Most Wrasses Have Internal Parasites?

JaaxReef · Mar 2, 2021

Is it just me, or do all Wrasses seem to have internal parasites when you get them? Obviously I’m excluding vendors that do QT and treat for it, but it seems pretty common. I automatically mix up metroplex into food before they even arrive.

Got an exquisite wrasse today and sure enough... white stringy poop after the first meal (which was already medicated).

I’m curious to know other’s experience with this topic!

Jay Hemdal · Mar 2, 2021

White stringy feces isn’t always parasites. Can be mucus from lack of food, a disruption in the gut biome due medications along the way, or bacterial infection.
Jay

JaaxReef · Mar 2, 2021

Jay Hemdal said:
White stringy feces isn’t always parasites. Can be mucus from lack of food, a disruption in the gut biome due medications along the way, or bacterial infection.
Jay

Good to know! So... if I just got the fish in transit, it could be a lack of food before transport?

Jay Hemdal · Mar 2, 2021

JaaxReef said:
Good to know! So... if I just got the fish in transit, it could be a lack of food before transport?

Could be, but it also could be the other issues. When you say you just got the fishm, was it shipped in or did you buy it from a LFS? Have you tried feeding it yet?

jay

JaaxReef · Mar 2, 2021

Jay Hemdal said:
Could be, but it also could be the other issues. When you say you just got the fishm, was it shipped in or did you buy it from a LFS? Have you tried feeding it yet?

jay

Shipped. Beautiful, active, and ate well already on the first day. I fed it mysis and spirulina brine with focus and general cure already... after feeding was the white stringy poo so I thought that was an indication I was doing the right thing.

I had one wrasse lose its appetite and slowly waste away in QT before with white stringy poo so I immediately start proactive treatment for anything internal right away with wrasses now.

Is that a bad approach?

capt.dave · Mar 30, 2021

Following. I have a family of Mollies, acclimated to saltwater that have enormously long white poops and I just started treating with API GC and focus on pellets (@Humblefish 's recipe). They seem to love the concoction.

I bought a pair of them a couple months ago to use as canaries in QT with a leopard wrasse I was hoping to not expose to copper. I intended to transfer the mollies to my display but Momma Mollie gave me about 25 babies one night. Now what was my QT is a planted tank for Mollies but the fry are dying off. I'm down to 6 and they're about a half inch big now. Their poop on the other hand goes on for several inches! It starts out brown and then turns white or even light blue depending on the light. Adults are affected, too, and Momma is pregnant again. Hoping to clear all this up by the time she gives birth.

@Jay Hemdal , I think your answer to @JaaxReef 's question would answer mine as well. Can we assume parasites and treat accordingly? The follow-up is, do we need to treat the tank, too, with GC in the water to rid the tank of parasites or now that we're killing the internal ones, will any live ones that got pooped out before treatment started just die off when they re-infect?

Jay Hemdal · Mar 30, 2021

capt.dave said:
Following. I have a family of Mollies, acclimated to saltwater that have enormously long white poops and I just started treating with API GC and focus on pellets (@Humblefish 's recipe). They seem to love the concoction.

I bought a pair of them a couple months ago to use as canaries in QT with a leopard wrasse I was hoping to not expose to copper. I intended to transfer the mollies to my display but Momma Mollie gave me about 25 babies one night. Now what was my QT is a planted tank for Mollies but the fry are dying off. I'm down to 6 and they're about a half inch big now. Their poop on the other hand goes on for several inches! It starts out brown and then turns white or even light blue depending on the light. Adults are affected, too, and Momma is pregnant again. Hoping to clear all this up by the time she gives birth.

@Jay Hemdal , I think your answer to @JaaxReef 's question would answer mine as well. Can we assume parasites and treat accordingly? The follow-up is, do we need to treat the tank, too, with GC in the water to rid the tank of parasites or now that we're killing the internal ones, will any live ones that got pooped out before treatment started just die off when they re-infect?

What are you feeding the mollies? You could treat the tank with GC, but I just want to rule out possible dietary causes.
Jay

capt.dave · Mar 31, 2021

Jay Hemdal said:
What are you feeding the mollies? You could treat the tank with GC, but I just want to rule out possible dietary causes.
Jay

Was feeding Aqueon Tropical flake food and nori. I started feeding New Life Spectrum Marine pellets with Humblefish's GC & Focus concoction yesterday. By the end of the day yesterday the poops were the super long brown to white/blueish ones I described above. They were long before but now they're more than twice the length of the fish itself.

capt.dave · Apr 1, 2021

@Jay Hemdal , since details matter, I followed the directions on the Focus box and mixed it 5:1 focus to GC. I now see on Humblefish's receipe that he said 1:1. Hopefully not a problem. The mollies love the stuff.

@JaaxReef , I sincerely apologize for high jacking your thread. I thought Jay's answer might be useful to both of us. Hopefully it still is. Any update on your wrasse's? I've had absolutely terrible results quarantining wrasses over the years (2 successful (6 Line and a Solar), and 5 unsuccessful (Carpenter's, Solar, and 3 Leopards all died in QT)). I'm to the point now where I won't even try a Leopard again. It's my favorite fish but it's just not fair to them! So I was following your thread to see if you uncovered something I was missing.

Jay Hemdal · Apr 1, 2021

capt.dave said:
@Jay Hemdal , since details matter, I followed the directions on the Focus box and mixed it 5:1 focus to GC. I now see on Humblefish's receipe that he said 1:1. Hopefully not a problem. The mollies love the stuff.

