Hey all, My golden dojo is sick with something, please help

[Baileofsolamnia]

sorry if I missed it but what size is the tank and what fish do you have in it?[/quote]

im sorry if this is in the wrong forum, but i saw ur post on skinny disease, signed up to the forum and then couldnt get back so i found u again here.

I have 2 golden Dojo Loachs, they live with my goldfish, i have had them for about a year now, and they are just awesome.

Unfortunatly one of them became sick just last week, so i put him in a quarentine tank.

He was VERY skinny, i mean really skinny, and he had this long indent running along the underside of his stomach. So i serperated him and gave him, some novqua anti-biotic/slime coat helper. Plus a little bit of Aquarium salt, i then proceeded to start feeding him 2-3 times a day, small things nothing major.

His thickness started improving, but then i noticed he had this wierd white (pretty large but definatly NOT ick) spot on his side, today when i looked at him, his thickness is very good, the indent in his stomach was almost gone, but that white spot was gone, and replaced by a hole the same diameter as the white spot. I can see his skeleton, he is now swimming very wierd, his balance is all off and he has stopped eating, i think.

i stopped adding aquarium salt before the weekend, and ive been doing regular 2 gallon water changes every other day. he was imprving and now it seems like he is gonna die.

If you have any ideas what could be wrong with him please help!

[starsplitter7]

I am so sorry I can not help you. Wait a little longer for someone who might be able to give you some good advice.

[Diana]

Losing weight, or not growing as well as another fish is often related to some internal parasites. This is especially common among bottom feeding fish, and fish raised as feeders (Goldfish). As long as the fish is healthy they can tolerate a low level of parasites. When the fish is stressed the parasites can grow more numerous and the fish starts losing ground. If this fish does have parasites then the main tank is also infested. There are many different parasites, but most have pretty efficient ways of moving from one fish to another.
I would treat the fish in the main tank with a worming medicine designed for fish, perhaps Prazi-Pro.

The white spot that was on the Dojo:
Might have been a minor injury, or an area where bacteria had gotten started, but it is almost impossible to tell without a skin scraping and looking at the sample in a 'scope.
Have a look here to see if you might ID it:
http://www.nationalfishpharm.com/diseases.html

Fish that are stressed can often have osmotic problems, too. Their body cannot get rid of the water that keeps trying to enter their cells. They may drift in the water, or float at odd angles. Increasing the TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) in the tank is a good idea, up to a point. Loaches in general are not very tolerant of salt, so I would do no more than 1 tablespoon per 10 gallons, and not for longer than about 2 weeks. Raise or lower the level slowly, over several days.
Nov-Aqua might help with this, too.
An antibiotic might help if it is the right medicine to treat the specific problem the fish has. Maintain the treatment dose and duration according to the label.
A slime coat enhancer might be helpful if the problem was on the outside of the fish. When the fish produces more slime coat the infectious agent can get sloughed off with the excess slime coat. This can also help a little bit (not much) with osmosis problems. Unfortunately some slime coat enhancers also can irritate the gills. Salt is also an irritant that can cause a fish to make more slime coat. Some slime coat enhancing products contain salt; read the label to be sure you are not double-dosing the salt.
Others contain Aloe vera. This is the product that I have heard of as causing problems with the gills.

Feeding: Try flavoring the food with garlic. Start with a clove of garlic, crush it, then soak the food in the juice. Feed the crushed garlic and the flavored food. Try foods that the fish really go crazy for, perhaps bloodworms or snails. (I have had some Dojos that are not fond of snails, though)

Here is a very good article about parasites:
http://www.loaches.com/Members/shari2/l ... chloride-1
For more info about skinny disease, use the search feature and look through the forums. Use the word 'skinny' in the search. Then look at how many posts there are in a thread. Go for the long ones. They are highly likely to hold the most info, and perhaps a link to another thread that has even more info.

Basically 'Skinny disease' is a combination of a parasite and an infection, often bacterial. The treatment is to alternate anti-parasite medicines with antibiotics. Use each medicine for the labeled dose and duration, then clear the tank of that treatment and switch to the other, then repeat the first, then repeat the second.
ie:
Wormer for a week
Antibiotics for a week
Wormer for a week
Antibiotics for a week.

Goal: Parasites live a life cycle that usually requires repeat treatment at spaced intervals. By spacing out the treatments hopefully you are catching the worms at a vulnerable stage in their life, and killing them.

You can use variations of this, for example, using different wormers. See the list in the article I linked. See how one wormer (Levamisol) does not treat all possible parasites. Rotate with a wormer that treats the things that Levamisole does not treat.

Do not combine meds unless both are labeled as safe to use with the other.

[Baileofsolamnia]

thank u for your helpful reply. Unfortunatly Mufassa the Dojo didnt make it. But i will start treating the main tank.

I upgraded the main tank 20 gallons to a 45 gallon after i removed the sick loach. Should i treat the old tank as well?or just the new 45?

I rinsed out the 20 gallon and turned it into A quarentine tank for plants and fish. Since i just got a 60 gallon as well, and need to quarentine new fish that i am purchasing.

thanks for your help!

[starsplitter7]

I am very sorry about your Dojo. I lost a Dojo over the weekend that was with me for 3 years, so I feel your pain.

I would certainly treat any tanks you would have fish in. Be careful that the treatments don't destroy your biofilter, and if they do, be prepared to start the cycle over. Do you have any healthy bio filter matter from tanks that do not need to be treated? If you do, I would use some of it in the filters of the newly established tank. If you are already doing that, it will make things go a little more smoothly.

[Diana]

Yes, treat the old tank unless you are throwing away all the substrate, rocks, driftwood and so on.
Many parasites spend a small amount of time (or longer) in the substrate. It is part of the way they spread to other fish; they hang out on the floor of the stream, pond, river... until they are picked up by bottom feeding fish.

I would boil or bake the substrate and anything else that can tolerate that kind of heat.