Over the last year or 2 I have heard many different ideas to curing Lymphosystus, http://www.aquarticles.com/articles/management/Lawler_Lymphocystis.html
I have heard things like, "it will eventually go away, use a fungal med, lots of salt, heat, scrape it off, cut the fin off that has the Lympho, clean water."
As for going away on its own, I have yet to meet someone where this has happened. Fungal meds? Nope it is not a fungus, meds just destroy the good bacteria in the tank and stress the fish out. Which in turn, causes the lympho to multiply. Scrape it off? In my experience this has never worked. It just grows back 10 fold in the same location. Its almost like the lympho is a cancerous glob, and when opened or messed with by scraping, causes it to go insane, and spread. Cutting the clump off? Again, it has always come back even worse. Everything you read says that there is no cure, and that it doesnt spread. I say wrong to that. First off, it does spread. And it looks like I have finally found a cure. (or at least something that has worked for me)
I have had Lympho on several fish in the past and presently. In the past I purchased 4 rare fish from a LFS and had them in with other grow outs. All 4 fish started showing this disease. Because I was new to this disease, I didnt know what to do, I was told to treat with fungus guard, and nopt to worry cause it does not spread. The Lympho soon started showing up on several other occupants, and the fungus guard was just stressing the hell out of all my growouts. It eventually got so bad on the 12 fish that got it, it completely took over and all 12 passed. I then purchased a tank from a friend and he had in it 4 - 4in Umbee. All 4 had Lympho, so I took them also so that I could experiment with finding something that works. I put all 4 fish into a 20 gal, raised the temp to 90 degreees, added lots of air, (cause as your temp goes up your oxygen level in the tank goes down) and added 1 TBL salt/ gallon. I tried the heavy salt treatment. The lympho didnt spread extremely fast like before, but did eventually take over all fish and they eventually were put down.
So now comes to whats working. I recently spoke with a couple fellow hobbyists regarding health issues, and just banging our heads together about different things. One thing that was brought up, obviously is clean water, and salt. Also, that doing a large water change without using any chemicals has been used to kill some of the fungus's found in aquariums. When I had that issue with my WC Dovii, so many said that the illness was again incurable and it usually overtakes the fish within a few days, then death within 5 days. Yes this technique is risky, but if a fish is going to survive it, it would be a Dovii. Well my Dovii is still with us today.
I gave him a 45 min dip in a saltwater bath, and then made several large water changes using no chemicals.
Recently I acquired some lyonsi about 1" and had them in a 20 grow out. I then dropped in 5 umbee grow outs. I began to notice that this dreaded lympho started showing up on all occupants. :wall: Especially frustrated about it being on the umbee, because these grow outs are F1's from the General. (those that frequent MFK, know who the general was). So this time I decided to try the water/no chem idea on this. I start by using 1TBL salt/gal for 1 day, then a 50% water change w/no chems. Add the salt again. 3 days later another 50%+ water change, and repeat. Here it is 3 weeks since starting this, and the only fish left with lympho is the Umbee that had it the worst. And it is almost gone.
I know that I rambled on regarding this, but I wanted to paint a picture. I hope that this works for others out there, as it has definitely (finally) worked for me.
Good luck.
I have heard things like, "it will eventually go away, use a fungal med, lots of salt, heat, scrape it off, cut the fin off that has the Lympho, clean water."
As for going away on its own, I have yet to meet someone where this has happened. Fungal meds? Nope it is not a fungus, meds just destroy the good bacteria in the tank and stress the fish out. Which in turn, causes the lympho to multiply. Scrape it off? In my experience this has never worked. It just grows back 10 fold in the same location. Its almost like the lympho is a cancerous glob, and when opened or messed with by scraping, causes it to go insane, and spread. Cutting the clump off? Again, it has always come back even worse. Everything you read says that there is no cure, and that it doesnt spread. I say wrong to that. First off, it does spread. And it looks like I have finally found a cure. (or at least something that has worked for me)
I have had Lympho on several fish in the past and presently. In the past I purchased 4 rare fish from a LFS and had them in with other grow outs. All 4 fish started showing this disease. Because I was new to this disease, I didnt know what to do, I was told to treat with fungus guard, and nopt to worry cause it does not spread. The Lympho soon started showing up on several other occupants, and the fungus guard was just stressing the hell out of all my growouts. It eventually got so bad on the 12 fish that got it, it completely took over and all 12 passed. I then purchased a tank from a friend and he had in it 4 - 4in Umbee. All 4 had Lympho, so I took them also so that I could experiment with finding something that works. I put all 4 fish into a 20 gal, raised the temp to 90 degreees, added lots of air, (cause as your temp goes up your oxygen level in the tank goes down) and added 1 TBL salt/ gallon. I tried the heavy salt treatment. The lympho didnt spread extremely fast like before, but did eventually take over all fish and they eventually were put down.
So now comes to whats working. I recently spoke with a couple fellow hobbyists regarding health issues, and just banging our heads together about different things. One thing that was brought up, obviously is clean water, and salt. Also, that doing a large water change without using any chemicals has been used to kill some of the fungus's found in aquariums. When I had that issue with my WC Dovii, so many said that the illness was again incurable and it usually overtakes the fish within a few days, then death within 5 days. Yes this technique is risky, but if a fish is going to survive it, it would be a Dovii. Well my Dovii is still with us today.
I gave him a 45 min dip in a saltwater bath, and then made several large water changes using no chemicals.Recently I acquired some lyonsi about 1" and had them in a 20 grow out. I then dropped in 5 umbee grow outs. I began to notice that this dreaded lympho started showing up on all occupants. :wall: Especially frustrated about it being on the umbee, because these grow outs are F1's from the General. (those that frequent MFK, know who the general was). So this time I decided to try the water/no chem idea on this. I start by using 1TBL salt/gal for 1 day, then a 50% water change w/no chems. Add the salt again. 3 days later another 50%+ water change, and repeat. Here it is 3 weeks since starting this, and the only fish left with lympho is the Umbee that had it the worst. And it is almost gone.
I know that I rambled on regarding this, but I wanted to paint a picture.
I hope that this works for others out there, as it has definitely (finally) worked for me. Good luck.
