The Puffer Forum

Hey all, it's been a few months since I've been on. I don't have internet anymore. My turgidus is doing great, he's four inches now and eating well. My DP's are also well. My discus aren't, however. Here's the what's going on.
The discus in question is a five inch, tank raised, blue from wild parents. He is currently housed in a 46 gallon with a six inch whiptail catfish and two full grown otocinclus affinis. The tank is heavely planted. Here are it's stats: pH is 6.6, ammonia is 0, nitrites are 0, nitrates are between 5 and 10, the dh is 3, the temperature is 84 degrees. There have never been any medications in the tank. I soften the water with API's water softener pillows and Tetra's blackwater extract.
The discus came from the store I work at. We had it along with one other, for three months, it ate well, showed gorgeous coloration and was very active. I then sold it to myself. I've had it now for about a month. In the last week he's completely stopped eating, he's turned black and is not moving. The same thing is happening to the other blue I brought in with him.
I know that he has a parasite of some sort. Unfortunately my employers still won't buy me a nice microscope so I'm left here to guess what the problem is. His feces was stringy until about ten days ago, now it is. The beginning of his fecal strands were healthy brownish and composed half of the feces excreted, then would fade into a transparent mucous-like area between 3mm and 6mm, into an opaque area roughly half the length of the mucous area.
I have also noticed one pus sac half way between his left eye and the beginning of his dorsal fin.
This discus is nearly dead now. I've accepted the fact that he is going to die. What I'm worried about now is the juveniles that I have in another tank that were at one point in the same holding tank he was in. I don't want them to suffer the same fate. Any help would be greatly appreciated by me and my discus.
I have access to just about every medication on the market, I just some tips as to what it could be. I believe that it is either a protozoan infection of the gut, or nematodes, but in all honesty I'm too concerned to be considered rational at this point.

What was he eating? I don't think it will transfer to the others. But I hope all goes better.

All the foods I'll list are made by Omega One. Tropical Flakes, Color Flakes, Veggie Flakes, Marine Flakes with garlic, Frozen Brine Shrimp, and Frozen Mysis. He also ate Hikari's frieze dried brine and bloodworms.

I'd use Flubenol-15 on him, it was designed for discus.

You won't have time to get Flubenol from Europe. Hit him with Prazi. My friend is a big-time discus breeder & he uses it on all of them.

I soften the water with API's water softener pillows and Tetra's blackwater extract.

Not necessary at all for a tank-bred discus, it was born in tap water. Don't waste your $$$. Remove that & slowly raise the pH w/water changes. Also, raise the temp to 86.

How large of weekly water change are you doing?

Personally, I wouldnt touch any praziquantel based meds with a very long stick.

With discus, if its got IP it can take ages for them to get really ill, if you want some flubendazole based meds that is the most effective treatment, pm me, it usually takes about a week, two at most to get there

Prazi is what my long-term discus breeder friend uses on all new fish that come in. Better than letting the discus die. I've seen him bring near-death fish back w/that stuff.

PraziPro works great ime.

Pufferpunk wrote:

How large of weekly water change are you doing?

20%
I do use prazipro on many fish that come in the store. All said and done I've been pleased with it's effectiveness. It usually takes two doses over the course of ten or so days. At this point, however, I'm not sure what the IP's are. So, I've been torn over whether to use Prazi, Metronidazole, or Furan. Although, I am leaning towards worms as being the main culprit.

Praazi would take care of all of them. Should be doing 80-90% weekly. Discus breeders do 100% daily.

Pufferpunk wrote:Praazi would take care of all of them. Should be doing 80-90% weekly. Discus breeders do 100% daily.

Some do, some don't. I believe that 80 or 90 is excessive for a display tank. The tank is heavily planted and I haven't had recorded levels of nitrAtes in quite some time. I did end up treating with Prazi and all is well now. The fish are eating well now and have improved in demeanor. I have also been doing slightly larger and more frequent water changes to bring the hardness and pH up. The KH is now around 10 dh and the pH is 6.8 - 6.9. Thanks for the help.