Rainbow forktails gasping and dying

[Lennie]

Hey guys,

I am creating this topic for my friend @Gorkem

He has been having issues lately with his fish, as they were starting to gasp and end up dying one by one. This seems to occur only on one fish at a time.

This is his tank:

 

 

This is the reaction of fish:

 

I personally thought It may be due to one of the following reasons:

1- High plant content, low surface agitation. Fish having struggle with oxygenation after night time. However, only one at a time seems weird on this one.

2- Potential stress due to betta. He mentioned his betta seems nice and peaceful in general and rarely flares on any fish, but still does that from time to time.

3- Potential ammonia/nitrite poisoning. Nitrite seems to read 0, he does not have a test kit for ammonia sadly. But I guess it would affect more than a fish at once rather than this.

4- Maybe parasites?

 

Here is his test results:

@Colu,  @Odd Duck any ideas guys?

Edited March 15 by Lennie

[Colu]

Rapid breathing hanging near the surface could be low levels of desloved oxygen I would expect all the fish to be hanging near the surface if that was the cause or it could be a  parasitic infections such as Gill flukes that can cause the odd random death every now and then what I would do is add an extra air stone and treat with praziquantel do three full courses of treatment 2weeks apart @Lennie

Edited March 15 by Colu

[Lennie]

On 3/15/2023 at 4:24 PM, Colu said:

Rapid breathing hanging near the surface could be low levels of desloved oxygen I would expect all the fish to be hanging near it that was the cause or parasitic infections such as Gill flukes that can cause the odd random death every now and then what I would do is add an extra air stone and treat with praziquantel do three full courses of treatment 2weeks apart @Lennie

Thanks colu! 
 

 

[Odd Duck]

I agree with @Colu but would maybe add Levamisole if available.  That rainbow is pretty thin.

[Lennie]

@Odd Duck  many thanks for the help.

He is also Turkish so I think only levamisole we can find is being used for cattle and sheeps here :,) 
 
I adviced him the praziquantel you guys helped me to select before.

 

 

Edited March 15 by Lennie

[Odd Duck]

I’ve used the sheep levamisole but you have to divide the powder fairly precisely for accurate dosing. Let me see if I have those directions saved.  Found it.

Directions in weird format (sorry, hard to fix with this copy/paste from my Notes app).

First pic is the directions, second pic is the label on the USA product. Hopefully what you can get is similar.
 

Deworming

Siphon out debris from the bottom before and after dosing to remove any expelled worms, eggs, debris, etc.  Levamisole is inactivated by organic debris and by light, so dose after lights out and black out the tank for 24 hours, remove organics via water changes and cleaning the bottom of debris as much as possible.

It’s likely that levamisole does what it can do within the first hour, but best to follow directions precisely.  If you have a bare bottom hospital tank available, it might be best and easiest to transfer the fish to that tank for the duration of treatment - up to 5 weeks total treatment time if doing 3 doses of praziquantal.

Levamisole treatment should be weekly for 4 treatments.  Praziquantal treatment should be every other week (at least) for 2-3 treatments and it is left in for a week at a time.  It can be dosed the day after levamisole treatment.  Remove any carbon or Purigen from filters before dosing.

Have enough dechlorinated water to do a 50% water change immediately if any adverse symptoms are seen in the fish.

A typical treatment regimen: 

1. 50% water change with careful siphoning of debris from the bottom of the tank.

2. Dose with levamisole and black out the tank for 24 hours.  Then 50% water change siphoning the entire bottom of the tank.

3. Dose with praziquantal directly after the second 50% WC.

4. One week later, 50% water change siphoning the bottom thoroughly.  Dose with levamisole following directions in step 1-2.

5. One week later (start of week 3 of treatment), repeat all steps 1-4 over another 2 weeks time.

6. Repeat all steps 1-5, then do last WC one week later after third dose of praziquantal.

Not all snails will tolerate treatments, so best to remove any snails in the tank.

 

Condensed, weekly schedule:

Week 1: siphon debris and do 50% water change, levamisole x 24 hrs, siphon.  Treat with praziquantal and leave in until next week.

Week 2: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon.

Week 3: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon, then prazi.

Week 4: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon.

Week 5: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon, then prazi.

Week 6: siphon.

Edited March 16 by Odd Duck
Add pics then again to add directions.

[Lennie]

On 3/16/2023 at 6:15 AM, Odd Duck said:

I’ve used the sheep levamisole but you have to divide the powder fairly precisely for accurate dosing. Let me see if I have those directions saved.  Found it.

Directions in weird format (sorry, hard to fix with this copy/paste from my Notes app).

First pic is the directions, second pic is the label on the USA product. Hopefully what you can get is similar.
 

Deworming

Siphon out debris from the bottom before and after dosing to remove any expelled worms, eggs, debris, etc.  Levamisole is inactivated by organic debris and by light, so dose after lights out and black out the tank for 24 hours, remove organics via water changes and cleaning the bottom of debris as much as possible.

It’s likely that levamisole does what it can do within the first hour, but best to follow directions precisely.  If you have a bare bottom hospital tank available, it might be best and easiest to transfer the fish to that tank for the duration of treatment - up to 5 weeks total treatment time if doing 3 doses of praziquantal.

Levamisole treatment should be weekly for 4 treatments.  Praziquantal treatment should be every other week (at least) for 2-3 treatments and it is left in for a week at a time.  It can be dosed the day after levamisole treatment.  Remove any carbon or Purigen from filters before dosing.

Have enough dechlorinated water to do a 50% water change immediately if any adverse symptoms are seen in the fish.

A typical treatment regimen: 

1. 50% water change with careful siphoning of debris from the bottom of the tank.

2. Dose with levamisole and black out the tank for 24 hours.  Then 50% water change siphoning the entire bottom of the tank.

3. Dose with praziquantal directly after the second 50% WC.

4. One week later, 50% water change siphoning the bottom thoroughly.  Dose with levamisole following directions in step 1-2.

5. One week later (start of week 3 of treatment), repeat all steps 1-4 over another 2 weeks time.

6. Repeat all steps 1-5, then do last WC one week later after third dose of praziquantal.

Not all snails will tolerate treatments, so best to remove any snails in the tank.

 

Condensed, weekly schedule:

Week 1: siphon debris and do 50% water change, levamisole x 24 hrs, siphon.  Treat with praziquantal and leave in until next week.

Week 2: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon.

Week 3: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon, then prazi.

Week 4: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon.

Week 5: siphon, levam x 24 hrs, siphon, then prazi.

Week 6: siphon.

That's amazing. Thank you so much!