Best treatment for internal parasites?

[vwill279]

My female guppy had a long stringy white poop today, about 3 days after I fed that tank some live blackworms. I've never had to treat for internal parasites before and she is the only one in the tank with symptoms, but I'm worried the others might have them too since the whole tank got blackworms from the same batch. I would like to treat the entire tank, but I have fry in that tank (2 day old free swimming kribensis and some nearly mature swordtail) as well as MTS snails and horned nerite snails. I just did a large water change (2nd this week) and all my parameters are good. The tank is a 38 gallon medium planted. There are 2 adult kribs, at least 20 of their fry (they are hiding in caves, I cant get a good count), 15 nearly mature swordtail fry, 3 guppies, 5 adult swordtails, 5 nerites, and god knows how many MTS. I was going to take the swordtail fry to auction in a couple of weeks and I want to make sure they are healthy before they go.

My questions are as follows:

What is the best treatment for internal parasites? I cant seem to find the thread that I read a few months ago about it.
Will said treatment hurt my fry or snails?
Should I treat the whole tank or move the female guppy to a quarantine tank and just treat her since she is the only one showing any symptoms?

Thanks!

 

[Manafel]

Blackworms are nasty things, unless your cultivatig your own. Since you have fry and young fish, feeding them food soaked in garlic juice will help. I'm not sure if you should use actual medication considering how sensitive fry are.

 

[mykidsmylife]

I think if you are going to treat her I would move her over to a QT and then treat her. The others you could treat with garlic in their food.
I read on here at some point how to use garlic and it's how I do it...I wish I knew who to give credit to this but buy some inexpensive garlic capsules...like you would take. Inside the gel cap is this liquid paste like garlic that I just clip the end of the capsule off and squeeze a bit of it into the flake or pellets and mix it up with a toothpick. I let it sit for a few minutes then feed it. I had some issues with stringy poo on some female guppies and that seemed to handle the situation. The fish aren't crazy about it, but will eat enough to get some benefit.

For the other, what I usually dose with is PraziPro. It has praziquantel in it which is a common worming medicine for a lot of critters. It works. I'm sure there are many out there with similar ingredients. I think there are even some little inexpensive tablets you could drop in that you get at Walmart.

 

[mykidsmylife]

Blackworms are nasty things, unless your cultivatig your own. Since you have fry and young fish, feeding them food soaked in garlic juice will help. I'm not sure if you should use actual medication considering how sensitive fry are.

I think your situation has scared me off blackworms for good!!:crazy: Scary stuff.

 

[vwill279]

I've been using live blackworms from the same LFS for 6 months and have never had an issue. They are the only things besides snails that my dwarf puffers will eat. I think I may try to set up my own cultivation for them and just do frozen for the rest of my tanks from now on though.

 

[Manafel]

I think your situation has scared me off blackworms for good!!:crazy: Scary stuff.

I know! I'm petrified of them now, so I don't support feeding them if they are from a lfs at all. You just never know what your getting when you buy live food from somewhere. If you cultivate your own, more power to you though!

 

[constevens]

As far as medications that work GREAT. Use API General Cure. The stuff works fantastic. I use a QT and then dose the QT as per. It takes about 4 to 5 days. Ive had great luck and its not harsh on fish.

I avoid feeding any live Blackworms or even bloodworms period. to many possible issues. About the only live anything i feed anymore might be some live brine shrimp. If I want to feed blood worms I get quality frozen.

 

[Fozzybear]

+1 on the general cure, it may kill some babies though. I think I need to finally bite the gross bullet and get myself an insect farm going....:barf:
there's nothing like feeding live to perk a fish up, and nothing like feeding gross infested live food to make them dead up.

 

[vwill279]

Thanks for all the info. I quarantined her, and treated her with the API general cure, but she isnt doing well at all this morning: sitting vertically at the surface breathing hard. She isnt eating either. She gave birth the night before I noticed the stringy poop, so now I'm wondering if something went wrong there or she was just too tired from her labor to fight. I'm hoping she turns around, but she was an adult when I got her from the pet store and I've had her for over a year now, so age might be playing a role too.

I soaked the flakes for the rest of the fish in garlic, since I didnt want to risk my fry. They ate it, but not with nearly as much enthusiasm as I usually get. I havent noticed any symptoms among any other fish so I'm hoping they're all healthy and stay that way. I refuse to auction sick fish and I dont have the space to keep these swords when they become adults.

 

[Manafel]

Do you have enough aeration in the qt tank? Or is your filter agitating the water enough? It says on the general cure box that it is suggested to increase aeration during treatment.