Is This White Spot?

[fmervin]

Hi all,

I recently got some fish from my friend since he had fry and had to get rid of some. I'm stocking my tank after almost 6 months since all my livebearers died ([topic="236012"]please read this topic which explains the history[/topic]). I've always heard of whitespot affecting the fish however, I had never seen this in any of my fish. Now one of my fish (the only harlequin) with some growth near his mouth which appears to be a whitespot. I've attached a pic which might help you confirm if this indeed is a white spot and if it is, please do let me know how I can treat this.

Also, one of the platties is exhibiting similar behaviour as before, it's been at least 4 months since the last platty died and I thought that disease if any would have gone out of the tank. I hope it is not the same issue again in which case I'm back to where I started

Please help, for about a year and a half my livebearers are dying for no reason, strangely my loaches who are supposed to be more susceptible to water conditions are doing fine and for more than 4 months were the only fish in my tank (with shrimps for company). I dreaded adding in new fish to have to bury them again Please help. Apologies for the long post, but I'm a newbie here so all help would be greatly appreciated

 

[minxfishy]

Not its not whitespot, whitespot looks like little grains of salt covering the body. It looks more like mouth fungus to me, although I cant tell with the platy picture.

Can you give us your tank size, water stats for ammonia, nitrIte and nitrAte please, plus a full list of fish in this tank with them. Also temperature would be good.

 

[fmervin]

Not its not whitespot, whitespot looks like little grains of salt covering the body. It looks more like mouth fungus to me, although I cant tell with the platy picture.

Can you give us your tank size, water stats for ammonia, nitrIte and nitrAte please, plus a full list of fish in this tank with them. Also temperature would be good.

Thanks for that, the tank is 65 litres, with a sand substrate. Water stats (ammonia, nitrite and nitrate) are all zero, tank has been running for almost 2 years now. How do I treat the mouth fungus?

 

[minxfishy]

Is is white and fluffy like cotton wool ? Does it have any redness in it?

 

[Colin_T]

It is either mouth fungus (Columnaris) or bruising from the fish bumping into something.
If the fish has had it for more than a couple of days and it hasn't spread then it is just a bruise and will clear up in a month or so.
If it spreads rapidly over the next day or so, then it is mouth fungus and you will need to treat the tank with an antibacterial medication.

 

[tom_os]

i have the same thing on my danio and told it was bacterial, so i dont really know what to believe now reading above. i am going to wait a few days and see how it progresses. i think it might just be a bruise as suggested by Colin above.

 

[fmervin]

Is is white and fluffy like cotton wool ? Does it have any redness in it?

Thanks for that, the first pic seems to suggest some redness, however may just be the camera. I'll have a closer look at the fish and post

It is either mouth fungus (Columnaris) or bruising from the fish bumping into something.
If the fish has had it for more than a couple of days and it hasn't spread then it is just a bruise and will clear up in a month or so.
If it spreads rapidly over the next day or so, then it is mouth fungus and you will need to treat the tank with an antibacterial medication.

I hope it is not columnaris since I was told my previous batch of livebearers were wiped due to that and from what I have read there is no cure for it I hope it is just a bruise and it clears up, but since my tank has had previous history of columnaris (or so I was told) it may well be that. Also due to the fact that one of the platty is lying on the bottom a behaviour exhibited by my previous batch of fishes (now dead )

 

[minxfishy]

If it is columnaris, dont panic, it can be cured and often is, although there are some strains that are pretty nasty and can cause deaths fairly rapidly. What exactly is wrong with the platy, I cant see any white fluffyness on it from the picture, does it have any?

If it is columnaris, then you can get medication, pimafix (API) and myaxzin (waterlife) used together can get rid of it, providing its caught fairly early on.

 

[fmervin]

If it is columnaris, dont panic, it can be cured and often is, although there are some strains that are pretty nasty and can cause deaths fairly rapidly. What exactly is wrong with the platy, I cant see any white fluffyness on it from the picture, does it have any?

If it is columnaris, then you can get medication, pimafix (API) and myaxzin (waterlife) used together can get rid of it, providing its caught fairly early on.

