sick loaches

[anak]

Help I have just discovered that my loaches have developed white and greyish patches on their body. They were ok two days ago. The larger one has the greyish patches on both sides by the dorsal fin whilst onother has a white ish patch across his head. Will acriflavine help. They are good loaches and I dont want to lose them.

[helen nightingale]

would you be able to give us more details please.

how big is the tank?
what are your water parameters - ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, pH, hardness?
what other fish do you have in the tank?
how long have you had them for?
has the tank been set up long?
how big are the discoloured patches? a picture would be very usefull
what type of loaches are they?

more information can help to give better answers

i hope your fish will be OK

[Diana]

Greyish patches can be many different things.

Is it excess slime coat? It may get to the point of trailing off the fish like a veil. There are a couple of parasites and diseases that can include excess slime coat.

Is it an infection on the skin? Flavobacteria columnare is common, and often attacks the dorsal and head area.

Is there a water quality problem?

Are there other symptoms such as red or white dots or streaks?
Any behavior differences? Fish still eating? Clamped fins?

First line of defense is to make sure the water is as clean as possible. Lowest possible ammonia, nitrite, nitrate. This means water changes, and gravel vacs to remove as much debris as possible. If this is a heavily planted tank with a specialty plant substrate then you do not need to vacuum so close to the plant roots, but just hover near the plants to pick up fallen debris off the surface of the substrate.

[anak]

Thanks for the replies. The fish are clown loaches and are about 4 inches long. They have been in the tank for about eighteen months. They are still very active and feeding. The tank is a 220 litre tank and has a variety of fish in it, angels,gouramis, kribs etc. the ph level is neutral and the amonia is levels are normal. The tank recently had a water change (20%)which I normally do fortnightly. I have added a solution with methlyne blue in it and they seem to be responding to this. I am sure it's a fungal disease. I need to wait a few days before a change the water again to give the solution time. I was concerned because of the lack of scales but as I say they seem to be reponding.

[brett_fishman]

what do you mean by 'normal' ammonia levels?

ammonia and nitrite should be at zero, and nitrates should not exceed 30 ppm

[anak]

Thanks . The amonia is zero that's what i mean. The fish have reponded to the solution and are just about back to normal. So i guess it was fungal.

[Tinman]

The tank recently had a water change (20%)which I normally do fortnightly

That is about 1/2 or 1/4 the norm.....You should slowly increase this schedule to avoid these problems....

[anak]

Thanks Tinman. I do the change fortnightly which would equate to 40% a month if done at one time. My understanding is that smaller and more frequent is better than a large less frequent one. This is the first time in 2 years that I have had a problem like this. By the way the fish are just about right now so the methylene blue seems to have worked. Thanks to you guys who have commented so far. I must admit I panicked a bit when I saw the fish because they are real characters and entertaining to watch. I will try and put some photos up of them.

[starsplitter7]

Please do post pictures. We all love pictures. We're nosy. I am so happy to hear your fish are doing better and responding well to treatment.

I change 25% - 50% of my water a week depending on the tank -- I have 9 right now.

One of the analogies I read was that fish live in their toilet, so the more water changed, the more fresh water, less toilet water they have. But I am lucky in that my tank water and my tap water are very similar, so I do not risk shocking my fish. Plants help stabalize the water.

I make the mistake of over scrubbing my tanks. I have to be careful, so that I don't scrub away my good bacteria.

Tanja.

[helen nightingale]

Tanja has the right idea on water changes, which Tinman was suggesting you should do. he meant that you should be doing more frequent water changes, rather than one big one a month. if you do a 25% change every week, that would mean 100% in a month, but as you know you cant do this all at once! some people here do more than one water change a week as routine.

its good to hear the fish have picked up

[fish_frenzy]

I am one of those people that do more than 1 water change a week. We have Discus in several tanks and they get a minimum of 3 water changes a week. So, we have 18 tanks, all tanks get at least 1 wc a week, and 5 of them get at least 3 a week. Now THAT is alot of water!

You will have happier and healthier fish with more frequent water changes. A fellow we bought Discus off of told us that the smallest one must be stunted because he hadn't grown...well he grew for us and is now 6"x6".

In other words...the way to encourage good growth from your fish is just basic water changes.

Sorry for taking up your thread. I wanted to explain some of the benefits of clean water.

[Keith Wolcott]

Keep in mind that it is correct that smaller water changes, more often, are better since there is less osmotic shock to the fish (a smaller change in the pollution level of the water is easier on our fish). But, on the other hand, smaller water changes more often are worse since you have to use more water to get the same effect.

For example, two 25% changes is not the same as one 50% change. In the first case, you first remove 25% of the pollution and then another 25% of the remaining pollution. If the pollution is 100 units, you have removed 25 units with the first 25% change and then you remove 25% of 75 which is 18.75. With both changes you have removed 43.75 units of pollution out of 100. Thus, two 25% water changes is the same as one 43.75% water change.

This is the same as the old question about a sale at a store. An item is marked down 25%. Then you are offered an additional 25% off or you can just get 50% off the original price. Which is better? As is shown above, two 25% discounts is the same as a 43.75% discount so you should take the 50% discount.

In Anak's case of changing 20% fortnightly, it is equivalent to 36% per month. This is definitely on the low side. I do daily 10% changes which are equivalent to about 44% weekly and this keeps my nitrates at around 6-8 ppm.

To do water change calculations yourself, check out the water change wizard that chefkeith and I wrote at http://www.geocities.com/chefkeithallen ... izard.html. For example, the wizard shows that if I switched to 20% water changes fortnightly, it would take a year, but my nitrates would go up to 50 ppm.

[anak]

Thanks to everone who has made comments since I posted HELP. There are some really interesting comments to think about. The fish have recovered and are as happy as larry. I still feel a bit concerned as I don't know what caused the problem in the first place. I did my usual water change yesterday and I must say 20% was not a good figure because when I worked it out from the change point it was more like 30%. The ph level was high today so needed adjusting. I wasn't to happy at using the ph down because I didn't want to upset the fish again- but it was at 7.8. what do others use for this?. Here in N.Z we use a solution administered at 10mls per 40 litres. I hate putting this stuff in the tank in case it upsets the fish. Once again thanks for the comments.

[starsplitter7]

I am pretty sure that my bogwood lowers my pH, and I have heard that people use filtered peat moss to lower pH. But this is something I know very little about. I am lucky my pH is naturally pretty neutral.