Clownfish internal parasite?

[Waters]

I have had a pair of Black Ice Snowflake clowns for about 8 months. Within the last week, the male suddenly stopped eating and has the white stringy poop almost daily. Nothing new has been added to the tank for roughly 6 months. All other fish appear to be fine. I removed the clown and treated with API general cure which has Metronidazole and Praziquantel. Treatment didn't seem to help at all. Any ideas on where to go from here? The fish still is not eating and remains in a hospital tank.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Take a look at my article on fish mucus here. The issue is that starvation itself produces white feces, as can protozoans and bacterial overgrowth. Worm parasites do not cause white feces. General Cure deals with protozoan issues.
Trouble is, once a fish stops feeding, the only way to get meds into them is through the small amount of water they consume while maintaining their osmotic balance. At this point, you could try antibiotics in the water, perhaps Maracyn 1 that is commonly used for internal issues....but that is definitely not a certain course of action.

Jay

 

[Waters]

Thanks for the response Jay...looks like the end of your post got cut off. I will read your article. Where do you recommend I go from here? Anything I can do (that isn't in your article) that will give him a chance at survival?

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Wow - my post sure got messed up! Let me go back and see what I meant to say (grin).
Jay

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I just can’t tell you if the clown stopped eating and then starvation is causing the mucus or if the mucus is caused by a gut organism out of control and then causing the fish not to eat. I would put the feces under a microscope to look for protozoans, but I understand that isn’t practical for home aquarists....
Jay

 

[Waters]

I just can’t tell you if the clown stopped eating and then starvation is causing the mucus or if the mucus is caused by a gut organism out of control and then causing the fish not to eat. I would put the feces under a microscope to look for protozoans, but I understand that isn’t practical for home aquarists....
Jay

Ok gotcha......unfortunately I do not have access to a microscope. At this point I am not sure I can do anything else other than to keep trying to get him to eat.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

You could try dosing Maracyn 1, it won’t hurt at least.
Jay

 

[HB AL]

The outcome is generally not good when a fish you've had for a while suddenly stops eating. Over the decades I've had this happen a few times, no recent additions, no obvious signs of disease and 1 of the fish suddenly stops eating but continues to act normal. Unfortunately in those few instances I usually find the fish dead in the morning within a couple weeks from when it stopped eating. Glad it's a rare occurrence because it leaves me scratching my head.

 

[Waters]

Ok thanks for the responses everyone. Yeah, this is a first for me.....I can usually point to something that would have caused the problem but definitely not this time. It has been over a week now with no interest in food.......just strange that it basically happened overnight. Ate with great enthusiasm the night before like usual to total lack of interest in food and hovering on one side of the tank the next morning.

 

[Waters]

Good news......clownfish has recovered, eating and acting normal again, and has returned to the DT

 

[ReefMind]

So what did you end up doing for treatment?