Gill flukes on my tomato clowns

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
I recently bought a bubble tip anemone and a pair of small tomato clowns and immediately I noticed the fishes scratching, head twitching and rapid breathing. There is no any visual signs on the fish so I suspect it's gill flukes. My tank is 12 gallon, 8 months old. I transferred the anemone to a 5 gallon container with tank water and added a flow and light, and lowered my tank salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days to treat with hypo salinity. As per Humble fish, egg laying flukes require 30 days and live bearer require 2 weeks in hypo but what about gill flukes? Are they egg laying or live bearers? My country doesn't sell prazipro or general cure either and I can get copper safe but after 15 days of shipping. Any help is appreciated.
 

vetteguy53081

Well known Member and monster tank lover
View Badges
Joined
Aug 11, 2013
Messages
98,960
Reaction score
223,181
Location
Wisconsin -
Rating - 100%
15   0   0
I recently bought a bubble tip anemone and a pair of small tomato clowns and immediately I noticed the fishes scratching, head twitching and rapid breathing. There is no any visual signs on the fish so I suspect it's gill flukes. My tank is 12 gallon, 8 months old. I transferred the anemone to a 5 gallon container with tank water and added a flow and light, and lowered my tank salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days to treat with hypo salinity. As per Humble fish, egg laying flukes require 30 days and live bearer require 2 weeks in hypo but what about gill flukes? Are they egg laying or live bearers? My country doesn't sell prazipro or general cure either and I can get copper safe but after 15 days of shipping. Any help is appreciated.
Im seeing guesswork and while symptoms suggest flukes, it is not confirmed. Hyposalinity and FW dips are measures for temporary relief of flukes and will not eradicate flukes. True medication is Prazipro and I understand you're in India and you should be able to obtain and use API general cure which contains PraziPro Or Blue Planet Fluke treatment
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Im seeing guesswork and while symptoms suggest flukes, it is not confirmed. Hyposalinity and FW dips are measures for temporary relief of flukes and will not eradicate flukes. True medication is Prazipro and I understand you're in India and you should be able to obtain and use API general cure which contains PraziPro Or Blue Planet Fluke treatment
General cure is rarely available but no stock over here atm. I also have seachem paraguard ready right now. Would it be any useful if I add it along hypo? My clowns are really small and I don't want to stress them
 

fishywishy

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Jun 26, 2022
Messages
1,661
Reaction score
1,527
Location
Nunya business
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
General cure is rarely available but no stock over here atm. I also have seachem paraguard ready right now. Would it be any useful if I add it along hypo? My clowns are really small and I don't want to stress them
Paraguard doesn’t do anything against flukes. hypo should do the trick if its actually flukes.
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Both of them stopped eating today(day 1 of hypo). Is it normal for fish to stop eating when in hypo?
 

vetteguy53081

Well known Member and monster tank lover
View Badges
Joined
Aug 11, 2013
Messages
98,960
Reaction score
223,181
Location
Wisconsin -
Rating - 100%
15   0   0
General cure is rarely available but no stock over here atm. I also have seachem paraguard ready right now. Would it be any useful if I add it along hypo? My clowns are really small and I don't want to stress them
Hypo mainly at level 1.012 keeps fluke eggs from hatching, and again not always a cure. I have no faith in paraguard which is Aldehde based
 

vetteguy53081

Well known Member and monster tank lover
View Badges
Joined
Aug 11, 2013
Messages
98,960
Reaction score
223,181
Location
Wisconsin -
Rating - 100%
15   0   0
Both of them stopped eating today(day 1 of hypo). Is it normal for fish to stop eating when in hypo?
Yes, it can alter appetite and hypo is Not for all fish as some are highly stressed and clowns would be one I dont recommend hypo with.
 

Hot2na

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Mar 5, 2018
Messages
1,213
Reaction score
925
Rating - 100%
1   0   0
Fwiw : I usually go down to:1.010 salinity .. with no ill effects .. Fenbednazole is something you should look up also ..I use it soaked in food and treat 3 days with it.. in.combo with hypo ...
 

