Deworming plecos who are not eating

[Taratron]

I did end up getting a few L14 before the ban. Four of them currently in a 55 gallon QT tank, 80* with a powerhead and three sponge filters, some caves and driftwood for hiding.

One of them is often on the glass, so when I noticed a sunken belly starting, I began to dose with Prazipro, and fed garlic-soaked frozen bloodworms and the like. I just don't know if the plecos are eating the frozen food (I turn off the powerhead when I feed and switch it back on after 20 minutes or so), and the belly on the one isn't getting better, and his poop has become white and stringy.

I do have some Fenbenazole powder, found in the back of my fish med cabinet, but it expired earlier this year. I'm ordering more online as no one has it locally, but if I am not sure the fish will eat it, can I dose the water direct?

[MarcW]

Hi,

I believe for Fenbendazole to be effective it needs to be ingested, so no good if the fish aren't eating. I seem to recall that if you just add it to the water it can do more harm than good, but I'll let an expert comment on that.

In this case I would use Flubendazole, which can be added to the water and absorbed through the skin of the fish. It can be hard to mix with water though, a trick I learned from one of TwoTank's posts was to put the correct dose of powder into a container and add a few drops of plain unflavoured vodka, then mix it to a paste. After that you can add some tank water and shake vigorously, then slowly add to the tank.

They are nice fish hopefully you can get them eating and settled soon.

Good luck.

[TwoTankAmin]

I got that method of dissolving flubendazole from the Inkmaker site. Dr. Charles Harrison sells a number of the good fish mads that can be hard to find. He also provides good instructions on how to dose them. Here is the link for how to medicate using flubendazole which contains the following:

*Dissolving the Flubendazole compound may be difficult. Two methods work for me,
1. Take out a large cup or microwave safe bowl of tank water. Heat it in the microwave until
it is too hot to touch - not boiling, just hot. Add the required 10% Flubendazole powder to hot
water and stir to dissolve. Allow it to cool some and gradually pour the solution into the tank to
be treated.
2. In a small measuring cup or large spoon, add the required 10% Flubendazole powder. Add
several drops of unflavored Vodka to the powder to begin a slurry and then almost a solution.
Don’t add more than half again as much powder you are working with. Stir in all well and then
thoroughly mix the slurry into the tank to be treated.

from http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/FlubendazoleTreatment.pdf

I have several different tank dedicated measuring cups and I use the one cup for Flub. Once I get the slurry I add tank water and mix. This med is hard to dissolve for sure. Once I have poured the solution into a tank, I tend to rinse the cup in the tank to get out what is still stuck inside of it into the tank. When dosing you will see it clouding the water. Don't worry, after it has circulated and dissolved a while, you will not see it.

The benefit of using the Vodka method is it requires one have a bottle of vodka on hand. You are permitted to use this for other purposes besides treating fish.......

[Taratron]

Do you think my Fish Bendazole (what it says on the jar), from thomas labs, will still be safe to use and effective if it expired in 1/17?

I also have Metroplex if that would help.

Lastly how do I know if it's a protozoa problem or basic worms?

[MarcW]

Past it's expiry date I would be concerned that it may no longer be as effective, I doubt it would do much harm, but probably not much good either.

I would try and get hold of FLUbendazole (Fish Bendazole is FENbendazole), as it is absorbed through the skin rather than needing to be fed, as you mentioned that your fish aren't eating.

I've not used Metroplex before so I'm not sure if this would help, but have read that Praziquantel may be something else to try, depending on the type of worm/parasite.

[TwoTankAmin]

You can buy Flubendazole from Dr. Charles Harrison here http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/ItemsForSale.html

[Taratron]

Thank you I have some on order now! I just hope it's not too late...

[Taratron]

I haven't seen any stringy poop from the plecos in a day or so. I did dose with Flubenazole tonight (yay overnight shipping) but how late is too late when it comes to parasites and sunken bellies?

At least the eyes aren't sunken in yet.

