Poorly Platy

[ccskitten]

Hi

I have a problem. One of my platy's is clearly not well. I think she just has a fungus. I got her about 2 month ago along with another female and a male. After a couple of weeks she was covered in fungus down one side. It also started to rot one of her fins. I treated it with Interpet anti fungus and fin rot. I treated the whole tank for 3 weeks and it cleared up but I have just noticed today (after buying new fish) that it is coming back. Also she has gone a very wierd shape and looks very unwell.

I have set up a hospital tank and separated her from the others. None of the other fish in the tank have had any symptoms of fungus or any other illness. Just her. My water stats have been amonia and nitrite 0 for the last week. I've been testing every other day. I change 20-30% water once a week.

Please see pics below. Is there anything else I can do for her other than keep treating her once a week for fungus and fin rot??

She looks very sad in that new tank. I want her to get better and back with her friends.

 

[WILDER]

Bless her.
When you say a weird shape do you mean a bent spine.
The fungus down the sides did it go a long the back and down the sides to form a saddle shape.
Was the fungus fluffy looking like cotton wool.
Anti fungus and finrot med not good on columnaris if its a bad strain.

 

[WILDER]

I had wagtail platys where the back end would sort of droop or bend sadly they died.

 

[ccskitten]

Hi Wilder

No her spine is fine. He belly has hollowed out. She looks very skinny but is eating fine.

The fungus is in 2 very small round patches on her right side, just behind her fin. You can not see it in the picture. It isn't fluffy, it's more flakey at the mo. She didn't have any patches on her this morning so it could be fluffy by the morning. She has been looking a little thin for about 2 days.

 

[WILDER]

Does she just look thin around the tail area as that what happened to mine.
What does it look like when she goes to the toilet.
Columnaris can look like the scales are flaking away.
Is she flicking and rubbing against things in the tank.
Get you some info.
She dosn't look good.
http/www.flippersandfins.net/flexibacter.htm

 

[ccskitten]

Actually now you say it, she does look like she is humping just behind her head.

I wonder what causes it.

I've only had fish for around 4 months and this will be my first death

 

[LauraFrog]

That hunched over shape and extreme emaciation looks a lot like what happened to my platys. They would act normal and eat and so on, but slowly get thinner, then hide with clamped fins for a few days and then die. At the end they looked like yours. I figured out eventually that it was a parasite infestation that progressed so far as to weaken the fish and cause infection with internal bacteria.

I never got the fuzzy stuff on mine but i did get the finrot, which was also cured by doing this:

Put in hospital tank with clean water, cooler than usual tropical (I used 22C)
Antibiotics (I used tetracycline) 3 days - full water change
Parasite medication (I used praziquantel) 2 days - full water change
Rest alone for 5 days - 1 week, gradually returning temperature to normal
Parasite med again for 2 days.

After this the ones that survived were much improved and went back into the main aquarium where they ate normally and gradually regained weight. I still have one of them over a year later - my geriatric fish. Yours looks about as bad as the worst one that I saved did.

I don't know if it's the same problem, but I hope this helps, it can't hurt to try it anyway.

Edit: use ammolock or zeolite filtration because you can't keep a tank cycled while there is tetracycline in it and praziquantel may affect bacteria as well. (It has never hurt mine, but some people I know swear that it wiped out their cycle.)

 

[ccskitten]

Poo is normal. Going down to her tail is paper thin though.

I'm not holding out much hope now. I'm just glad I was able to separate her. I don't want the others picking on her.

Did it take your wags long to die? I'm hoping she has gone by morning. I don't want to see her suffer.

 

[WILDER]

Laura mine went thin around the tail area but never the stomach area.
I always wondered if it was internal parasites.
This was about 3 years ago.

Signs of internal parasites are.
Long stringy white poo, or clear mucas poo.
Worms prutruding from the anus.
Enlarged anus or red inflamed anus.
Sunken in belly.
Being thin or bloated.
Swimming on there sides.
Sometimes bent spines.

She sounds to far gone to save.
If her poo a normal brown colour I doubt its internal parasites.
Mine went like yours but was lucky as it only affected a few platys no other fish.
Sometimes fish can go thin at the back end when there old, abit like animals when there really old when they go thin around the back end.
How old are the platys.

 

[ccskitten]

Hi Laura

I will write a shopping list for tomorrow. It is worth a try. I hope it is not too late.

The only parasite symptoms she has is the sunken belly, thin and I suppose bent spine.

It can't hurt to treat her though can it? Does it matter that I treated for fin rot today?

Platys are young. I got them about 2 months ago from LFS (explains a lot) and I imagine they were only a few months old. This platy is only about 5cm.

I'm not going back to that LFS again. I had my suspiscions then. I should have trusted my insticts. I got new fish today from another store. All the fish there looked wonderfully heathly and weren't as young.

 

[WILDER]

Have you noticed any other fish producing long stringy white poo or clear mucas poo.
Internal parasites do a lot of damage to the internal organs and cause bacterial infections.
Once fish are really wasted away and the spine bends the meds to late.
You still have to treat the whole tank for internal parasites.
There this med in the uk.
<a href="http/www.thegreenmachineaquatics.com/mal...ol%20001/198936" target="_blank">http/www.thegreenmachineaquatics.com/mal...ol%20001/198936</a>

If she looks like she suffering might be best to end it for her.
Jug of very cold water and add icecubes till the water freezing cold.
If not ice cubes add the jug to the freezer till a thin sheet of ice forms.
Place the fish in the water should take about thirty second for the fish to die.
Leave the fish a while to make sure it's passed on.
Make sure the gills are not moving.

All so I will leave a link to fish tb just to be on the safe side.
http/www.torrens.org.uk/NatHist/Aqua/disease/tb.html

 

[ccskitten]

Thank you Laura and Wilder for your advice last night. It is so nice to be able to come on here to get some support when you are worried.

I left her overnight and this morning she looks a bit more lively. Yesterday she was either hovering at the top of the tank or floating near the bottom. This morning she was swimming around a bit more. Also the white patches appear to have dissapeared this morning. I wonder if my fungus treatment has worked already. I must have caught it in very early stages as she was fine on Saturday.

I am going to treat her for parasites this evening and keep my fingers crossed. At least if she starts to improve with this treatment I know to treat the rest of the fish. I still think it is probably too late for her though.

On a positive note, this is a good learning curve for me and it is helping me to recognise signs in the future. It's just a shame my platy has to suffer. If she gets any worse I will euthenise but at the moment I still have that tiny, tiny flicker of hope.

 

[WILDER]

I would worm the tank to save the rest.
Keep us all updated.
Good LUck.

 

[ccskitten]

Ok I'm going to sound really thick now.

I got my other tank second hand with filter included. Its a big box one thats built into the back corner. There are about 10 different pads in there. I know I have to remove carbon or it takes all the meds out of the water. Am I right in thinking that the black pad is a carbon pad? Is this all I need to remove??

I thought I had better be safe and ask than be sorry!!

 

[ccskitten]

Right, I've just got back from LFS. I'm not very impressed with their range. They had nothing for internal parasites. Nothing at all. I asked for help and all they could suggest was API Melafix and API Pimafix. I bought them both. I'm not going to be able to get to another store before Saturday so I thought it had to be worth a try.

He didn't give me any instructions and there is no information on either bottle on how to use them together. It just says that they can be used 'with' eachother.

I have just done a 50% waterchange on my hospital tank. Should I put the full dose of each in or half and half or do one tonight and the other tomorrow.

HELP!!!!!