whats this skinny disease with cichlids

[trace&steve]

ok so ive heard of this skinny disease in african cichlids ive seen cichlids at peoples house when ive been to buy or just to have a look

some of there fish are all boney around there heads they look terrible is this life threating to other fish that are housed with them????

not that i have brought any that are in this condition it sucks that people sell fish like this when they know there fish are infected and still carry on selling them!!!!

when most peeps are not aware of the horrible disease :evil: and take these infected fish home and add them to there healthly tanks!!!!!!!

i know to always put my new ones i buy in a holding tanking by them selfs for 2 weeks before adding them to my healthly tanks but not everyone knows to do that :roll:

does anyone know of this disease :-? :-?

[ryanjury]

It might be this:

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/spironucleus.php

Generally happens with fish that are lower down the pecking order I have had it in a peacock female that was kept with larger more aggressive haps and wasn't getting alot of food and was getting a hard time so it is brought on in fish that are more stressed. The fish that I had that was affected with it died despite the metro treatment and it was many months ago and I have never seen another affected fish so I don't think it is highly infectious, either that or my fish was affected with something else.

I also think that maybe it might not even be spiral nucleus related I have seen it most often in females and often in peacocks so it seems to be those that are softer and less aggressive eaters so I think maybe it is just an opportunist infection that kicks in when the fish is so run down.

There is of course the other options that people aren't feeding enough and females breeding all the time and being allowed to spit and getting run down and loosing condition. Or that they maybe filled with some sort of parasite that is making them waste away.

BTW 2 weeks quarantine is pretty useless but is better than nothing. Most bugs (even spironucleus) can lay dormant for many months worms are terrible for this. Some people do preventative treatments for certain diseases before adding them into their systems again this has its issues.

End of the day I have no answer for you my first port of call if you do have any fish affected with this would be to remove them and feed them up. If that doesn't work then try some meds and see what you can do.

I would welcome any discussion on this as I have said the above is only my opinions and what I have seen or thought, I have seen this problem in a few tanks over the years and often wondered what was wrong.

[trace&steve]

thanks ryanjury for your info and no i dont have any infected fish i hate seeing other peeps fish in bad condition makes me

[alanmin4304]

Piscene TB is a wasting disease but the wasting is usually in the belly and back rather than the head. Also infectious.

[elusive_fish]

I think my big, beautiful, male electric yellow and one of my lion heads has this. They largely ignore food and when they do take some in they generally spit it back out. The other fish in the tank seem find at the moment.

What should I do?

[ryanjury]

I would isolate them and see if you can tempt them to eat other foods first.

Then you have to determine what you think may be affecting them, my first guess would be treatment with metro if they are completely off their food but could also be parasites so you might need to try levamisole or prazi as well..

Are there any other symptoms apart from them being off their food?

[trace&steve]

how long have you had them for????

[elusive_fish]

how long have you had them for????

Both of them around a year? Why do you ask?

[Jennifer]

Wasting is a clinical sign associated with a number of conditions with different causes (e.g. bacteria, protozoa, internal parasites). You can try treating with a random selection of medications to try and cure the problem or you can attempt to identify other signs that may help to correctly identify the causative organism. Signs to look for are: swimming behaviour, appetite, slime coat condition, identifying where on the body the wasting is occurring, whether the eyes are popping out, condition of faeces, condition of the mouth, straigntness of the spine, whether other fish have it as well, whether or not you have wounds/sores/redness on your hands....

[trace&steve]

because theres afew people here in chch that have this problem in there tanks and are still selling fish in this condition and i think its highly rude :evil: :evil:

Both of them around a year? Why do you ask?

[trace&steve]

thats another one the sticking out eyes!!!!

looks terrible.....

Wasting is a clinical sign associated with a number of conditions with different causes (e.g. bacteria, protozoa, internal parasites). You can try treating with a random selection of medications to try and cure the problem or you can attempt to identify other signs that may help to correctly identify the causative organism. Signs to look for are: swimming behaviour, appetite, slime coat condition, identifying where on the body the wasting is occurring, whether the eyes are popping out, condition of faeces, condition of the mouth, straigntness of the spine, whether other fish have it as well, whether or not you have wounds/sores/redness on your hands....