polgara Posted September 23, 2005 Report Share Posted September 23, 2005 Well only 3 or 4 tanks now out of 11 that arent infected with sunken bellies... dont know what to do.... treating with cure-ex on a few but not sure if its working... anyone else got any ideas??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 23, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 23, 2005 The weird thing is one of the tanks had not had any water removed or added since it first started appearing and theres only 2 fish in the tank (breeding pair) and they are fussy fish and will only eat flake food so im actually putting this all down to the food which has infected most of our tanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BK Posted September 23, 2005 Report Share Posted September 23, 2005 Are they in the same room. Can be carried in the air. What kind of fish are they. Have they got worms. Apart from sunken bellys what else can you notice, faeces, colour. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 23, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 23, 2005 No not all of them are in the same room... only other symptom that is present is that the geos scales seem to be flaking off... not sure if they are getting beaten up or not by the salvini's, colour is fine... faeces are green/brown... the food we feed them is green so figure thats teh right colour... the occasional one does have long white faeces though... just reading a disease book (the same one caryl uses) and if its worms or flagellates i need piperazine citrate for the worms or metronidazole for the flagellates.... could also try flbendazol for the worms Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 23, 2005 Report Share Posted September 23, 2005 what was the first fish,that died? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 25, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 25, 2005 All the ones with sunken bellies havent yet died... not a single one... lost a few malawi's though... all from mysterious things that dont have anything to do with the water quality(they as yet dont have sunken bellies). Going to hopefully try get one of the geos to a vet so he can give us some of the stuff we need... dam shame about the cost though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 25, 2005 Report Share Posted September 25, 2005 dude, your geo's are probably getting a hiding from your salvani,maybe after lights out. as for your malawi's,if your water is cool,maybe they are fighting too,that's the reason i switched to tangi's,i got sick of my malawi's killing each other. can you put a pic up of a sunken-bellied fish? sunken-bellies usually mean:"maybe"TB,velvet,worm's,but if worm's fishies poo is whitish,seethrou,stringy. seen as it is spreading throu tanks that even aren't in same room,it must be getting carried from hands,net etc."need more info" shelley Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 26, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 Found it that it was probably nutrinational reasons why the malawi's were dying... were just feeding them on a general flake food and since we've switched to a high vege or spirulina food havent had any troubles... as for the sunken bellies we originally only used a certain bucket on the geo tank and had a seperate net for them to... then we noticed it in our electric yellow tank which is in our bedroom (others in dinnign room) and no it has spead to our brichardi tank which didnt have any water changes done from the time hte geos first got it untill after we noticed... I always wash my hands with soap and HOT water after each tank and dry them... dont think its tb coz its not sperading fast coz some fish in with the geos still dont have the sunken bellies, we are completely stumped and I think its the flake food and thats why our malawis havent caught it coz we never feed them the flake food but all the other tanks get it. Will try get a few pics later on in the week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 26, 2005 Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 hi, only use hot water,cos if your hands still smell like soap,there will be residue.so the boss told me. it could be that it is your flake food.... flake food is high on protein,so to much of and ph goes down quicker. are the fish eating well? you should be feeding your electric yellows the same as the malawi's and your birchardi's as they are all malawi's. try a smll pellet like JBL nova granocolour,it's expensive but it's good,and frozen brineshrimp every now and then. Too much food makes your ph drop off quicker and african's don't like a low ph. maybe heaps of variety might fix-em. hope this is of help. shelley Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 26, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 electric yellows have always been feed the same as the malawis but sometimes gave them some flake food coz i was feeding them to try fatten them up for breeding so didnt just want to give them spirulina sticks... no have got a bag of other high vege matter food Hikitata or something like that lol... brichardis are a tanganikian fish so was trying to get them to eat the other stuff but they dam fussy... as well as the flake food was also feeding bloodworms to the south americans and other americans and also live brine shrimp to the malawis and baby's (which also got ground up flake food)... all the babys seem fine but most of them are only like a cm so cant really tell... gonna try get one of the geos to the vet to get something to treat them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 26, 2005 Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 just read my post,nah!!!!!wrong birchardi's are tangi's,still african's. do try the JBL smll pellet it caters for the algae eating african's as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 26, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 Yeah soap was never left on my hands. always made sure of that... all the fish are eating fine... and have always kept an eye on the ph's... they never really drop but we are using coral rock to keep them all up so ph is never a problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 26, 2005 Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 let me know how you get on at the vet. i haven't found a vet down here that's any good. probably give you tetracycline,be careful sometimes the remedy is worse than the desease. if it is a desease!!! try using dolimite rock or limestone to buff ph. coral rock is to harsh on fish if they rub on it. shelley Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polgara Posted September 26, 2005 Author Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 how well does limestone work??? have thought about using it as a substrate but wasnt sure how much it effected ph and gh/kh and stuff... We havent had any probs with the coral rock... either use it in the filter or mix it in with the substrate... we get all the crushed up pieces and most of them arent all that big. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craig Posted September 26, 2005 Report Share Posted September 26, 2005 hi, so long as there is no pieces big enogh for them to scratch on, you will be right. i have frontosa's in a 6-2-2 tank, i run calcite substrate and dolimite rock. the ph sits 8.3 and the hardness,20-21.when i first got them 7yrs back, i didn't run calcite and had nothing but trouble with ph[i was running dolimite chip]. i saved my penny's,stripped tank at a cost of $300 bucks, but it was well worth it. i had been having to buff up,my boss told me that if you use buffers to abtain correct ph [up-down] eventually my tank would crash with toxins as there is a certain metal substance that doesn't break down,just builds up then goes toxic."scared the shit out of me" my front's have been doing great since and i have never had to buff yet. your coral pieces should be keeping your ph around the 8's so will be fine. just remember that high ph has it's prob's "ammonia" just watch how much you feed. i feed every 2 day,although you have littles so 2 sm feeds everyday should be fine,just watch for ammonia. do you have brown algae on your rocks? if so it produces a sm ammount of nitrates,not enough to cause a problem thou,it helps combat ammonia, can't remember exactly how, but it does!!! its a good thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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