I'll give you my opinions... This sounds like a bacterial infection to
me. For one thing, White Spot Disease (ICK), contrary to popular opinion,
does not exist in a "dormant state in most tanks", ready to "spring" when
conditions are right, at least not for long periods anyway. It's a protozoan
organism (and does not exist as "spores", nor is it present in air) and it
dies off unless it finds a host and can complete/continue its life cycle. So
unless you added some fish that had come into contact with it or allowed
something in the tank that had been exposed to it in another tank you should
not have White Spot in your tank, after all this time. My fish all "flash"
or rub against things *from time to time* (doing it only once in a while is
normal) and I do not expect to see White Spot any time soon. Healthy fish
are normally resistant to White Spot disease. The fin rot and the blood
under the skin of the fish that you mentioned also strongly indicate a
bacterial problem (IMO) and bacteria DO hang around dormant in tanks (and
indeed are everywhere) waiting for the right conditions to "spring" and
usually that means when your fish, for some reason (that you may or may not
be aware of) are experiencing weakened immune systems (due to some type of
stress or dietary deficiency, or perhaps just old age). I have had a single
fish in my tank become afflicted by bacteria and show symptoms exactly as
you describe, moved it to a hospital tank, treated it with antibiotics
unsuccessfully and watched it decline, lose its fins/scales and eventually
die, without any of the other fish from the same tank being affected at all.
I've found it very difficult to treat a fish successfully in these
instances, once the bacteria has really gotten an advantage. One very
important thing to do is to get any sick fish out of the main tank and into
a hospital tank ASAP, because a sick fish can be a reservoir for a large
number of bacteria, which can overwhelm the immune systems of the healthier
fish if left in the tank. This is why it is so important to not ever let a
fish die in the main tank (the bacteria are released when the fish dies). In
other words it can all start with a single weakened fish. One thing you
posted that sticks in my mind is that you use cold water for your water
changes. That is something I am very careful to avoid. I'd prefer it be a
little warmer rather than colder. Sudden cooling really stresses fish and
can weaken their immune systems. In fact when fish ARE exposed to White Spot
disease, sudden cooling can impair their ability to resist it. Water
temperature is one thing I don't fool around with. Another thing that comes
to mind is that your nitrate level is zero. I realize you have a lot of
plants, but zero nitrate? Are you sure your nitrifying bacteria haven't been
killed off somehow? If so, the plants would surely reduce nitrate to zero in
a short time. But I may be off base here.
Prevention is the best cure, and your fishes own immune system is their
best health insurance. So what I do is I try to do all I can to not stress
them; I try to avoid temperature or pH swings, keep the dissolved oxygen
level high, try to keep everything rock steady, and I make sure they're
getting everything in their diet that they should get. Keep my hands out of
and away from the tank (frightened fish are stressed) and things like that.
I am certainly no expert and I can't say for sure what happened to your
fish, but there are some sites that have very good information on fish
diseases, and maybe I've given you some ideas that will help. One particular
site that is a favorite of mine is at
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/index.html and perhaps you can find some
information there that will help you more.

Fedor


wrote in message
ups.com...
Is it White-spot, Velvet, or both?

I have three fresh water tropical tanks
One 45 litre shallow tank for growing on corydoras and Ancistrus fry
One 70 litre tank which will be home to my Ancistrus so they can breed
in peace, but currently houses an assortment of tetras.
One 170 litre heavily planted tank with a large piece of mopani wood
and 2" deep, fine gravel, which is my 'show tank' , and contains;

2 ancistrus (7 years old)
3 albino corydoras(1 year old - 1.5" long)
3 clown loaches (5 years old - 3" long)
2 upside down catfish (5 years old - 2" long)
1 whiptail catfish(7 years old) - 4 " long)
2 siamese flying foxes (2 years old - 3" long)
8 congo tetras (6 months old - 2" long)
6 bleeding heart tetras (1 year old - 1.5" long)

Nitrites 0
Nitrates 0
Ph 7.2
Gh 160
Kh 140
Temp 24 (75)

(the tap water is virtually the same as my aquarium)

I have not lost a fish in four years (and hardly had any illnesses at
all), the catfish are spawning regularly and I successfully raise the
fry and sell them. All the other fish were in peak condition and
regularly display courtship behaviour.

