Vorticella on neocardina

[LDZ]

Hey all, 

I have been given wonderful advice from this forum, so here I go again.  

I have a permanent quarantine tank for some of my Red Rilis shrimp that I have been fighting a bacterial infection for months.   I think I may have stopped the spreading of the bacteria but now my quarantine tank of shrimp has vorticella.   I did a salt dip on each shrimp a month ago.   Still showing symptoms I added hydrogen peroxide to the tank about three weeks ago but they still have white things on them.  This is not japonica parasites, I have had those too and successfully treated them with salt dip.  I treated the tank again (1.5 ml h2o2 per gallon) a week ago.   They still have white specs on them. 

I am wondering if they might be dead but still attached to the shrimp.  How long does it take for the vorticella to fall off and no longer be visible on the shrimp??? 

Should I treat with h2o2 again or do you have any other recommendations.   Thanks for your time.  BTW all tank parameters are good and I'm starting to see breeding (babies) in this tank.  Thank you for your advice 💜🐟🐌🦐

[Guppysnail]

I would treat the entire tank with ich x until no signs were left. Vorticella is protozoan like ich. The entire tank should be treated. 
Good luck I’m sorry your shrimp are struggling. 

[nabokovfan87]

There's a few key links here and I share the thread because it might be a key one to follow along.

My recommendation would be to dose in the ich-x as well as 1 tbsp of salt per 5G for the shrimp tank.  Don't re-dose the salt, but if you do a WC on the ich-x every 3-5 days, that should be ok.  With shrimp, longer gaps between WC is better.  You may see some stress signs, but the most common way to treat shrimp diseases will be salt dosing, not dips, but actual dosing.  That dose of 1 per 5G is something I've used on my own tank and have had isses with higher doses.  It feels like the right / safe dose for neocaridina/caridina shrimp. 

Hopefully that helps!

[LDZ]

Thank you for all your great advice.   I salt dipped every shrimp prior to starting ick x treatment.   I'm now on day seven of the ick x treatment and the shrimp don't show any signs of improvement.   Still covered with vorticella.   Any suggestions or do I just keep going with the ick x???  Thanks 💜🐟🐌🦐

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/21/2023 at 5:49 PM, LDZ said:

Thank you for all your great advice.   I salt dipped every shrimp prior to starting ick x treatment.   I'm now on day seven of the ick x treatment and the shrimp don't show any signs of improvement.   Still covered with vorticella.   Any suggestions or do I just keep going with the ick x???  Thanks 💜🐟🐌🦐

Can you show some photos of what you're seeing?  How are the shrimp doing with the salt dose? Do you see any signs of stress on them or just normal behavior?

If you're not seeing any improvement you may need to dose the tank itself with salt.  Let me do a bit of research on Ich-X usage for this disease just to double check everything.

From another forum, here is a recommendation for using hydrogen peroxide:

 

Quote

So in almost a month, may shrimp tank is infested with vorticella, I have found various articles on the internet regarding vorticella treatment and I ended up trying 3 of them. First was using salt. Ineffective. Second was using Indian Almond Leaves as it was said it to have anti fungal and anti bacterial properties. Ineffective. Third was using API Pimafix. Works on first outbreak. The second time I had vorticella, it didn't work anymore. Yes, I had a second outbreak weeks after I got rid of vorticella using API Pimafix.

Here I will be sharing a short treatment with lasting permanent effect. It is by using Hydrogen Peroxide in your tank. I refer to the following article for my dosage and method.
 

 

 

Edited October 22, 2023 by nabokovfan87

[LDZ]

I used one tablespoon aquarium salt to one cup aquarium water and they showed no sign of stress and all came thru it fine.    I will admit the first time I used salt on these shrimp one didn't make it.  I have tried using h2o2 at a dose of 1.5 cc h2o2 per gallon for five days in a row also just previous to my original post asking for advice.   Also no change to what ever is affecting these shrimp.  I'm concerned they are going to start glowing green and flying around the room due to all the chemicals they have been exposed to over their short lives 🤣.  I will try to add a picture.   I have seen the poster every one points to about as shrimp diseases and what I see looks exactly like vorticella.

