White poo poo!

Hi everyone...

We received an email from a distraught hobbyist today and I would like to share it with all..

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Hi there,

I need a help to save my "kimo" flower-horn fish.
About 3weeks ago, he stops eating and I have notice that his color is becoming dull, he is not as happy and aggressive as he used to be.
He stops eating for the past 2weeks and his waste looks like a long soft white tread, about 2-3 inches long.

I have tried to feed him some feeder fish, but this did not work as he does not take or like to eat them.

I check on the water temperature and it is about 75 to 80 deg. F. (safe zone?)
A pet-shop vendor told me that it cold be the water temp, as we have a cold weather recently in Hawaii and he recommend to put a heater.
Also, he sold me a Furazone Green capsules to put in the water...seems not working.

I really want to save Kimo as he is my loving fish, I want to see him back in a happy condition.

Please advise what to do. Again, any help and suggestion to this is highly appreciated.

Worried Flower-horn fish friend.
Eugene

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Hi Eugene...

This is a very common case of bacteria infecting the fish's stomach. You would need antibiotics to treat it and its called metronidazole . You will have to mix the white powder with hot water, wait for it to cool down and pump it into the mouth twice a day. Just use a syringe without the needle (or what ever you call that) and shove it into the fish's mouth as deep as you can. You will have to squeeze its gills together so that the medicine does not flow out from there. Then pump as much as possible into the stomach.

Do this twice a day, and remember to raise the temperature of the tank to about 30 celcius. Do this for about 4-5 days. Start feeding the fish only after 3 days, and check if the fish eats. Check its faeces to see if the white stringy poo is still visible. Continue this until you see that the poo is dark in color and it is considered healed.

This method is not guaranteed to work but it has worked for us lots of times. Or you can read a little on other treatment methods such as here http://www.wetwebmedia.com/metranidazole.htm
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/VM053

Hope this helps....Al.

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Thank you. I would like to grow another one, but not sooner coz I want to make sure that I will be a good pet keeper next time.
Anyway, do you know why the fish gets this illness? I want to prevent this next time rather than getting into the same situation and curing or saving the fish mode...
Sinecrely thank you.
Thank you.

Hi Eugene..

This often happens when the fishes' immune system is low thus getting the infection easily. There is always a multitude of bacteria, protozoa, viruses, etc in the water but if your fish is healthy the chances of it getting infected is low.

Most of the time, it is because of bad water quality, stress or foreign pathogens that is introduced into the water by feeder fish or live food. Sometimes it is also the food that you feed your fish, which consists of protein that is not easily systhesized by the fish's digestive system.
You can find out a little more about proteins here.

Hope this helps, and pls post on the thread/blog here if you have more questions. This way all other readers can benefit from it.. Thanks and good luck!

Al