Fish Stopped Eating

[mjreefs]

Hi all,

I currently have 2 pyramid butterflyfish and 3 bellus angelfish in my 45gallon water volume quarantine tank. Yesterday, I dosed Prazipro in 2 doses (one in the morning and one in the afternoon). All fish still seemed well and are eating. However, just a while ago I noticed both butterflyfish breathing rapidly, but not laboriously, and one is hiding, while the other would still eat. The 3 Bellus angelfish are unaffected. Is this normal for a Prazipro treatment?

 

[Doctorgori]

I understand QT but Why did you treat with Prazipro?
...and no I’ve never had that reaction

 

[mjreefs]

I understand QT but Why did you treat with Prazipro?
...and no I’ve never had that reaction

I treat all fish prophylactically with Prazipro, since most of my fish are angelfish and they’re notorious for carrying flukes.

 

[mjreefs]

Also, forgot to include that the water was cloudy. And as an update one of the butterfly died, I don't think it's velvet, is it maybe due to oxygen deprivation?

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

So: it’s complicated. You need to run full water chems to rule out issues, and turn the air up. Praziquantel is mostly insoluble in water. Companies use various solvents. Sometimes they use alcohols. These can cause massive bacterial blooms that drop the oxygen levels. One final bit of bad news; the common fluke on pyramid butterflies is Neobenedenia, and prazi does not kill he eggs of that, I use hyposalinity for 35 days to treat pyramids. I would have suggested a FW diagnostic dip on the pyramids to check for Neo, but having lost one, that may be too stressful on the remaining.
Jay

 

[mjreefs]

So: it’s complicated. You need to run full water chems to rule out issues, and turn the air up. Praziquantel is mostly insoluble in water. Companies use various solvents. Sometimes they use alcohols. These can cause massive bacterial blooms that drop the oxygen levels. One final bit of bad news; the common fluke on pyramid butterflies is Neobenedenia, and prazi does not kill he eggs of that, I use hyposalinity for 35 days to treat pyramids. I would have suggested a FW diagnostic dip on the pyramids to check for Neo, but having lost one, that may be too stressful on the remaining.
Jay

I checked Ammonia a while ago and it's 0, so that's ruled out.

As for Neobendenia, yes, prazi doesn't treat the eggs, as stated in Humblefish's post. The idea of having Prazi dosed twice spaced 5-7 days apart is to make sure that all the parasites are taken care of. The first dose is to "kill" the existing ones, while the second dose "kills" those that were still eggs during the first dose.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Trouble is the timing on that isn’t sufficient, Neo eggs can take up to 30 days to hatch. Even stretching out the timing, or increasing the number of treatments doesn’t work because a heterotrophic bacteria soon grows that consumes prazi about as fast as you add it. Try a Google search for Stamper + Praziquantel to find a paper on that. Hyposalinity is the only sure cure for Neo. It is a scourge in public aquariums because they almost always have sharks in their tanks and therefore can’t run hypo. I know some curators who won’t acquire pyramids or lookdowns due to the Neo issues. I risk it, but always run 35 days of hypo and then 2 to 4 weeks observation, and then screen for Neo.
To be clear, I still think the issue is low DO due to something related to the cloudy water, and it likely being a bacterial bloom that lowered the DO.

Jay

 

[vetteguy53081]

Look at water., mainly salinity-ammonia and nitrate
Freshwater dip and Ruby rally best on flukes IF present.

 

[Tamberav]

Also, forgot to include that the water was cloudy. And as an update one of the butterfly died, I don't think it's velvet, is it maybe due to oxygen deprivation?

Prazipro can cause bacterial blooms, sounds like this happened since the water is cloudy. Get some aeration in there asap. Carbon and water changes to pull the prazi out.

 

[AZMSGT]

Trouble is the timing on that isn’t sufficient, Neo eggs can take up to 30 days to hatch. Even stretching out the timing, or increasing the number of treatments doesn’t work because a heterotrophic bacteria soon grows that consumes prazi about as fast as you add it. Try a Google search for Stamper + Praziquantel to find a paper on that. Hyposalinity is the only sure cure for Neo. It is a scourge in public aquariums because they almost always have sharks in their tanks and therefore can’t run hypo. I know some curators who won’t acquire pyramids or lookdowns due to the Neo issues. I risk it, but always run 35 days of hypo and then 2 to 4 weeks observation, and then screen for Neo.
To be clear, I still think the issue is low DO due to something related to the cloudy water, and it likely being a bacterial bloom that lowered the DO.

Jay

Take a look at this. It is specifically for treating Neobenedenia

Marine Parasites

Marine Parasites is a resource for the study of parasites in south Australian fishes.

www.marineparasites.com

 

[lagatbezan]

I have zero faith in Prazipro lately. It’s always tends to cloudy up the water and there seems to be a lot of flukes that are prazi resistant lately.
I have always done hypo but only for 10 days max.
didn’t know it needs to be for 35 days.