Protozin And Invertebrates

[KieranP]

Hi
I have one balloon molly with what appears to be very bad whitespot, although i cant see it on any of the other fish, the problem is i have 2 yamato shrimps and want to treat with protozin. I only a very small spare tank, which i can float in my current one!
my main problem is that with the abscence of algae what can i put in the small tank for the shrimps to eat in the meantime?
Also why is it only one of my fish has it when there are other ballon mollys in the tank tht have been there the same amount of time, and many other fish!

Thanks

 

[WILDER]

Does the mollie look like she sprinkled in salt, or have whitespots on her the size of a grain of salt.
Yes you will have to remove the shrimps from the tank to medicate with a parasite med.
As for feeding the strimp I don't know as never kept them.
You can buy algae tablets.

 

[KieranP]

yes the molly has quite large spots on him, a grain of some i would even consider the size of sugar rather than salt.
im just confused as to why his is so far gone, and no other fish have it, is there any other kind of disease it could be?.

i have some algae tablets actually somewhere so il try use those, just got to find and catch the shrimp now!

 

[WILDER]

If the spots are large dosn't sound like whitespot to me.
If whitespot is left untreated the spots can start to join up and form a patch.
Is the molly flicking and rubbing it's self on things in the tank.
Has the molly started to labour breath.
The spots do they look a greyish colour with any redness to the spots, like on the outside of the spot or a red centre.

 

[KieranP]

theres no patch of spots, and i cant see any red to them maybe a bit of grey to thm but thts just because their a bit see through,
thats what confused me, hes not rubbing, but he is finding it hard to swim, and i cant see any signs of irratic breathing
or any of the other signs of whitespot other thn the spots themselves.
so confusing, knowing what to do

 

[WILDER]

Dosn't sound good to me if he struggling to swim.
If the spots are quite large it dosn't sound like whitespot.
Fish can get columnaris spots which are a greyish white with red tinging.
Sometimes there isn't always redness to columnaris spots.
Can you issolate the fish.

Whitespot signs are.
Spots the size of a grain of salt.
Flicking and rubbing.
Once the labour breath they never seem to make it as the parasite has infested the gills.
Sometimes can get excess slime on the fish with whitespot.

Is it possible to load a pic up of the sick fish.

 

[KieranP]

i can isolate the fish, although getting a photo will be a problem as i ahve no camera currently!
none of the other symptoms of white spot are present, the spots themselves do protrude slightly rather thn are flat
i have been looking all over the internet for pics of white spot and they dont look quite the same, mine are larger and there is no grouping, ill look at photos of what you suggested and see if thts familiar

 

[WILDER]

Just put flexibactor columnaris into the search engine.
Here is an article.
http/www.americanaquariumproducts.com/Columnaris.html

 

[KieranP]

thanks very much, but it doesnt look like that,
im going to have to just try the whitespot treatment for the whole tank and remove the shrimps,
hopefully this will work if not then i will have to investigate further
ill keep an eye on the molly and see if he is scratching and breathing differently over a period of time incase ive missed it