Fungus or columnaris?

Noticed what looked like tiny little bit of fuzz at the end of my new betta's tail last night when I got home, figured it was fin rot and that i'd go pick up some meds today. When I got up (3 hours before the store opens), I noticed it was more fluffy, thought it might be fungus. I fed him later this am, absolutely no interest in food; and he looks as if his entire balk half, tail and body are now covered in fluff, and he is gasping at the surface (I moved an anubias leaf so he can rest on it near the surface, he's having trouble holding himself up). I want to go to the store, but if it's moving this fast it sounds more like colmunaris than fungus to me, but it looks just like a fungus! I don't want to treat him with the wrong stuff (he's a cup baby, and not the strongest fish around), is there something that would effectively treat both?

 

he's also doing the sort of "parasite dance"; like rubbing up against things like he's got ich or another parasite; does fungus irritate in the same way a protozoan parasite would?

 

This is definitely Columnaris, and meds with one or more of the following ingredients should help: kanamycin, erythromycin, furizolidone, and nitrofurizolidone.
I hope he's still alive, this type of infection tends to spread quickly and kill quickly.
Fungus only occurs if something is already injured, and does not affect uninjured skin/scales. 9/10 times, if it moves this fast it's Columnaris.
Oh, and fast-moving finrot is another symptom of Columnaris.

 

Unfortunately, he didn't last the day. After he passed I was almost positive it was columnaris because I had simply never seen anything kill a fish so quickly

 

I'm so sorry

 

I'm sorry to hear that! I knew when I wrote the post it was probably too late, but I hope the info helped you should you encounter it again.

 

Thanks for the condolences guys; I'm actually dosing my other two betta tanks with half doses for the colmunaris, just because I'm so afraid of cross contamination, and I'm going to go to the store to pick up some extra just to have on hand should this awful disease ever rear its ugly head again in my tanks. At least he didn't suffer long, I've seen poor bettas at the pet store take weeks to wither away from fin rot.

 

My other two bettas are infected don't have a lot of hope on this one. I'm dosing with maracyn II, and keeping my fingers crossed...
never cried because a fish was sick before, but when I saw poor Queeny struggling to move her gills under all that crud, I started bawling like a kid.

 

Oh man, that really stinks.
Wishing you and your bettas the best.
Please keep us posted.

 

Thanks for the well-wishes, I'll let everybody know how this goes.

 

Oh no! have you tried adding a little aquarium salt? That won't cure it, but in a study with goldfish it slowed it down a lot- something to do with bacteria not being able to stick as well.

 

I haven't added any salt; I didn't realize bettas could handle it. I'll look into the salt thing... Queenie was dead when I got up this morning and Jade (had stress lines last night) has obvious white fuzz and shocking finrot (there was no finrot last night; it looks like somebody took a child's craft scissors to her tail). I'm going home for thanksgiving; I'm sure the travel won't be good for her but I can't just leave her here to die alone. She'll be coming with me in a brand new "soup tupperware", but I'll try to make sure I don't fill it very full so she doesn't have to exert too much energy to get to the surface.

 

Sorry to hear about Queenie! Hope Jade pulls through.. I don't usually advocate this,but if Maracyn isn't cutting it you might want to start dosing another med with a different active ingredient in addition to maracyn.

 

I think that's the plan; I'll give this another 24 hours and if she hasn't changed I'm going to start double dosing. I feel so powerless against this illness; most anything else I can at least treat, or if it's a new fish I'll know that they were in pretty crummy condition to start with. But this... this is like fish plague or something. I'm just glad to know what it is, I was so afraid that it was something I'd brought home from the lab that could be getting my dog or the people I cook for sick... ugh. What a terrible experience.

 

Oh no! I'm so sorry you lost Queenie.
Colmunaris is nasty fast moving stuff.
Fins are crossed for Jade.

 

Jeez, so sorry.

Oxolinic acid is your best bet. If not perhaps nitrofurazone, furazolidone and/or kanamycin. If it’s the maracyn line your shop carries, switch to maracy TC or Plus. No time to waste on something ineffective.

