I seek help. I don't know what this is or what to do. For the last few months all of my clown loaches have developed black spots all over themselves.
Here's a pic.-
I think this is black spot disease. This pic is of my avg clown loach, some of my clowns have many more black spots covering them. It's really hard to get good pic's of them to show how bad the black spots really look up close. I have had no fish deaths due to the black spots, so I'm not in panic mode yet.
Water Parameters-
Temp- 78.7 degree's F.
pH- 6.95
Kh-7 d/125ppm
NH3/NH4- 0
NO2-0
NO3-10
Cu- less than .5
Tanks- 95g, 90g, 85g, and 33g connected together with water-bridges. 300 gallons total.
The tanks/filters are well cycled the oldest about 3 years old. The filters I use are in my tank spec's below.
The complete story-
During Febuary, I recieved 2 clown loaches that I think hosted the black spots disease when I got them. I think they were the hosts because they were completely covered with black spots when I got them. (I got them from Aquabid, so I didn't see them before I actually got them) Soon after I took them out of Quarantine the rest of my clowns got infected. I screwed up by taking them out of Quarantine too early and screwed even more by hooking up the Q-tank (the 33g tank) with a water-bridge to my other tanks. I had these clowns Q'd for 4 weeks with no signs of ich. The Black spots did start to go away while I dewormed them with Pipezine in the Q-tank, but little did I know that I was dealing with these parasitic flukes called Black Spot.
When I 1st noticed the black spot outbreak in my main tanks, I treated all my tanks with Coppersafe. I continued the Coppersafe treatment for about 1 month with no noticable improvement, I think it actually got worse. Then I tried “Black Spot Control”, which is a dip medication by Aquatronics.(Aquatronic is now out of business and all their products have been pulled off the shelves) I then waited another month and treated all the tanks with Trifon. I've been using the Trifon for 2 weeks now.
http://www.novalek.com/kpd76.htm
I'm not sure what my next coarse of action should be. I recently purchased a new 190g tank. I don't want to set-up the new tank until I get rid of this problem.
I've been doing 2 -60g water changes per week for more than a few months now and I clean all my filters about once every other week. If it's a water quality issue I'd be very surprised because I had no problems until I introduced these new clowns with the black spots.
Here’s some additional info I found on how to treat black spot, from-http://www.novalek.com/kfaq.htm
Question #10: How do I get rid of an infection of black spots on fishes?
Answer: The medication of choice is Kordon's Trifon, containing trichlorfon. Many kinds of fishes may be found to have tiny black spots the size of a pinhead up to 1 mm in diameter on various parts of their body, such as in their skin on the head and body, inside their mouth, on their gill arches, and on their fins. The black spots are caused by the adult cercaria life stage of parasitic flukes, which are digenetic trematode worms, occurring when the mature female penetrates the skin of the host fish and lays or secretes thin flexible egg sacs called cysts. These cysts become surrounded by the fish's skin tissue. The black spots are caused by the development of the metacercaria life stage of the flukes in the cysts which accumulate black pigment cells (melanophores) around them. The metacercaria hatch out into free-swimming young. In those trematodes with the simplest life history, the young mature, the sexes copulate, and the female lays her eggs in the fish's skin. In most of the marine aquarium fishes with black spot disease, there has to be an intermediary host, such as a particular species of mollusk. Most cases of marine aquarium fishes having black spot disease have been wild caught within the previous month or two and are bringing the infection into the aquarium. Crowded aquarium conditions with resultant stress in the fishes aid in the transmission of the parasite. For treatment procedures see the Kordon Product Data Sheet for Trifon.
Here's a pic.-
I think this is black spot disease. This pic is of my avg clown loach, some of my clowns have many more black spots covering them. It's really hard to get good pic's of them to show how bad the black spots really look up close. I have had no fish deaths due to the black spots, so I'm not in panic mode yet.
Water Parameters-
Temp- 78.7 degree's F.
pH- 6.95
Kh-7 d/125ppm
NH3/NH4- 0
NO2-0
NO3-10
Cu- less than .5
Tanks- 95g, 90g, 85g, and 33g connected together with water-bridges. 300 gallons total.
The tanks/filters are well cycled the oldest about 3 years old. The filters I use are in my tank spec's below.
The complete story-
During Febuary, I recieved 2 clown loaches that I think hosted the black spots disease when I got them. I think they were the hosts because they were completely covered with black spots when I got them. (I got them from Aquabid, so I didn't see them before I actually got them) Soon after I took them out of Quarantine the rest of my clowns got infected. I screwed up by taking them out of Quarantine too early and screwed even more by hooking up the Q-tank (the 33g tank) with a water-bridge to my other tanks. I had these clowns Q'd for 4 weeks with no signs of ich. The Black spots did start to go away while I dewormed them with Pipezine in the Q-tank, but little did I know that I was dealing with these parasitic flukes called Black Spot.
When I 1st noticed the black spot outbreak in my main tanks, I treated all my tanks with Coppersafe. I continued the Coppersafe treatment for about 1 month with no noticable improvement, I think it actually got worse. Then I tried “Black Spot Control”, which is a dip medication by Aquatronics.(Aquatronic is now out of business and all their products have been pulled off the shelves) I then waited another month and treated all the tanks with Trifon. I've been using the Trifon for 2 weeks now.
http://www.novalek.com/kpd76.htm
I'm not sure what my next coarse of action should be. I recently purchased a new 190g tank. I don't want to set-up the new tank until I get rid of this problem.
I've been doing 2 -60g water changes per week for more than a few months now and I clean all my filters about once every other week. If it's a water quality issue I'd be very surprised because I had no problems until I introduced these new clowns with the black spots.
Here’s some additional info I found on how to treat black spot, from-http://www.novalek.com/kfaq.htm
Question #10: How do I get rid of an infection of black spots on fishes?
Answer: The medication of choice is Kordon's Trifon, containing trichlorfon. Many kinds of fishes may be found to have tiny black spots the size of a pinhead up to 1 mm in diameter on various parts of their body, such as in their skin on the head and body, inside their mouth, on their gill arches, and on their fins. The black spots are caused by the adult cercaria life stage of parasitic flukes, which are digenetic trematode worms, occurring when the mature female penetrates the skin of the host fish and lays or secretes thin flexible egg sacs called cysts. These cysts become surrounded by the fish's skin tissue. The black spots are caused by the development of the metacercaria life stage of the flukes in the cysts which accumulate black pigment cells (melanophores) around them. The metacercaria hatch out into free-swimming young. In those trematodes with the simplest life history, the young mature, the sexes copulate, and the female lays her eggs in the fish's skin. In most of the marine aquarium fishes with black spot disease, there has to be an intermediary host, such as a particular species of mollusk. Most cases of marine aquarium fishes having black spot disease have been wild caught within the previous month or two and are bringing the infection into the aquarium. Crowded aquarium conditions with resultant stress in the fishes aid in the transmission of the parasite. For treatment procedures see the Kordon Product Data Sheet for Trifon.
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