GSP brown streamers (worms) coming from left gill

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Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.

1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.

2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.

3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)

4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.

5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.

We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.

While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.

Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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Re: GSP brown streamers (worms) coming from left gill

Post by lil fish »

Ok, So I tried burping her and nothing really happened. She's still kind of hangin around near the top of the tank and is very off balance when she swims down.
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Re: GSP brown streamers (worms) coming from left gill

Post by lil fish »

Upon stumbling over an article about rams disease, I further looked into whirling disease and the pictures I found on google look like Nan. I thought it was just the way she was trying to keep herself from floating back up but her tail is not straight even when shes just at the top. Is there somewhere I can go, or something I should be doing for this? I cant seem to find much on here about it except in non puffers. Thanks
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Re: GSP brown streamers (worms) coming from left gill

Post by Pufferpunk »

Did she puff with water when you burped her?
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...

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Re: GSP brown streamers (worms) coming from left gill

Post by nmonks »

If these are gill parasites, probably the best bet would be to maintain in marine conditions for a while -- that should kill off any freshwater parasites. After a few days of that, switch to freshwater -- that should kill off any saltwater parasites.

http://www.fishchannel.com/setups/ponds ... sites.aspx

There are various medications for gill parasites, they're probably not "worms" in any true sense of the word, but some sort of crustacean, anchor worm, or something along those lines. Hence dewormers won't work. Consult your vet for tips on handling these sorts of parasites.

Cheers, Neale
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