[Taratron]

Update. Lost the smallest of the plecos today. None of them are eating, and the person I got them from assumed it was because of my pH being too high for them. Very possible, but I've never had any wild caught fish do so bad so fast! I ordered some repashy meat pie (I used the stuff years ago and had to throw it out, none of my fish or shrimp would touch it, no matter how I made it) and it was supposed to be here today, but now USPS is pushing it till Monday night.

So lots of frozen food that the remaining three don't eat, lots of water changes, no medications right now because there's not much point when I'm doing so many water changes (when all else fails, right?).

[MarcW]

Sorry to hear you lost one.

I've lost newly imported fish which I thought were fine, and at the other end of the scale I've just had a couple fish recover and start eating really well, which I thought were too far gone. They had really sunken stomachs and one had sunken eyes too.

All I did in that case was treat with Flubendazole once, and feed Repashy foods. They started eating on the first night. Obviously this isn't always the case, different fish bring different challenges, but it sounds like you are doing everything right. Make sure there is a bit of Repashy in the tank overnight so they have the chance to feed when it's dark.

Good luck.

[Jobro]

Plecos won't stop eating or start dying from a little higher PH. That's nonsense.

Try offering little cubes of raw potato or sweet potatoe.

[Taratron]

Little higher being like 8.0?

[TwoTankAmin]

Just a heads up. Repashy has discontinued the Meat Pie. It has basically been replaced by Bottom Scratcher. I was a user of both and now am on the last of my usable meat Pie. I just checked his site and the Meat Pie is not offered for sale there. So I am guessing you bought it from a different seller. Please be sure the Meat Pie you got still has a decent expiration date.

I went back and forth with Alan about this and I concluded that the ingredients in the two foods were highly similar. He also told me he has been using the B S for his plecos. Mine seem to relish both equally.

One last thought, though I do not keep L14, I noticed from the PC L number Cat-eLog that they like to munch wood. You might want to consider getting a small container of the Repashy Morning Wood and then mix some of it in the the either of the other two foods. I do most of my Repashy as blends usually involving two products.

[Jobro]

Little higher being like 8.0?

I hope everyone here agrees, that PH 8 won't make your plecos die? At least I would.

Having low in NO2/NO3 but warm and well aeriated water is way more important than PH or hardness.

Don't do too many big waterchanges. Only little ones. Water temp should not variate too much.
Keep the light turned off.
Temperature 28°C/83°F.
Use airstones to maximize the O2 saturation.
Offer big shelters, like wood and slate for them to hide.
Offer raw potato cubes 24/7. Remove the cubes after 24h and add new ones. check if there are any biting marks on the potatoes. Cubes in sizes of 1x1x1cm. Add three cubes for three fishes.
Add snails in various sizes to the tank. Maybe squash a snail against the tank glass and drop it somewhere close to or underneath their shelters.

Stay away from the tank as much as possible.

[Taratron]

Thank you guys!

I do have a large branch of driftwood in the tank because they do need somewhere to hide, even in QT. My mom got me some sweet potato today, so that's in the tank for now, and my Repashy finally came, so the bottom scratcher is being made right now.

I just don't understand why they weren't eating the frozen food.

[MarcW]

I would agree that a pH of 8 shouldn't kill them, providing they were properly acclimated to it.

Some fish just take a while to get used to the foods we feed them, hopefully as the Repashy has arrived they will eat that. As Jobro mentioned keep some raw, peeled sweet potato cubes in there, so long as you change them every 24 or even 48 hours they won't adversely affect the water quality. By doing that it gives them a chance to get used to it as a food source and also eat when it's quiet, dark, and without being disturbed.

If you can, get some more shelter in the tank for them, it shows make them feel more comfortable, with lower stress levels they may start to eat.

Good luck.

[Jobro]

It is very likely, that these prey on live snails, mussels and sponges. That's why I would add some snails.

[frootbat]

Just a heads up. Repashy has discontinued the Meat Pie. It has basically been replaced by Bottom Scratcher.

