It's all @Paul B's fault... my journey to an immune reef (hopefully!)

[Gweeds1980]

Thanks - I guess I meant - how are you determining (or perhaps not just you but everyone) - what the best mix of protein, vitamins, fats and carbohydrates are for your fish. As the article I posted suggested - mixing a variety of stuff together doesn't make it nutritious or 'good' for the fish. Paul B specifically - what 'bacteria' are you trying to introduce.

If a fish eats other fish in the wild and you feed that fish whole fish then by happy coincidence they should be getting the full amount of nutrients in the correct ratios. Same applies for those that eat algae or inverts... most fish are omnivores in reality tho so I try to include equal amounts of fish, inverts and algae. Not very scientific but it seems to work

 

[MnFish1]

Immunity and resistance is a complex subject, i think what paul is trying to achieve is keeping his fish with as many antibodies present as possible. So if i understand correctly its like farmers catching cow pox and immune to small pox.
Side note.

The problem is that there is no reason to believe that feeding live food x gives immunity to an unrelated external parasite. And if a live food contains a parasite the only way immunity would be affected is if the fish was infected by the food in question. The only way an organism can obtain immunity to something it has eaten is if the barrier of the gi tract is broken. Otherwise if everything we eat caused an immune response it would be a bad situation. (in fact there is evidence that suggests that fish immune to one strain are not immune to others)

During the last couple of years rather much evidences has been shown that the bacterial content of the gastrointestinal tract has a huge importance for the wellbeing of humans including the immune system - so its not impossible. Sincerely Lasse

Agree Lasse. Each hunan and presumably fish has its own microbiome in their gi tract. The fish or person tolerates these organisms and it is a beneficial relationship for both. There is no evidence in people or fish that (unless the microbiome is disturbed let’s say by antibiotics) that it needs to be constantly replenished by keeping fish in conditions where they are constantly exposed to new live bacteria.

 

[MnFish1]

Just like with people, fish have both an innate and an adaptive immune system. Unfortunately for fish, the adaptive immune system is only highly effective for around 6 months. If a fish that was immune to Ich isn't subjected to Ich for a year it will respond just like a naïve fish would. The method to the madness of trying to constantly add new parasites/pathogens is to both broaden the exposure and to ensure any strains that may have died out are re-introduced.

As an interesting aside, it has been shown that reproductive rates have a strong impact on immunity. Animals that lay thousands of eggs tend to have a shorter "immune memory" than animals with much smaller reproductive rates.

I agree with you in part. There is information concerning CI for example that the immune starts to fade after 6 months. There is not evidence that this is true for other organisms. In some fish certain organisms require 2 exposures to a foreign invader to create long term immunity. It is very complex as you and Garth have said. The problem with your logic is that it’s well known that there is not great cross immunity between different strains of ich firstly. And secondly there is no reason to believe that a healthy cod used as fish food has ich. Thirdly eating an external parasite does not invoke an immune response

 

[Paul B]

The problem is that there is no reason to believe that feeding live food x gives immunity to an unrelated external parasite. And if a live food contains a parasite the only way immunity would be affected is if the fish was infected by the food in question. The only way an organism can obtain immunity to something it has eaten is if the barrier of the gi tract is broken. Otherwise if everything we eat caused an immune response it would be a bad situation. (in fact there is evidence that suggests that fish immune to one strain are not immune to others)

That is true with people, but not fish. Fish get their immunity by means of their kidney, unlike most of us. The parasite, bacteria or virus gets detected in the kidney and antibodies are made and exuded in their slime. The more parasites in their water, the better for their immune system.
Fish will also be immune from similar parasites they eat, unlike us. Fish in the sea eat parasites at every meal because the sea is full of them. In my tank the parasites keep living and keep trying to infect my fish, but they never will and never have in 4 decades.

