Flukes?

[DrMMI]

I've had a royal Gramma in quarantine now for about a month. Yesterday I noticed he was hiding the entire day, not eating as much as he used to, and breathing heavy. Today he didn't eat anything and his breathing was pretty labored. I did a freshwater dip and these were left behind. He's already been through 2 doses of prazipro, but because I had a powder blue that was struggling, I did a water change 48 hours after the first dose, 24 hours after the second. After the freshwater dip, the royal gramma had a long string poop. Does he still have flukes? Should I try a 3rd round of prazipro or maybe switch to general cure?

 

[fishguy242]

hi lets get some expert help here, @Jay Hemdal #reefsquad

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I don’t see any flukes in the dip, but some are too small to be seen without magnification. Sudden rapid breathing is not a sign of flukes, sometimes breathing isn’t affected, and for gill flukes, the rapid breathing comes on slowly. I’m concerned about the spot on its belly. That could be Uronema, come on fast, hard to treat. Do you have any antiprotozoan meds on hand?
Jay

 

[vetteguy53081]

Rapid breathing can be ammonia, liw oxygen, nitrates or itritant from ick or Oodinum

 

[DrMMI]

I don’t see any flukes in the dip, but some are too small to be seen without magnification. Sudden rapid breathing is not a sign of flukes, sometimes breathing isn’t affected, and for gill flukes, the rapid breathing comes on slowly. I’m concerned about the spot on its belly. That could be Uronema, come on fast, hard to treat. Do you have any antiprotozoan meds on hand?
Jay

What would antiprotozoan meds be? It's in copper now. I have prazipro, general cure, kanaplex, furan-2, melafix, and primafix on hand

 

[DrMMI]

Rapid breathing can be ammonia, liw oxygen, nitrates or itritant from ick or Oodinum

It's in a 55 gallon tank with a firefish and a bullet goby. I've lost a powder blue and a carpenter's wrasse in this quarantine already. Ammonia is 0, I have a wave maker pointed at the top,a bubble filter, air stone, and a hob filter so I don't think oxygen is an issue. Despite ammonia being 0, I've been doing 50% water changes every other day so I don't think nitrates are an issue either. Copper has been 2.15 - 2.25 for the last 3 weeks.

 

[vetteguy53081]

It's in a 55 gallon tank with a firefish and a bullet goby. I've lost a powder blue and a carpenter's wrasse in this quarantine already. Ammonia is 0, I have a wave maker pointed at the top,a bubble filter, air stone, and a hob filter so I don't think oxygen is an issue. Despite ammonia being 0, I've been doing 50% water changes every other day so I don't think nitrates are an issue either. Copper has been 2.15 - 2.25 for the last 3 weeks.

Id bring copper to 2 and it sure sounds like symptoms of velvet although velvet highly visible

 

[DrMMI]

Id bring copper to 2 and it sure sounds like symptoms of velvet although velvet highly visible

Do you think velvet would survive copper levels that high? If so, wouldn't bringing the copper level down make it worse?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Do you think velvet would survive copper levels that high? If so, wouldn't bringing the copper level down make it worse?

Velvet typically should not. For velvet, my quickest treatment of it was polyp lab MEDIC
The reason I suggested lowering was at levels above 2, fish seem to get irritated hence their behavior as it appears you have a handle on water quality and oxygen levels

 

[4FordFamily]

Do you think velvet would survive copper levels that high? If so, wouldn't bringing the copper level down make it worse?

Yes it can, I've run in to some that survived higher concentrations

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

What would antiprotozoan meds be? It's in copper now. I have prazipro, general cure, kanaplex, furan-2, melafix, and primafix on hand

If it is Uronema, you would need to treat with formalin dips or chloroquine - neither of which as easy to obtain right now. Hopefully it isn't Uronema...
The general cure has metronidazole in it, so that would have some anti-protozoal activity, but I don't know the amount they use in it since it is a proprietary formulation. One dose I've used for metro is 7 mg/l every day for three treatments. If you can figure out the amount in general cure, you could back-calculate. The basic formula is: mg/l times tank volume, divided by 266 = grams. So - if you had a 20 gallon tank, and wanted to dose it at 7 mg/l - you would want to add 0.53 grams of pure metro.

Jay

 

[DrMMI]

So just an update. I dosed general cure and 3 days later, the gramma was doing much better. He was out and about like he normally was. No longer breathing heavy. My copper level also happened to be 2.41. I guess i overdosed slightly with my last water change. I did a 20% water change and brought the copper down to 2.0. Should I do the second dose of general cure? He's already gotten 2 doses of prazipro previously (but I had to do water changes before the 5-7 day mark). They've got 9 days of copper left and I hate taking the chance of mixing meds.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

That’s a tough call! I can’t get a good read on which medication is working here , and I agree there is a risk in running both meds at once. However, you already doubled them once, and that was when the copper was above normal, so I think a partial water change, bringing the copper back to 2, and then recoding the GC would be the way to go.....maybe
Jay

 

[Privateye]

Formalin is in stock here, if you want a whole gallon: https://pentairaes.com/parasite-s-1-gal.html

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Formalin is in stock here, if you want a whole gallon: https://pentairaes.com/parasite-s-1-gal.html

That's where I get mine. I'm not positive, but I *think* the shipping is costly because it is flammable and has to ship a certain way (UPS Ground or common carrier?).

Jay

 

[Privateye]

That's where I get mine. I'm not positive, but I *think* the shipping is costly because it is flammable and has to ship a certain way (UPS Ground or common carrier?).

Jay

No kidding! You must do a lot of treatments lol. I think they have free domestic shipping if the order total is over $50 (some exclusions, like fiberglass tanks) but I'm not sure how the sale price factors in.