Columnaris, Saprolegnia or Fungus??? Help!
- Thread starter flamechica
- Start date
flamechica
New Member
Well, I went to the co-op last night and talked this over with Cory. He tested my water and it was good. Since the last fish that had the symptoms of this crud died yesterday, he thought it was best to treat prophylactically with just one dose of the erythromycin, just in case there is any of the fungus left in the tank to infect the rest of the inhabitants. Then I will just watch the rest closely.....I woke up this morning and so far haven't been able to find the last remaining fish from this evil purchase. Right now, only the LED light from my bubbler is on. It comes on an hour before the hood lights come on. The hood lights will be coming on pretty soon, so once they come on, I will be doing a more thorough investigation....this panda has always been real hard to find, so I am really hoping that it is just hiding and not dead somewhere...
That would be great, Vickmacki! Just let me know what you have and how much you want for them. I'm supposed to be doing most of this with supplies I already have (I have been out of work for a few months), since I have the heaters, filters, etc for most of these tanks that I am setting up, but several things have come up already and I've kinda over spent a bit...well, I am sure everyone here knows how that goes! So, anything I can pick up for cheaper definitely helps.
Vicmacki said:
That would be great, Vickmacki! Just let me know what you have and how much you want for them. I'm supposed to be doing most of this with supplies I already have (I have been out of work for a few months), since I have the heaters, filters, etc for most of these tanks that I am setting up, but several things have come up already and I've kinda over spent a bit...well, I am sure everyone here knows how that goes! So, anything I can pick up for cheaper definitely helps.
flamechica
New Member
Whew! Finally found the panda alive. He/she is so good at hiding, being so small.
OK, I guess. But I still have an issue with this. Erythromyacin is a gram positive medications, and will also wipe out your entire beneficial bacteria population. The illnesses that you believe to be what your fish have/had are gram negative as well as most issues in our aquariums. So using Erythromyacin in my opinion is a waste of time, effort and money.
I am just trying to help, in the end it is your decision
I am just trying to help, in the end it is your decision
MattArmstrong
Member
flamechica said:So, the best I've got is what little bit of the white crap that I couldn't get very easily off the air tubing without pulling it all out of my substrate and disrupting my sword and making a mess of things....
If you do a google search for "aquarium white stuff on airline tube" you'll find a lot of people asking about similar things. No definitive answers. I saw no one else reporting illness or deaths occurring along with it. My guess would be that it neither causes nor is caused by whatever else is harming your fish.
flamechica
New Member
Madness said:
I know you are trying to help and I appreciate it. I'm not really sure that it was columnaris or any of the others. It's the only things that I could come up with for mouth type fungus in google search, but after talking to Cory, it didn't seem like that is the only one and the erythormyacin is for common mouth fungus. The other reason I thought it was that was due to the growth on the air tube, but Cory told me that he has seen that stuff growing on air tubing before and it was fairly normal and usually harmless. I had never seen it before in any of my tanks that I have ever had running. I am thinking that this is MAYBE due to that fact that this is a softer airline tubing that I typically use....possibly silicone, but not really sure. It came with the led bubble wand, so I rinsed it and used it, instead of digging out some of my stash of tubing. As far as the beneficial bacteria goes, I will keep an eye on that. I had read that about this medicine before I went and got it. I have extra media seeding for my next tank set up. It's not what I had planned on doing, but if this tank crashes, it will be what I will have to do.
Vicmacki said:
No problem. Just let me know where and when you would like to meet. My schedule is pretty flexible since I don't work.
MattArmstrong said:flamechica said:So, the best I've got is what little bit of the white crap that I couldn't get very easily off the air tubing without pulling it all out of my substrate and disrupting my sword and making a mess of things....
If you do a google search for "aquarium white stuff on airline tube" you'll find a lot of people asking about similar things. No definitive answers. I saw no one else reporting illness or deaths occurring along with it. My guess would be that it neither causes nor is caused by whatever else is harming your fish.
I did do a google search and most people that had it didn't have fish in their tanks. Then once I found that one of my fish had the white stuff in their mouth and white dots on him and started reading about diseases that that could be, I did find some instances where columnaris did grow on things in the tank. However, those people did not include pictures of what that looked like. But yes, I showed the pic to Cory and he told me the same thing, that it was most likely harmless and it was fairly normal, but no one really knows what it is. I am thinking that it might be due to the type of tubing that is used. I have never seen this growing in a tank before. I usually use the harder more plastic type tubing in my tanks, but this bubble wand came with a softer, almost silicone type tubing, so I just used what came with it, instead of digging out my stash of tubing. Most people that were asking about this also had it on silicone type suction cups, etc. What it is? I have no idea, but it likes silicone and that is my theory until someone proves me wrong. LOL!
flamechica
New Member
vtran86 said:
That is very possible. I've seen stuff on hoses before, but never really this thick or accumulated this fast. Maybe it is due to the type of material. I will probably never know. As long as it doesn't hurt my fish, I guess I really don't care.
Everyone seems to be fine. Nobody else has died. Still have one from this bad purchase. They are all ating great. They aren't all darty and stressed anymore. I did a 50% water change last night in an effort to start getting rid of the meds and salt, since everyone seems to be doing great. The water change was a nightmare, as one of my connections in my filling hose busted and water sprayed ALL OVER my bedroom. :shock: That kinda sucked! But my hubby was home dealing with the electrician, because we had some stuff we needed done on our house. So, at least he was here to come help with the disaster...