How many times on one thread do I have to link this:

Ref: Copyright © 2012 María Ángeles Esteban. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
(ISRN ImmunologyVolume 2012 (2012), Article ID 853470, 29 pageshttp://dx.doi.org/10.5402/2012/853470Review ArticleAn Overview of the Immunological Defenses in Fish SkinMaría Ángeles Esteban)
Quote: Immunity associated with the parasites depends on the inhabiting discrete sites in the host. Especially important for this paper are the ectoparasites, those habiting in or on the skin. Until recently there had been little direct evidence of innate immune mechanisms against parasites associated with mucosal epithelium [285]. The active immunological role of skin against parasitic infection has been shown recently [286–288], and now mucosal immunity against them start to be elucidated.
Non-parasitic fishes usually die following infection, but animals surviving sublethal parasite exposure become resistant to subsequent challenge. This resistance correlates with the presence of humoral antibodies in the sera and cutaneous mucus of immune fishes.
According to these authors "probiotic for aquaculture is a live, dead or component of a microbial cell that, when administered via the feed or to the rearing water, benefits the host by improving either disease resistance, health status, growth performance, feed utilisation, stress response or general vigour, which is achieved at least in part via improving the hosts or the environmental microbial balance."The first demonstration that probiotics can protect fishes against surface infections was against Aeromonas bestiarum and Ichthyophthirius multifiliis in rainbow trout [330]. The research on this topic is considered of high priority at present because enriched diets could be used as preventive or curative therapies for farmed fishes. End Quote

And read this about how nutrition affects immunity and how a fishes immune system works.
:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0145305X17301118

 

[jasonrusso]

That is true with people, but not fish. Fish get their immunity by means of their kidney, unlike most of us. The parasite, bacteria or virus gets detected in the kidney and antibodies are made and exuded in their slime. The more parasites in their water, the better for their immune system.
Fish will also be immune from similar parasites they eat, unlike us. Fish in the sea eat parasites at every meal because the sea is full of them. In my tank the parasites keep living and keep trying to infect my fish, but they never will and never have in 4 decades.

Paul, you swear by black worms and white worm to supply the good bacteria. How does this work? The worms are freshwater so how do they supply the needed nutrition?

I'm not disagreeing, but I don't understand

 

[Paul B]

The worms supply living bacteria which the fish needs to keep it's immune system working. I am not sure how much nutrition a worm supplies to a fish, especially a fresh water worm but I know they work through experience. I am going to tell you the story about blackworms that I have told untold times. (I have linked articles many many times about gut bacteria and it's affect on disease)

In 1971 I started my tank with 7 blue devils. They always had ich and I had to keep copper pennies in the water. They were always on the verge of dying.
In a year or two I started feeding live blackworms. In a few weeks the fish became very blue and one of them (the male) became all blue, even his fins while the females remained with clear fins. Ich disappeared and I did not have to add pennies to the water any more.

The fish spawned and kept spawning every few days for the 7 years I had them. Ever since then, I added live worms almost every day and eventually all my fish became immune. It took a few years because in the 70s I didn't have any other foods to feed the fish and I was stupidly still feeding flakes as that was all I could get then. There was no salt water food.

Now, in spite of all the negative ideas and people telling me my fish don't get sick because I use Ozone, or collect mud, or add amphipods from the sea or my fish are not the type of fish that are susceptible to ich, or the parasites are getting stuck in my UG filter and the big one, I am lucky. I get those things almost every day and they are always invariably from people without immune fish so they have to go on disease threads. They don't understand immunity so they attribute it to all sorts of things. But being I am the owner of my tank and have not had problems since the early 70s I think I can say for sure if my fish are immune or not and the reason.
People also say feeding the correct foods will not get fish immune, and that is correct, but they fail to read the rest of it which includes parasites and other pathogens.

But that is off the topic.

Here is that male over his nest of eggs in that barnacle shell


Here are those blue devil eggs, and that was in the 70s.. before most people could spell blue devil.
It is no big Woop to spawn blue devils now, but then no one could even keep them so it was like going to the moon...Kind of, but not exactly. Going to the moon was easier.