I feed flake food and catfish pellets once a day, with frozen
bloodworm and brineshrimp once or twice a week, and the odd garden pea
or courgette for the catfish.

I don't use CO2, the light is on a timer for 10 hours a day, and I use
a liquid plant food once a week

Waterchanges are once a week and I change roughly 12%, gently cleaning
the filter.
For several months I have not gravel vac'd much of the substrate as
all the bottom-feeding fish and numerous malasian trumpet snails keep
it pretty clean and the plants are fairly thick.
I use cold treated water to re-fill the aquarium which helps to
trigger spawning.

For several weeks I have noticed one fish or another flash against a
plant or rock - just once, every now and then. So I have been watching
closely for white-spot, but seen nothing else to signify its presence.

About four weeks ago one of my albino corydoras suddenly became ill.
She developed blood under the skin on her back and became very
listless.
I removed her to one of the tubs I use for newly hatched fry, and went
to the cupboard for my interpet anti-internal bacteria treatment. The
bottle was empty - it had all leaked out. Wondering what to do I
decided to briefly bath her in Methylene blue and then add some human
amoxicillin to the water in her tub (this was the first time I had
tried doing this - and you cannot buy fishmox in the UK)
The next day she was the same, I went out and bought some interpet
anti-internal bacteria treatment, changed her water and added the
medication. Over the next couple of days she got worse, lost all
ability to balance or swim and her skin and fins began to rot badly -
eventually I put her out of her misery using a 25% dose of top quality
Gin which I have read about on the web (again something I have never
had to do before, she died pretty peacefully 30 minutes later)

Still thinking this was a bacterial infection I treated the show tank
just to be safe.

Two weeks went by with no further illness, then I started noticing an
increase in the number of visible trumpet snails in the tank and I
realised I had not seen the clown loaches for a couple of days, then
I saw white salt-grain sized spots on the bleeding-heart tetras - just
a few, mostly on the tails.
Thinking I knew what was going on I did a 30% waterchange (warming the
added water) and dosed the tank with interpet anti white-spot, which I
got from my cupboard.
I increased the temperature to about 80 degrees, and turned off the
light.
The medicine must have been four years old and after a couple of days
it became clear it had had little or no effect. I went out and bought
a new bottle and on day four of the treatment I added a full dose of
the new stuff. By now all the bleeding heart tetras were badly covered
in salt-grain white spots and were hanging near the surface, not
eating and clamping their fins, their gills and mouths were moving
very fast, and some were developing secondary bacterial infections, I
added 250 milligrams of amoxicillin to the tank to try and combat the
infections.
The clown loaches were now out of their hiding place but looking very
ill although they had only one or two white spots each, they actually
looked more like they had got velvet, but it was very subtle.
The next morning two of the tetras were dead.Next day two more died,
and the last two died the following day.

By now I was wondering if it could all be velvet and maybe it just
looked like white-spot on the bleeding heart tetras? Could that have
been why neither dose of white spot medication seemed to help?
I did a 50% water change and added a carbon filter for 24 hours, the
next day I did a 30% water change, removed the carbon and treated the
tank for velvet (again using interpet product)
The clown loaches were listless, not eating, not moving around much
and by now looking pretty velvety, they were breathing fast, and lying
around on the gravel.
They also had a couple of the white-spots each here and there.
Two days later and two of them were dead.
As I write this the last one is lying on the gravel upside down
looking as though it will die. It is four days since I added the
velvet meds, I have just done a 50% waterchange and thoroughly vac'd
the gravel (I read on the web that by removing as many spores from the
gravel as possible you help to halt the progress of the parasite -
makes sense once you think of it)
I have re-filled the tank using warm water and added a half-strength
dose of velvet medication

Up til now none of the other fish have been affected at all, however
one (not both) of my upside down catfish is now covered all over in
small (salt-grain size) yellow blobs - not spheres like with the white-
spot, more like tiny pustules. Could this be another way for velvet to
manifest itself?


Can anyone please tell me the following......

What do you think was wrong with the original corydoras?
The bleeding heart tetras?
The clown loaches?
And now the upside down catfish?

Could this have all been velvet?
Do you think I had velvet and white spot all at once?
Why does none of the medication I have used seem to have worked?

What can I do to stop this now?

Thanks for any help


Chris Nuttall