@JaaxReef , I sincerely apologize for high jacking your thread. I thought Jay's answer might be useful to both of us. Hopefully it still is. Any update on your wrasse's? I've had absolutely terrible results quarantining wrasses over the years (2 successful (6 Line and a Solar), and 5 unsuccessful (Carpenter's, Solar, and 3 Leopards all died in QT)). I'm to the point now where I won't even try a Leopard again. It's my favorite fish but it's just not fair to them! So I was following your thread to see if you uncovered something I was missing.

The Focus instructions are messed up: the box says 5:1 and the bottle inside says 1:1 - not very confidence inspiring! That's like your doctor saying, here take this pill every day, or take five of them, whuichever you want! Then, you're supposed to mix that with "some food". How much? A gram? A pound? Sorry to rant, but I think I'm going to have to contact the company and try to get them to fix their dosing errors.

Jay

JaaxReef · Apr 1, 2021

capt.dave said:
@Jay Hemdal , since details matter, I followed the directions on the Focus box and mixed it 5:1 focus to GC. I now see on Humblefish's receipe that he said 1:1. Hopefully not a problem. The mollies love the stuff.

@JaaxReef , I sincerely apologize for high jacking your thread. I thought Jay's answer might be useful to both of us. Hopefully it still is. Any update on your wrasse's? I've had absolutely terrible results quarantining wrasses over the years (2 successful (6 Line and a Solar), and 5 unsuccessful (Carpenter's, Solar, and 3 Leopards all died in QT)). I'm to the point now where I won't even try a Leopard again. It's my favorite fish but it's just not fair to them! So I was following your thread to see if you uncovered something I was missing.

No worries hi jacking the thread!

I treated with Focus and General Cure for 14 days despite not being sure if it was just empty fecal casing or parasites. Both wrasses (Orange Back Fairy and Exquisite Fairy) are now in my main display and are doing great with my Pintail Fairy and Red Lined Wrasse. Probably the last of my wrasse additions.

On a different note, I too lost a Leopard Wrasse just due to shipping stress and also a different Exquisite due to what I think was most definitely an internal parasite. Didn’t treat him until it was too late. Have had the best luck treating Wrasses in QT proactively almost immediately feeding General Cure and Focus. Wasn’t sure if that was the right move, but better than a dead wrasse due to too little too late I guess?

JaaxReef · Apr 1, 2021

Jay Hemdal said:
The Focus instructions are messed up: the box says 5:1 and the bottle inside says 1:1 - not very confidence inspiring! That's like your doctor saying, here take this pill every day, or take five of them, whuichever you want! Then, you're supposed to mix that with "some food". How much? A gram? A pound? Sorry to rant, but I think I'm going to have to contact the company and try to get them to fix their dosing errors.

Jay

For this very reason, I just ignore their instructions and follow Humblefish’s guidelines for this treatment. Haha.

capt.dave · Apr 1, 2021

Hoping the focus isn’t harmful. The fish sure seem to like it but oh my goodness, are they poipin’! They all look like parade floats at the end of a string!

JaaxReef · Apr 2, 2021

capt.dave said:
Hoping the focus isn’t harmful. The fish sure seem to like it but oh my goodness, are they poipin’! They all look like parade floats at the end of a string!

Definitely not harmful. It’s just a binder for medications so probably some sort of starch or something like that? I find fish eat Focus mixed with General Cure better than trying to use Focus with Metroplex alone. It covers more potential issues too since it has both Metronidazole and Praziquantel.

Jay Hemdal · Apr 2, 2021

JaaxReef said:
For this very reason, I just ignore their instructions and follow Humblefish’s guidelines for this treatment. Haha.

Ah, trouble is, his directions don't work either! All oral fish medications need to be dosed as mg of drug per kg of fish body mass. ANY medicated food process that doesn't take into account the fish's body mass can only work out of pure luck. There are only two medications that can be dosed by weight in food: Epsom salts can be mixed into food at a 3% rate as a purgative, and Metronidazole can be mixed in at 5000 ppm (but that is very bitter and many fish won't eat it).

David Scarbough, a member here, recently developed a medicated food calculator. It is very complicated, but it is really the only way to do this correctly. Here is a link:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fish-weight-calculator-medicated-fish-food-mix-calculator.814591/

Jay

JaaxReef · Apr 2, 2021

Jay Hemdal said:
Ah, trouble is, his directions don't work either! All oral fish medications need to be dosed as mg of drug per kg of fish body mass. ANY medicated food process that doesn't take into account the fish's body mass can only work out of pure luck. There are only two medications that can be dosed by weight in food: Epsom salts can be mixed into food at a 3% rate as a purgative, and Metronidazole can be mixed in at 5000 ppm (but that is very bitter and many fish won't eat it).

David Scarbough, a member here, recently developed a medicated food calculator. It is very complicated, but it is really the only way to do this correctly. Here is a link:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fish-weight-calculator-medicated-fish-food-mix-calculator.814591/

Jay

Well, now I feel like I’ve just had dumb luck using it the way I have! Good to know...

Jay Hemdal · Apr 2, 2021

Yes - the are three possible outcomes: a low dose that has no benefit, a proper dose that has the expected benefit, Or a high dose that can harm the fish. Kind of a crap shoot....

Jay