Many people started in this hobby last Tuesday so to them everything is new. Look at this page from my log book and see what type of fish I was keeping then. I wasn't to good at it because I lost a lot of fish, but no one else knew about them either.

 

[MnFish1]

That is true with people, but not fish. Fish get their immunity by means of their kidney, unlike most of us. The parasite, bacteria or virus gets detected in the kidney and antibodies are made and exuded in their slime. The more parasites in their water, the better for their immune system.
Fish will also be immune from similar parasites they eat, unlike us. Fish in the sea eat parasites at every meal because the sea is full of them. In my tank the parasites keep living and keep trying to infect my fish, but they never will and never have in 4 decades.

There is an immune function in fish kidneys. But - as stated in the article (below) - there is also thymus, spleen and mucosal lymphoid tissue. The immune system in vertebrates is remarkably similar. In fish - Antibodies tend to be IgM - as compared to IgG.

"An overview of the morphology of the immune system in teleost fishes is given drawing principally on studies in only a few species. The major lymphoid tissues in teleost fishes are the kidney, thymus, spleen and mucosa-associated lymphoid tissues including the skin and gills"
The morphology of the immune system in teleost fish | Request PDF. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/public...rphology_of_the_immune_system_in_teleost_fish[accessed Jan 30 2018]."

According to these authors "probiotic for aquaculture is a live, dead or component of a microbial cell that, when administered via the feed or to the rearing water, benefits the host by improving either disease resistance, health status, growth performance, feed utilisation, stress response or general vigour, which is achieved at least in part via improving the hosts or the environmental microbial balance."The first demonstration that probiotics can protect fishes against surface infections was against Aeromonas bestiarum and Ichthyophthirius multifiliis in rainbow trout [330]. The research on this topic is considered of high priority at present because enriched diets could be used as preventive or curative therapies for farmed fishes. End Quote

There is no data that suggests (including the article you posted) that 'having more parasites in the water the better for their immune system. The article that you post also does not suggest that 'the more parasites they eat the more immune they become'. The article suggests that specific probiotics in specific fish can improve their immune system. (against Freshwater Ich and Aeromonas). Assuming that this study has been reproduced (and even if not) I believe it. but It does not support what you say. you are not feeding a specific probiotic formula. You are feeding random live foods.

 

[MnFish1]

The worms supply living bacteria which the fish needs to keep it's immune system working. I am not sure how much nutrition a worm supplies to a fish, especially a fresh water worm but I know they work through experience. I am going to tell you the story about blackworms that I have told untold times. (I have linked articles many many times about gut bacteria and it's affect on disease)

There is no evidence for this. Paul - Im not arguing with your success in keeping the type of aquarium you want to keep. So dont take this disparagingly. Im only arguing that your rationale behind it does not make sense. It reminds me of the old 'Jack Wattley" discus articles that suggested that his magic forumla and suggestions - were 'true'. In fact many have been debunked. This again is neither an insult to him or you.

 

[MnFish1]

Quote: Immunity associated with the parasites depends on the inhabiting discrete sites in the host. Especially important for this paper are the ectoparasites, those habiting in or on the skin. Until recently there had been little direct evidence of innate immune mechanisms against parasites associated with mucosal epithelium [285]. The active immunological role of skin against parasitic infection has been shown recently [286–288], and now mucosal immunity against them start to be elucidated.

This is also from the article you posted - it says that immunity developes by ectoparasites inhabiting discrete sites in the host - the skin. It does not suggest that fish 'eating' parasites provides any kind of immunity. It specifically states that skin infection is needed to promote immunity.

 

[Paul B]

There is no data that suggests (including the article you posted) that 'having more parasites in the water the better for their immune system.

That was all me. And I still believe it. The rest of the stuff you dispute I didn't make up as it took me a long time to research all of that. Unfortunately I am going to the dentist now, then to therapy for my back that doesn't seem to have any immunity so I willbuy some worms on my way home to seeif I can fix it myself. I will get back to this

 

[MaccaPopEye]

How long after exposing a fish to a tank with velvet would you expect to see symptoms or call it resistant/possibly immune?

