[DirtyBlackSocks]

Have a trio of guinacara which came in with a lot of fungus, HITH, sunken bellies - the works.

Three months later they're breeding and showing lively behavior - but still sunken bellies and very timid with taking any foods.

Wondering what you would do, knowing the fish were wild caught and in bad condition to begin with. Would you treat with clout? Other medications?

Their appetites aren't nearly as vigirous as I'd like to see - though I have yet to try live foods.

 

[cichlidaholic]

I always treat my incoming wild fish for parasites while in QT. I usually use Jungle Parasite Clear on them, and I also feed the Jungle antiparasitic food (usually need to soften it in tank water and mush it a bit to get them to take it) for two weeks.

So, I would try giving them some medicated food, DBS. :thumb:

 

[DirtyBlackSocks]

Well they've been treated with clout and furan for a while now - I'm just unsure of what to do since they're still not eating very heavily and their bellies are concave? Poo is brown.

 

[cichlidaholic]

Sounds like they might have what is referred to as "skinny" or "wasting" disease, DBS, or fish tuberculosis.

Not much can be done about it, if this is the case. Other than looking not so great, fish survive with these problems for long periods of time.

I'd have to try feeding them some medicated antiparasitic food, just for the heck of it. I find fish with internal parasites always respond to meds better when you can get them to ingest the medication.

 

[DirtyBlackSocks]

You think I should soak some blood worm in metro over a week or so and see how it clears em' up?

 

[cichlidaholic]

That should be sufficient. I think it's worth a try.

I've also heard of people re-freezing the blood worm once they soak it in metro, but I'm not sure that's a good idea. You shouldn't have any problem finding metro powder, but if you do, there is a product by Jungle called HITH Guard that is great for soaking food in!

That's the thing with wild fish, you never know what you're getting, or what you're going to wind up with once you introduce them to tank raised fish, or what your tank raised fish are going to catch from your wild fish.

It's almost enough at times to make you give up on wild caught altogether!

But, at least yours are still eating...

Another thing I've seen people do with seemingly resistant parasitic problems in wild fish is to alternate treating the food with metro and sulfa based meds.