Just for references, 2 ppm Potassium permanganate/salt with new water for few hours followed by Oxolium/salt with new water for the rest of the day, repeat daily, is what I’d do with goldfish. Whenever you’re dealing with an outbreak of pathogens, you must work on the population control, hence 100% new water taking the best care not to shock the fish. Mild concentration of salt cocktailed with pp and antibiotics if strictly for helping with oxygen intake. Nowadays it takes .6 to .8% salt concentration to fight off some resistant strains of colmuaris, and full grown, fat goldfish may tolerate that but probably not a sick betta. Do aerate despite what you read on one website about colmunaris being aerobic—not to do anything with the bacteria but for the fish’s breathing.

 

I haven't added any salt; I didn't realize bettas could handle it. I'll look into the salt thing...

if you pre-dissolve it and slowly work it up to about a half-dose(increase by a 1/8 dose every 4hrs. or so), it should be fine. If you add it undissolved, then yes, it can burn them, and too quickly it can shock them.

 

Jade passed while I was in my 4 hour chemistry exam. So that's it, all my bettas wiped out

I'll sterilize everything of course, but I think I may wait a while before I go running off to get another betta. I feel a sort of... gap, at their passing, unlike anything I've felt with a fish before. I miss them. When we had to have my dog put down a couple years ago, it was over a year before I wanted another dog in the house. I don't think it'll be that long with the bettas, but it feels like a similar thing; that I don't want to mindlessly replace them. I'm actually rather sad about it... not really a familiar thing for me with fish.
If and when I do decide to get another betta, I'm done with funky looking tanks. Just a straight 5G with a nice soft filter and light aeration and a nice little heater. Maybe some nerites, and perhaps some shrimp. Just plain old, plain old.

RIP ladies, and sir. I miss you far more than I anticipated.

 

I'm sorry you lost them all.. especially so suddenly. I cried when I thought my first betta was dying, so I can't imagine the loss of three like this. RIP little fish. :'(

 

Oh man, I'm so sorry.
That's really rough.
Bettas are very special fish. They sure have a way of grabbing our hearts.

An old thread I'd like to share with you:



:console:

 

new development! When I got back from my exam on tuesday, jade was lying on the bottom of the tank, on her back, gills not moving, eyes clouded over. I didn't have the heart to flush her that night, so I said fine, I'll just take care of her in the morning. In the morning, I turned on the light and went over to the tank and SHE FLIPPED OVER AND SWAM TO THE TOP!!!!! I couldn't believe it! She wasn't dead! Her head was completely coated in the growth, so her eyes looked clouded over, and the plates over her gills were just stuck open, so I hadn't been able to see the weak flutter of her actual gills. Not only that, but she followed me around the room as I hurried to prepare another dose of medication for her (I had to dissolve it in a soda bottle of water to dose properly). When I dosed her tank, she FLARED at me! Then, she stayed at the surface, BEGGING!

I hadn't fed her since she got sick; she hadn't showed any interest in food before this. Tentatively, hardly daring to hope, I dropped a single betta flake onto the surface in front of her; she gobbled it hungrily. She had some trouble eating with her face all covered in fluff, but she ate 7 whole flakes!

She had a horrific battle the day I bought her, and her mouth got a little torn (she won, though). It healed fine, but the scar tissue makes it so her mouth can't really open very wide; she's never been able to eat larger pellets or anything like that. Wednesday morning, she was having trouble even with the flakes, and after eating, she drifted back towards the bottom, looking exhausted, but she had eaten! She shoved herself under a moss ball, and stayed there until I loaded her into her travel tupperware to bring her home for thanksgiving.

She didn't enjoy the trip (neither did I, I had the heat on full blast to try to keep her comfortable and I was sweating!), but now she's in a 2.5G hospital tank, thanks to PFunk, with an incandescent light and a small under-gravel heater (I have to look up the person who gave me this idea and credit them; it's a wonderful technique for heating a small tank; it allows me to increase the temperature very slowly by bringing the lamp an inch or so closer every couple hours). The nano filter is hiding behind a big fat anubias, and the bubble stone is tucked in the same corner as the filter, to try to keep current at the other end of the tank to a minimum, so she can get out of it to rest. I'm doing 10% water changes daily, just before medicating.

