Columnaris

[mel_20_20]

Addendum to my post above: Maracyn and Maracyn 2 are antibiotics that are dosed everyday, and they don't instruct you to do water changes daily, nevertheless, those two products have their immediate beneficial impact after the dose and for a few hours and then break down. There is no cumulative benefit to increasing levels of those two in the tank. Daily water changes and then fresh doses of this combo provide optimum benefit.

If the fish keeper just can not do daily water changes then at least every other day, along with close monitoring of the parameters and dosing with Prime to handle any detectable levels of ammonia or nitrite.

 

[mel_20_20]

Sorry for being so long-winded.

 

[Cerianthus]

I beg your pardon!
I really did not know some members were/are with biochemistry/biopharmaceutic background or in related fields.

Like I said, One should just follow instructions on each individual/specific medication rather than deciding on their own and/or following recommendation by others (I admit it did justice sometimes though).
I have not gone wrong following recommeded dosage and frequency of wc during and/or b/n treatment.

On the other hand, I dont think I ever written negative statement in reference to salt as I used just salt to cure many fish illness. Although time consuming and amt will/should vary dpending on type of fish/illness and phases/stages of diseases, I am a firm believer of using salt full time majority of commonly kept fish. Of course, there exception. But again, that should be each keeper's perogative.

As far as comments by manufacturers, NO comments as I would rather rely on my colleagues who are still active in pharmaceutics and my over two decades old Merck Manual for informations. Ive spoken to enough reps from manufacturers in my time to many disappointed/unsatified answers/replies to my specific questions. Once again, this is from my experiences.

If need further info, I will try to obtain abstracts from any fish pathology research when possible (TG for internet, lol!). And often enough, I may have to reread my old text books to understand whats written on the abstract, that is if i can find some.
That's when my old colleagues come in, to fulfill my lost memory!!!

I usually dont post in details most times as diagnosing thru pics are very difficult, if not, an impossible task in certain cases. I would rather give someone a possible direction (Educated Guess) where they can perform follow ups thus could make better/correct decisions.

I have posted many occasions that reading books and/or copying off other written articles is one thing but experiences (understanding how it happened with each individual case) is another crucial part of successfuf treaments and fish keeping in general. Therefore keeping record of all the events is crucial part of understanding why it happened or is happening, IMHO.

Bottom line, just follow the instruction on the pkg. Difficult lies in correctly diagnosing the illness to begin with, IMO.

btw, even with similar pics provided, it could be something simple oe same to untrained eyes but it could be totally different diseases to trained eyes. Please, in no way I am claiming to be trained eyes. Rather I will ask many questions, as many of our members do, in order to understand the scenario which led to illness before posting..

 

[mel_20_20]

Applie, how are things going? Please give us an update on your sick fish. I hope things are better. Let us know when you can.

 

[Rbishop]

I really hope your treatment regime goes well and the fish recover.

For me, I have a slightly different standpoint, while wholeheartedly agreeing with mel_20_20.

IF it is columnaris, it is not worth treating for me, even though I know some folks have done so successfully. The eventual risk is to great, IMO.

The entire tank would be euthanized, broken down, disinfected and set back up.