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/22/2023 at 5:12 PM, LDZ said:

I used one tablespoon aquarium salt to one cup aquarium water and they showed no sign of stress and all came thru it fine.    I will admit the first time I used salt on these shrimp one didn't make it.  I have tried using h2o2 at a dose of 1.5 cc h2o2 per gallon for five days in a row also just previous to my original post asking for advice.   Also no change to what ever is affecting these shrimp.  I'm concerned they are going to start glowing green and flying around the room due to all the chemicals they have been exposed to over their short lives 🤣.  I will try to add a picture.   I have seen the poster every one points to about as shrimp diseases and what I see looks exactly like vorticella.

I'm sorry this is such a resistant disease it seems.  I would dose the tank itself. 1 TBSP per 5G of water is the dose I used.  It will very likely take more than a few days for you to see any improvement (if you do).  Try to siphon the substrate and keep things clean.  Also take time to make sure filtration is clean as well. 

If all else fails, next step is a product called no planaria.  I understand the frustration when getting advice and it turns into, "ok now try this."  I don't want things to seem that way and the best I can do is offer advice based on the easiest / most often recommended methods followed by how risky those treatments are.  A salt dip may not be enough for the sake of this specific disease.  It might take days given the state of the infestation.  I don't know if you need to pull molts, but that is something to consider as well.

When you dosed the Hydrogen peroxide, did you follow the method that is mentioned in the Mark's Shrimp Tanks video?  Equipment off and all of that?

I hope we can resolve the situation and get these guys healthy.  I'll spend time tomorrow doing a deep dive into the research side of things for vorticella.

[LDZ]

Thank you for your time.   It seems your findings on the web have been the same as mine.  I will keep looking too.  Funny how it's considered an "easy" disease to treat.   Guess I'm just lucky 🙄. BTW I did use Marks Dosage recommendation for the h2o2.  I also followed the recommendation above and dosed the tank one time with aquarium salt prior to starting ick x.

 

Would you stop the ick x now......  currently on day eight. 

 

More info for you, these shrimp are in a 1.5 gallon "hospice " tank I set up for them over six months ago because I thought they had muscular necrosis.  You can kinda see the white belly in the second picture.   I have not lost one of them so it must not have been MN because they say it will kill the shrimp within a week or so.  Months after first seeing the white belly I finally treated with a product called CURE from Plamski Shrimp Farm that claims to kill 95 percent of all bacteria and they are still white inside but I'm now seeing berried shrimp and babies so it must have helped.  Only happy shrimp would breed under these circumstances.  It's always something with these guys.  I feel bad for them ☹️. Again thank you for all your help.💜🦐🐌🐟

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/23/2023 at 9:28 AM, LDZ said:

Would you stop the ick x now......  currently on day eight. 

You can do it almost daily.  I would treat it for ~2 weeks. Water change of 30-50% every few days to be able to re-dose in the meds.  BUT, because it's shrimp, I think you're at the mercy of how often you can change water.  At most I would dose every 7 days, still for that minimum of 2 weeks.

On 10/23/2023 at 9:28 AM, LDZ said:

You can kinda see the white belly in the second picture.   I have not lost one of them so it must not have been MN because they say it will kill the shrimp within a week or so.  Months after first seeing the white belly I finally treated with a product called CURE from Plamski Shrimp Farm that claims to kill 95 percent of all bacteria and they are still white inside but I'm now seeing berried shrimp and babies so it must have helped.  Only happy shrimp would breed under these circumstances.  It's always something with these guys.  I feel bad for them ☹️. Again thank you for all your help.💜🦐🐌🐟

Might actually just be a bacterial infection. 😞

Following all of what you're doing now for the vorticella, you can try maracyn and then give that 2 weeks.  Once that gives you your results, give the shrimp a break, and then try kanaplex.  I have not used kanaplex on my shrimp, but flip aquatics does have directions for bacterial treatments using maracyn for this issue.