Nematodes

[Grannyrat]

I recently fed my fish some live Daphnia (a treat I thought) from what I also thought was a reputable source and then about two weeks later one of my previously healthy peacock gobies suddenly died, with a noticable red worm protruding from its vent. I took the fish and worm to an expert in these things who identified the worm as Camallanus sp and said that it almost certainly came in with the Daphnia. I now notice that a honey gourami that I have in a different tank is also infested - I can see 2-3 worms sticking out - but it still seems relatively healthy.

I have just been round several tropical fish shops and no-one seems to even know what a nematode is, let alone how to make them all die. I was offered various fluke and louse remedies but I am guessing this will be useless at best and at worst will kill off my cherry shrimps. A search of the internet suggested using industrial cattle wormer in small doses.

Has anyone had any experience of this problem? What I really want to know is:

a) How to kill the worms, preferably without harming crustaceans.
b) How likely are the worms to kill my other fish? Some other research indicates that the worms rarely kill anything outright but obviously they reduce the health of the host and leave it susceptible to other problems.
c) Could they have come in from another source? I also feed my fish live brine shrimp occasionally.
d) Can the worms infect other fish directly or is an intermediate host required? The worm I had examined was heavily pregnant!
e) If I cannot treat this how long before all the worms die naturally?

Any help at all with this would be very gratefully received. I have only been keeping fish for a few years but have learned a few harsh lessons along the way, this is one of the worst.

[mickthefish]

levamisole will do the job, but the only trouble you may find is it's got to be bought from the vets.
another one to use is wormer plus, which you can get on the web from plymouth discus which you can find if you google.
both these will get rid of the worms pronto.
remember to redose a while later as the fish will still have the eggs of the worms in them.

hope this helps.
mick

[andre]

Hi Grannyrat, sorry to hear that. I had a similar problem few months ago with camallanus also introduced with live daphnia.

I didn't find Levimasole at the time and I used Fenbendazole which is a cattle dewormer. I soaked bloodworms in it and I fed the fish with them for a week.

After 48 hours the worms were gone and the drug did not harm the non affected fish. BUT! the problem is that once the worms leave the fish's body the intestine walls are often so damaged that the affected fish dies anyway.

I think that only at the initial stage the fish can survive but if you see the worms protruding it's possibly too late. Of 20 fish affected (black neon) all the ones with visible worms died (about 10) after the treatement. Of the remaining ten with no visible worms 6 also died. It's difficult to say whether or not the surviving ones didn't have the worm or had it at an initial stage.

I also had an UV sterilizer and I performed a nearly 100% water change after each feeding.

I belive that Shari had better luck with Levamisole. Hopefully she'll read your post soon.

Good luck!

[The Kapenta Kid]

I used Fenbendazole which is a cattle dewormer.

Wow, that sounds like the nuclear option. Blow the backside off a bullock much less a goby.

Sorry to be facetious. I am sure that the advice is good.

[Grannyrat]

Thanks for all the suggestions, got some wormer from Plymouth Discus and treated fish yesterday, all seems ok so far.

[Diana]

Repeat the treatment, as many parasites live a life in different steps, and some phases are more susceptible to wormers than others. Look up Camallanus and see how long the life cycle takes, and when is the optimum time to treat.