It's now been 6 months since my velvet wipe out and the blue tang and black cardinal that survived are still going strong (no signs of ich or velvet since). They have been in the tank the whole time and as the tank didn't go fallow velvet should still be present. A bit over 2 weeks ago I added a tiny scribbled angel that came more or less direct form the ocean (it would have been a bit stressed as it had spent a couple of days in a tiny amount of water) but so far it's is doing well and showing no sings of being sick or having velvet or ich.

This weekend I should be able to pick up a cheap blender and start making a DIY fresh food mix (I'll likely use some mix of prawns, squid, some kind of fatty fish and some fish guts if I can get it from the fish market). Does anyone have any suggestions for types of places that I can try and get some black worms? I'm not able to find anyone that is advertising them for sale locally and the only LFS (a bad chain store) doesn't sell them.

I still haven't had time to start doing any NSW water changes but I have picked up 2x 220L barrels so I can get almost 500L at a time. Next on the list is a petrol fire pump so I can fill them up but hopefully in the mean time I can borrow one from another local reefer.

There is a low tide in a couple of days too, if I find any I'll grab some ghost shrimp and/or small crabs to add to the DIY fish food

 

[Paul B]

(I'll likely use some mix of prawns, squid, some kind of fatty fish and some fish guts if I can get it from the fish market)

I would not use prawns or squid. Get shellfish instead like clams, mussels or oysters. Much better.

 

[MaccaPopEye]

I would not use prawns or squid. Get shellfish instead like clams, mussels or oysters. Much better.

Thanks for the tip, I'll do that instead. They are usually a bit more expensive here but were aren't talking large quantities anyway haha. I should be able to get all of it more or less straight off the boat.

What about small ghost shrimp & crabs from tide pools? Yay or nay?

 

[CNDReef]

I’d be careful with the crabs unless you know what type they are and know they won’t touch anything.

 

[MaccaPopEye]

I’d be careful with the crabs unless you know what type they are and know they won’t touch anything.

I don't think they will touch anything if they are blended up in a DIY fish food mix

Most of the crabs in my local inter-tidal area would defs go for fish if I did put them into the tank though (some of the bigger ones have even tried to have a go at my feet when walking through the tide pools haha)

 

[Paul B]

You could blend them if you like but shrimp and crabs are a lot of shell. Shellfish are the best as there is no waste and they are loaded with nutrients and gut bacteria.

 

[MnFish1]

That was all me. And I still believe it. The rest of the stuff you dispute I didn't make up as it took me a long time to research all of that. Unfortunately I am going to the dentist now, then to therapy for my back that doesn't seem to have any immunity so I willbuy some worms on my way home to seeif I can fix it myself. I will get back to this

I feel your pain. Maybe your back is autoimmunewhich means the worms will make it worse

 

[Paul B]

LOL, they are giving me these nerve block pills that are also used for depression, but I don't have any depression and am very happy (even if I have to explain my success a thousand times whenever someone comes up with a new scenario and I have PTSD )

The pills also make me tired, but I can't be tired because I am moving soon and will need a lot of energy. While I am moving I won't come on here to prove all sorts of silly things. I will just get older with my tank until we fade away under the big UG filter in the sky.

 

[MnFish1]

LOL, they are giving me these nerve block pills that are also used for depression, but I don't have any depression and am very happy (even if I have to explain my success a thousand times whenever someone comes up with a new scenario and I have PTSD )

The pills also make me tired, but I can't be tired because I am moving soon and will need a lot of energy. While I am moving I won't come on here to prove all sorts of silly things. I will just get older with my tank until we fade away under the big UG filter in the sky.

Hopefully not

 

[atoll]

I use fresh prawns and squid along with clams and mussels etc. Squid as a lot of oil in it I am told. However I also add fish oil to all my DIY foods. Variety is the spice of life.