I'm new to Hypancistrus and Repashy and recently ordered some Bottom Scratcher and Grub Pie:
https://www.store.repashy.com/grub-pie- ... z-jar.html

Since I'm new I have no idea what was in Meat Pie, but I bought Grub Pie because the ingredient list looked sufficiently nasty for a group of L236s (they arrive tomorrow!!!). Speaking of nasty, the smell when preparing it

[TwoTankAmin]

The Botton Scratcher is based on Krill Meal, Insect Meal, Mussel Meal and Squid Meal, compared to the ingredients in the Meat Pie which lists Fish Meal, Squid Meal and Krill Meal. The Grub Pie is an insectivore food and lists the only "meaty" ingredient as Insect Meal.

The other big difference between the Meat Pie and Grub Pie v.s. the Bottom Scratcher is the latter contains garlic and the other two do not. I am a pretty big fan of feeding garlic. The Soilent Green also contains garlic.

I also use the formula Repashy created for Swiss Tropicals called Fruut Luups.

FRUUT-LUUPS is composed of Papaya, Mango, Organic Banana, and Fig. The fruit is complemented with easily digestible Black Soldier Fly, Krill, and Squid that attract even the finickiest feeders. These top-shelf ingredients make up >75% of the food. Fortified with our new Nutraceutical Premix made from Mango, Dandelion, Stinging Nettle, Garlic, Ginger, and Cinnamon based on published peer-reviewed research.

I have a 150 gal featuring clown loaches. The two biggest are pushing one foot. The clowns literally inhale the Fruut Luups.

[Taratron]

The third one died today. I can't find the body of the fourth, which is odd because they are not small fish. I only had a few BN pleco fry in with them and they all seem to be fine somehow.

So now I have a mostly empty 55. How do I make sure any and all parasites are gone?

[MarcW]

Sorry to hear they didn't make it, I have lost smaller fish, tetras etc. without finding bodies but they would get eaten pretty quickly, with a large fish its more surprising.

I think the only way to ensure that any parasites are gone is to know what parasites they are, so you can treat appropriately. You could bleach the tank, substrate, filter media, etc. but they could still survive in a fish being moved to another tank.

When I have lost newly imported fish like this I haven't added any treatment and if there have been other inhabitants they seem to survive fine. I think there are a few explanations for this:

Either there were no parasites and the new fish didn't adjust well to captivity so wasted away.

There were internal parasites, but they didn't leave their hosts (I guess that when a host dies the parasites would leave, but I'm not sure how long that would take, the bodies could be removed before they leave the fish).

The parasites may not be able to find a suitable alternative host.

Or your other healthy fish haven't endured shipping/acclimatisation stress, so can cope with the parasites, and continue living normally.

[TwoTankAmin]

Sorry they did not make it. My feeling is the fish were in the advanced stages of whatever was afflicting them, not at the beginning. A lot of the internal parasite type problems that end up as "wasting" get missed early one because the fish are eating and nobody spots abnormal poop. Along the way from the wild to your tank they may only look on the thin side and often this is assumed to poor feeding along the way. And then not all the fish in a shipment may have the problem and those that do may be in various stages.

The result is we buy a fish that doesn't look too bad and when it hits the tank it starts to decline more rapidly. This is compounded by having the proper meds to deal with things. I finally decided I needed to keep a medicine kit. Waiting a few days for meds to arrive can be a critical difference. Plus the fish always seem to need meds quickly at times when they can be the hardest to obtain.

Unless you had the right med on hand and were able to begin using it ASAP, there may not have been enough time to effect a cure.

As for the bn that survived and the tank. As noted you can sterilize most everything with bleach except the fish. I would suggest you set up a new tank for them and quarantine them. M it bare bottom to monitor eating and pooping. You might want to consider medicating right away. If they are not infected, then I think they will handle the meds OK and if they are at the early stages of an infection, stopping it now is a good idea. Others may prefer to wait for some symptoms to appear before treating.

The one thing I would suggest is not to allow the "survivors" to have contact with your other fish until you are absolutely certain that this is safe.