Sorry, but just checked my tank and found the platty dead with two shrimps feasting away R.I.P. Judging by the state of the body it looks like it died sometime in the afternoon. The the white stuff on the harlequin has definitely changed, it seems to have opened up (bit like a flower) and is definitely red in the center. Any clues? I could post more pics if required, the problem is getting a good photo

The problem with the platty (and the previous livebeares that died) is that they would start settling to the bottom of the tank. They seemed to be fine at first however they just remain at the bottom. After a few days they start to swim with the back noticably droopy and they swim slowly and even the water current pushes them away. And after a while they just writhe in pain and die I did try myxazin but it did not help at all in fact my entire batch of livebearers (guppies and platties) were wiped out in a couple of weeks. A month later I got few more and they were wiped out as well. Now I've added fish after more than 4 months since I read somewhere that the infection dies out eventually. So I've given it this long to restock and I'll be at my wits end if they start dying out again. The lfs suggested myxazin, but apart from that they are useless and I can appreciate that it is difficult to diagnose correctly online.

Thanks again, you've been a lot of help Please do advise on the harlequin

Sorry, forgot to add that all the time my tank was empty, the loaches and shrimps were doing fine. In fact I think the loaches were so used to having the tank to themselves they were bullying the new fish for a couple of days. They have settled down now, but do you think that the bullying could have something to do with this (stress?)

Also, last night when I was observing the platty, I noticed it gasping at the bottom and its gills kind of flapping. Not sure if t makes sense but it looked like it was having trouble breathing. It hardly swam in the hour I was observing the harlequin and the platty

 

[Colin_T]

The livebearer problem could be soft water. Try increasing the general and carbonate hardness in the tank. Make the GH about 250ppm.
Livebearers are usually infested with flukes and intestinal worms. You could try treating the new fish in a quarantine tank/ bucket before you add them to your normal tank.

 

[fmervin]

Thanks for that Colin

The livebearer problem could be soft water. Try increasing the general and carbonate hardness in the tank. Make the GH about 250ppm.

Never had this advice before, what is GH? Can you please advice how I can test for it and how I can increase (or decrease?) if it is not 250ppm? I only test for Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate

Livebearers are usually infested with flukes and intestinal worms. You could try treating the new fish in a quarantine tank/ bucket before you add them to your normal tank.

That is a good idea again, can you please advice which medicine I should treat the livebearers with? Since they are already in the tank and they are all new additions could I just treat the tank now? Would this medication affect the loaches/shrimps? There are also quite a few fry in the tank and one platty that is pregnant, would the treatment affect them? I already have some myxazin left over from the previous treatment (that failed), would this help?

Sorry, quite a few questions I know, but really I need to get this problem solved. Thanks for your help

On a positive note (I hope), the white stuff on the harlequin appears to be clearing up. I checked this morning and it definitely looks smaller than it did last night. Hope I'm not speaking to soon

 

[Colin_T]

GH = general hardness. Water can contain minerals that are dissolved in it. The more minerals in the water the harder it is considered. The most common mineral to increase the hardness is calcium and then magnesium.
The general hardness can be increased by adding calcium or magnesium. The easiest way to do this it to use a rift lake conditioner at about half strength. Rift Lake conditioner is available from any petshop. It is usually in a powder form and you simply add it to the tank.

You can test the hardness of the water with a general hardness test kit. These are available from any petshop. If your water is harder than 250ppm then don’t worry about adding anything to increase the hardness.
Most petshops will do water testing for customers. You could take a glass full of tap water into them and ask if they can check the general hardness for you. Then if it is over 250ppm you won’t have to worry about increasing the hardness or buying a test kit.

If you want to decrease the hardness you can mix rain water or reverse osmosis (R/O) water with the tap water. Rain water and R/O water are free of minerals and have no hardness.

Use a worm medication to treat the livebearers. Praziquantel can be used to treat tapeworms and flukes in fish. Use 100mg of Praziquantel per 20litres of water. Do a 50% water change 24hours later. Re-treat the fish a week later and do another water change the day after that.
There are other intestinal wormers around including Flubenol, which is meant to work well.
These medications are normally fine with all types of fish including pregnant and baby fish. I’m not sure how safe they are with shrimp.

Myxazin is only useful for treating bacterial and fungal infections. It does nothing to intestinal parasites, flukes or worms.