She ate some blood worms for dinner last night, and a few flakes this morning. I'm trying to feed her a few times a day, but only very little bits at a time. I still don't know if she's going to make it, but I'm trying my very best. The bacterial growth is very prominent, and while when she's interested in something, she'll make the trip up from the bottom, she spends much of her time crammed under her moss ball on the bottom with her fins clamped. I'm hoping this is sort of how when I have a bad flu, I get up to eat or go get a book but then I just stay in bed all day... Fingers crossed.

I've never seen stress lines like this before, it's VERY intense, I'm going to try very hard to get a picture. She's always been very very dark green, almost black, but now it's like she has red crosshairs over her eyes, and her body is sort of grey, with kind of blue/green/black lines.

It's kind of scary, she's very obviously in pain and quite unhappy, but because she's eating, I'm hopeful. Thank you everybody for your wellwishes, and for your thoughts, they mean so much right now. Thank you especially yukoandk for your advice about aeration; I'm convinced that keeping her air stone on while she was weakest, and unable to move her gills properly (and medicating before any visible symptoms) was what kept her alive this long.

Here's hoping, and happy thanksgiving!

Heres another way to cheat a bit if you want to. Considering these are vases you could always light them with an incandescent bulb placed a good bit over the tank of over 40Watts. Those things will also throw some heat and could help out that small one ken mentioned as well as light the tank. Just a thought is all.

Thank you so much P3! I'm using a 75 wat bulb for a 2.5G tank and it's just wonderful. I HIGHLY recommend this (to anyone who can sleep with the light on). Just make sure you have some sort of large, broad leafed plant or a floating plant to help provide some shade and darkness for your fish. Gigundo anubias works awesome.

 

WOW! don't you just love it when they surprise us like that? Hope your little girl makes it!

 

I wouldn't suggest moving fish around too much when they're sick, especially with columnaris, a disease that is usually caused by stress, newly bought fish are the most at risk for this reason and it's very important to acclimate all new fish properly and treat as soon as you see bad fin rot happening. the best thing to do now is try to make her comfortable and keep medicating, hopefully she'll make it!

 

I wouldn't suggest moving fish around too much when they're sick, especially with columnaris, a disease that is usually caused by stress, newly bought fish are the most at risk for this reason and it's very important to acclimate all new fish properly and treat as soon as you see bad fin rot happening. the best thing to do now is try to make her comfortable and keep medicating, hopefully she'll make it!

unfortunately, she didn't make it; it may well have been because of the move, but that was unavoidable. if I had left her where she was, there would have been no way to continue the medication or even to feed her (home for the long weekend to cook thanksgiving dinner for my family and to work, since I need to pay the bills).
rip jade

 

Most betta enthusiast will adivse having salt in the tank to help prevent the issues all to common with bettas. I use a regular 1tsp to the gallon method. Of course since the ADF arrival I had to change out the water to get rid of the salt lol. But bettas can handle salt quite well.

 

Oh! I'm sorry to hear that. Yeah, just recovering from columnaris + move was just too much for her. I hope you start feeling better soon.:console:

 

sorry to hear about the loss of your betta.

 

thanks for the condolences guys; i've decided I won't get another betta until I can be in one place for at least 2 weeks, so that I can get in twice daily observations during the first two weeks (this won't be for a few months, but that's ok). That way, if anything scary happens, I can, instead of tearing through the streets wildeyed on my way to the fish store for drugs, simply go to my little fishy medicine cabinet and begin medication on the first day.

idk if anybody saw my post a while back about looking to do a 10G super tiny-stuff tank, but I think i'm going to retire my little tanks (except perhaps as snail/algae farms and hospital tanks), and gut and recycle my 10G into a betta home. It just seems nicer, somehow.