When soaking frozen food with Metronidazole for use as a prophylactic treatment for Puffer parasites, Seachem's Metro didn't seem to dissolve in the water so I looked it up. It turns out that it isn't very water soluble (10 mg/ml), and I've found that 100mg won't come close to fully dissolving in 1 tbs of water, even if left overnight. Seachem says to mix it into a tbs of frozen food paste and feed the paste to the fish, but most puffers are not real fond of dry food. I'm not sure what frozen food paste is, or if it would hold together long enough to be eaten.
Is there a trick to getting this medication into a puffer in sufficient amounts to be effective? Our burrfish will both eat Hakari Sinking Carnivore pellets willingly if soaked in Metro, but spit out thawed krill where I've punctured the shells and mashed them with tweezers into the undissolved Metro at the bottom of the beaker. I suspect that in the former case they are not actually getting a sufficient dose, but in the latter they are, or am I wrong?
-R
Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
Forum rules
Read this before posting!!
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.
Read this before posting!!
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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FishFan
- Figure 8 Puffer
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Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
A = Anne, R =Robert
There has to be a point.
There has to be a point.
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DarkStorm
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Re: Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
have you tried injecting it into a shrimp?
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FishFan
- Figure 8 Puffer
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- Location: USA
Re: Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
Nope, but I was considering injecting a shrimp or an earth worm, but I'd need it to be dissolved, unless maybe a syringe with a large bore needle.DarkStorm wrote:have you tried injecting it into a shrimp?
I can't remember how I did this in the past, just that it was easy. I probably just soaked frozen krill and didn't notice that the stuff didn't seem to dissolve.
-R
A = Anne, R =Robert
There has to be a point.
There has to be a point.
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Pufferpunk
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Re: Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
Pretty sure you could get a larger bore needle into a earthworm.
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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Tripp
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Re: Feeding Metronidazole to Puffers
Not sure how big the fish is but with mine since he is finally eating again I have been injecting stuff into the clam meat strips we have been using.