictures look like they are producing excess mucous, which could be in response to an external parasite, or poor water quality, or something in the water irritating the fish. Others look like they have white spot.

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Can you test the tank/s for nitrates or get the nitrate level tested at a pet shop?

Can you check the water supply for chemicals?
Contact your water company via their website and get a water analysis report. Go through that and look for chemicals that might be irritating the fish?

How often do you do water changes and how much do you change?
Do you gravel clean the substrate when you do water changes?

What sort of filter is on/ in the aquarium?
How often and how do you clean the filter?
What filter materials/ media is in the filter?

Do you add any plant fertiliser to the aquariums?
Does anyone use any deodorants, perfumes, sprays or anything that might land on the water?
Do you have anything on your hands (moisturising cream, perfume, soap residue, hand sanitiser residue, grease, oil, etc) when you work in the tanks?

How often is it appearing?
Are you adding new fish to the tank shortly before it appears?
Do you quarantine new fish before adding them to the aquarium?

Do the fish rub on anything when they get this problem?
External parasites generally cause the fish to rub on objects to try and remove them.

 

[Abaddon]

Based on the photos my money is still on epistylis (although the first picture does kind of look like velvet)... how's your water quality/tank maintenance? It's possible that the fish are dying from secondary bacterial infections rather than the initial parasite infestation. Have you tried raising the temeperature? If it's actually ich, it should respond. If it's epi, it'll get worse rapidly.
Did this just pop up out of nowhere, or have you recently added new fish?