Jay Hemdal

10K Club member
View Badges
Joined
Jul 31, 2020
Messages
30,333
Reaction score
29,959
Location
Dundee, MI
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
I recently bought a bubble tip anemone and a pair of small tomato clowns and immediately I noticed the fishes scratching, head twitching and rapid breathing. There is no any visual signs on the fish so I suspect it's gill flukes. My tank is 12 gallon, 8 months old. I transferred the anemone to a 5 gallon container with tank water and added a flow and light, and lowered my tank salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days to treat with hypo salinity. As per Humble fish, egg laying flukes require 30 days and live bearer require 2 weeks in hypo but what about gill flukes? Are they egg laying or live bearers? My country doesn't sell prazipro or general cure either and I can get copper safe but after 15 days of shipping. Any help is appreciated.

Gill flukes are Dactylogyrids and are egg-layers. Since a positive diagnosis isn't possible without a microscope, you should always go with 30 days of hyposalinity to treat flukes.

That said, sometimes, sometimes, aggression between two clownfish can be confused with flukes; head shaking and rapid breathing for example. Do you know if these are tank raised clowns, or wild caught?
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Gill flukes are Dactylogyrids and are egg-layers. Since a positive diagnosis isn't possible without a microscope, you should always go with 30 days of hyposalinity to treat flukes.

That said, sometimes, sometimes, aggression between two clownfish can be confused with flukes; head shaking and rapid breathing for example. Do you know if these are tank raised clowns, or wild caught?
It's the tank raised one but unfortunately both of the clowns didn't make it. I brought down the salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days and the fishes died on the 2nd day of being at 1.012 They started to swim weirdly and died later that night. Maybe smaller clowns and more sensitive to hypo. Anyways today on Amazon when I was searching for prazi I came across "Fritz Prazi Cleanse". Is it any good or better then prazipro?
 

vetteguy53081

Well known Member and monster tank lover
View Badges
Joined
Aug 11, 2013
Messages
98,960
Reaction score
223,181
Location
Wisconsin -
Rating - 100%
15   0   0
It's the tank raised one but unfortunately both of the clowns didn't make it. I brought down the salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days and the fishes died on the 2nd day of being at 1.012 They started to swim weirdly and died later that night. Maybe smaller clowns and more sensitive to hypo. Anyways today on Amazon when I was searching for prazi I came across "Fritz Prazi Cleanse". Is it any good or better then prazipro?
While I support Hypo, this is the risk in which I recommend hypo for certain fish, not all. The smaller fish like clowns, damsels, gobies and basslets seems to struggle in low salinity.
 

Jay Hemdal

10K Club member
View Badges
Joined
Jul 31, 2020
Messages
30,333
Reaction score
29,959
Location
Dundee, MI
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
It's the tank raised one but unfortunately both of the clowns didn't make it. I brought down the salinity to 1.012 from 1.025 in 3 days and the fishes died on the 2nd day of being at 1.012 They started to swim weirdly and died later that night. Maybe smaller clowns and more sensitive to hypo. Anyways today on Amazon when I was searching for prazi I came across "Fritz Prazi Cleanse". Is it any good or better then prazipro?

Sorry to hear.

No - clowns of all sizes can handle hyposalinity - what happens though is with severe infections, the flukes drop off the fish during hypo, but there are so many holes in the fish's skin, that they cannot survive because they bleed out. There isn't any way around that though - if you don't treat, the fish die from flukes, if you do treat later in an infection, they die from blood loss. The trick is to catch it early on. I actually treat for flukes proactively, during quarantine, before the fish show symptoms.
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Sorry to hear.

No - clowns of all sizes can handle hyposalinity - what happens though is with severe infections, the flukes drop off the fish during hypo, but there are so many holes in the fish's skin, that they cannot survive because they bleed out. There isn't any way around that though - if you don't treat, the fish die from flukes, if you do treat later in an infection, they die from blood loss. The trick is to catch it early on. I actually treat for flukes proactively, during quarantine, before the fish show symptoms.
Thanks for the advice. The shop where I bought the fish have always had gill flukes on all of their fishes. This is the second time I am dealing with it , last time I had a pair of small clarkii clowns and I treated them with seachem paraguard but no use they died anyway.I can't get prazipro over here but have access to Fritz Prazi Cleanse. Anyone have any experience with prazi cleanse from fritz?
 

