I think i may have cured the guppy "skinny" disease.......

Matt68046
  • #1
So I have had an ongoing problem with my guppies. The new ones get bloated, hang or sit on bottom, and have stringy poo and breathe fast. I have had it going on in my tanks all summer and have lost many fish to it. It seemed to resist all treatments for internal parasites/bacteria....ie metro,clout prazi, benadazole de-wormer.
I recently found an article by the guppy god Stan Shubel describing some mystery disease, and although he didn't describe the symptoms in detail, I had a hunch that's exactly what my fish had...So I tried his treatment.
I used a Acriflavin/Malachite Green "fungus" cure or "ick" cure. I also added some liquid "rid ich" about 2ml per gallon daily. The tabs or packets work for the first 2 days, every other day, but then I was adding them daily to keep the water green.
I did not feed for 1 day and then only 1x per day. I used Epsom salt in their tank, 1TBSP per ten gallons.
After 5 days of this treatment, they stopped hanging and started showing interest in food again. I did several PWC and added carbon to the water to get rid of all the chemicals, then I dosed with metronidazole and praziquentel and let it sit. Its been over a week and they are all acting normal, no stringy poo, no gasping or sittin on the bottom. They are back to mating and playing and begging for food like guppies are suppose to. I'm gonna continue feeding the metro food (I just dosed once with the powder, had all this on hand anyways from previous attempts) for about a week, then I'm gonna say their out of the woods.
Nobody on any forum I had knew of a cure to this disease, or even what it was, but many people said they had the same problem. Using shubel's method WORKED or it appears so far so good a week into my treatment and their acting o.k.
I hope this will help others with whatever (took a guppy to the vet for a biopsy. They found nothing in its intestines parasite wise. Cost me 45 bucks just for a microscope look at it, plus 6 months or more of frustration and wondering what this is and loosing guppies left and right. I was about to give up on the hobby. I will report back on this thread if they start showing signs of it again. My wife even said the fish at petsmart all had the same problem. Its like an outbreak or something that has been going around. I hope this helps some people at least attempt a cure.
 

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Rivieraneo
  • #2
Matt, sounds like the same flagellate that causes hexamita.
 

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Lucy
  • #3
That sounds great Matt.
Tanks for sharing your experience and what you have learned.

Please follow up and let us know if the success continues.
Sure hope it does!
 
Matt68046
  • Thread Starter
  • #4
Will do. Super excited to see the last few days they are behaving normally. So in the future, we just tell people to use Acriflavin and MG and salt. Seems like this has been going around lately in the guppy hobby, must have been an outbreak at one of the fish farms. It has been a cold winter as well, stressed fish get sick. Its weird that the guy at the vet did not see any hexitima, but he did say there was a lot of mucus. Maybe it was just too small (I culled a somewhat healthy one to give to him, maybe it was only eggs at that stage) Anyhow I'm super excited to know what to do to eradicate this pest in the future. It sure is stubborn.
 
Matt68046
  • Thread Starter
  • #5
Yep, actually just a few days ago I noticed some males whom I had moved into an old ten gallon without stearalizing it, came down with similar symptoms, I used Acriflavin/Malachite green for 5 days and 1 Tbsp per gallon epsom salt once, and it cured them. Some kind of weird parasite. Good to know a cure exists tho. yaay!
 
saipanstayathomemom
  • #6
I'm having the same problem with my guppies. Thanks for sharing!


 

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