Jay Hemdal

10K Club member
View Badges
Joined
Jul 31, 2020
Messages
30,333
Reaction score
29,959
Location
Dundee, MI
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Thanks for the advice. The shop where I bought the fish have always had gill flukes on all of their fishes. This is the second time I am dealing with it , last time I had a pair of small clarkii clowns and I treated them with seachem paraguard but no use they died anyway.I can't get prazipro over here but have access to Fritz Prazi Cleanse. Anyone have any experience with prazi cleanse from fritz?

Prazi cleanse is essentially a copy of General Cure, it is praziquantel and metronidazole combined. It works against flukes, but unlike Prazipro, or pure Praziquantel, it is not reef safe due to the metronidazole.
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Prazi cleanse is essentially a copy of General Cure, it is praziquantel and metronidazole combined. It works against flukes, but unlike Prazipro, or pure Praziquantel, it is not reef safe due to the metronidazole.
Thanks for sharing your experience. It's so wrong that they mention it's safe for coral and inverts in their package.
 

Jay Hemdal

10K Club member
View Badges
Joined
Jul 31, 2020
Messages
30,333
Reaction score
29,959
Location
Dundee, MI
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Thanks for sharing your experience. It's so wrong that they mention it's safe for coral and inverts in their package.

It isn't a sure thing that it will kill invertebrates, but there is some risk involved. Metronidazole is not considered "reef safe".

Jay
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Hi, I bought another pair of tomato clowns today and they too are exhibiting same symptoms of flukes. So I thought I'll go with mardel copper safe this time since I fear hypo from what happened last time. The only thing is that there is no availability of copper test kits so would be okay if I remove the only 2 piece of rock in the tank and dose the copper as per the dosage mentioned?
 
OP
OP
Mighty Fish

Mighty Fish

New Member
View Badges
Joined
Sep 29, 2024
Messages
24
Reaction score
3
Location
India
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Prazi cleanse is essentially a copy of General Cure, it is praziquantel and metronidazole combined. It works against flukes, but unlike Prazipro, or pure Praziquantel, it is not reef safe due to the metronidazole.
I just went through their website and found that the combination of praziquantel and metronidazole is actually called Para Cleanse where as Prazi Cleanse is just pure Praziquantel, so I am wondering if I should go with these...
 

Jay Hemdal

10K Club member
View Badges
Joined
Jul 31, 2020
Messages
30,333
Reaction score
29,959
Location
Dundee, MI
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Hi, I bought another pair of tomato clowns today and they too are exhibiting same symptoms of flukes. So I thought I'll go with mardel copper safe this time since I fear hypo from what happened last time. The only thing is that there is no availability of copper test kits so would be okay if I remove the only 2 piece of rock in the tank and dose the copper as per the dosage mentioned?

Coppersafe isn’t really effective against flukes. If the tank has any calcareous material in it (coral sand for example) you can’t dose without a test kit because you’ll have no way of knowing how much copper remains. In a bare tank, with just PVC or other inert hiding places, if you know the exact water volume, you can dose coppersafe relatively safely without a test kit. You just redose any water change water for that volume.

Jay
 

TOP 10 Trending Threads

HOW OLD IS YOUR OLDEST FISH? (APPROXIMATELY)

  • Less than a year.

    Votes: 20 13.0%
  • 1-2 years.

    Votes: 25 16.2%
  • 3-5 years.

    Votes: 40 26.0%
  • 6-10 years.

    Votes: 34 22.1%
  • 10-15 years.

    Votes: 18 11.7%
  • 15-20 years.

    Votes: 5 3.2%
  • 20+ years.

    Votes: 9 5.8%
  • Other (please explain).

    Votes: 3 1.9%
Back
Top