Uronema? Vibrio? Other? What's going on with my tank?

[vetteguy53081]

I was thinking maybe between 10-12 days just to be safe, since I wouldn't want to stop them prematurely and for something to resurface. For reference I started them on 10/15 so this will be the 8th day. Do you have any suggestions there?

Go 5 days of treatment past signs of healing

 

[Colorado]

Well... I think I may have jinxed myself- was looking at the tank late last night and found my midas blenny dead on the sandbed in the corner. I had to use tongs to get him out (may be why some of the scales are missing) on his sides. He had been doing well previously- but seemed to take a quick dive. He had been bullied by my starry blenny in the past- but i caught the starry and removed him to allow the midas to adjust- and the midas has been doing fine since.

I was able to do a skin scrape and observe under a microscope (these are mostly at 10x magnification). I did see some movement- but not a crazy amount of movement from what I saw. I was thinking it did look like uronema, but the quantity was a lot less than what I would expect? I wanted to see what you guys thought it could be? Any suggestions on next steps?

Thanks guys!

@Jay Hemdal @vetteguy53081 @MnFish1

 

[MnFish1]

@Jay Hemdal - unfortunately I cannot see the mp4's - jay or @vetteguy53081 may be able to help better ID this

 

[MnFish1]

I was thinking maybe between 10-12 days just to be safe, since I wouldn't want to stop them prematurely and for something to resurface. For reference I started them on 10/15 so this will be the 8th day. Do you have any suggestions there?

One comment - remind me in case I'm remembering wrong - but you're giving kanamycin orally (in food), correct? As jay had said before - this can be a very toxic medication - and at some point I would start to worry about overdosing or the combination causing a problem. Normally as vetteguy said - in a bath situation, a few days after would be a good time to stop. With feeding - I might be a little more concerned (since you're not really treating your other fish for anything treatable with kanamycin)

 

[vetteguy53081]

Looks more

Well... I think I may have jinxed myself- was looking at the tank late last night and found my midas blenny dead on the sandbed in the corner. I had to use tongs to get him out (may be why some of the scales are missing) on his sides. He had been doing well previously- but seemed to take a quick dive. He had been bullied by my starry blenny in the past- but i caught the starry and removed him to allow the midas to adjust- and the midas has been doing fine since.

I was able to do a skin scrape and observe under a microscope (these are mostly at 10x magnification). I did see some movement- but not a crazy amount of movement from what I saw. I was thinking it did look like uronema, but the quantity was a lot less than what I would expect? I wanted to see what you guys thought it could be? Any suggestions on next steps?

Thanks guys!

@Jay Hemdal @vetteguy53081 @MnFish1

like an injury than uronema which is oval and ciliated with scale imperfections in many cases

 

[Colorado]

One comment - remind me in case I'm remembering wrong - but you're giving kanamycin orally (in food), correct? As jay had said before - this can be a very toxic medication - and at some point I would start to worry about overdosing or the combination causing a problem. Normally as vetteguy said - in a bath situation, a few days after would be a good time to stop. With feeding - I might be a little more concerned (since you're not really treating your other fish for anything treatable with kanamycin)

@MnFish1 Yes- I have still been dosing Kanaplex in the food (but a very minimal amount based on the feedback above since I think the kanaplex may assist with bacterial issues). Since I've been seeing progress with the anthias and foxface I assume something is working well but i was definitely disappointed to see the blenny's death. I guess it is possible that the combination of the metro/kana in the food could have contributed to it's death. Perhaps one of the emerald crabs got to it as well.

@vetteguy53081 thanks for the insights- so it looks more like an injury to you? Were the microscope videos telling at all? I know that sometimes you'll see movement on dead fish during skin scrapes... wasn't sure if it seemed to be more bacterial or more like uronema. I agree that the blenny's death doesn't seem to have any of the typical uronema signs.

Thank you guys!

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Well... I think I may have jinxed myself- was looking at the tank late last night and found my midas blenny dead on the sandbed in the corner. I had to use tongs to get him out (may be why some of the scales are missing) on his sides. He had been doing well previously- but seemed to take a quick dive. He had been bullied by my starry blenny in the past- but i caught the starry and removed him to allow the midas to adjust- and the midas has been doing fine since.

I was able to do a skin scrape and observe under a microscope (these are mostly at 10x magnification). I did see some movement- but not a crazy amount of movement from what I saw. I was thinking it did look like uronema, but the quantity was a lot less than what I would expect? I wanted to see what you guys thought it could be? Any suggestions on next steps?

Thanks guys!

@Jay Hemdal @vetteguy53081 @MnFish1

Those do look like Uronema, the first videos seemed too slow, but then in the last one, they were buzzing around like Uronema can do. Trouble is, pear-shaped ciliate protozoans are REALLY common, and many of them cause no harm. I cannot visually tell these apart. In bad infections, when you tease open muscle tissue and see protozoans, that confirms uronema. If you find these on a fish that has died and was sitting on the tank bottom, they well could be protozoans that feed on dead material.

Jay

 

[Colorado]

@Jay Hemdal Thanks Jay- i definitely noticed a few of the pear shaped ciliates that were moving faster- which made me think they were uronema, however, the midas didn't appear to have any other symptoms-typical uronema lesions. Agreed that the may have been feeding on the dead material, I looked under the microscope for about an hour and this was really the extent of life I could find. Do you have any other recommendations at this point? Keep an eye on things and continue the water changes/metro food dosing?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

@Jay Hemdal Thanks Jay- i definitely noticed a few of the pear shaped ciliates that were moving faster- which made me think they were uronema, however, the midas didn't appear to have any other symptoms-typical uronema lesions. Agreed that the may have been feeding on the dead material, I looked under the microscope for about an hour and this was really the extent of life I could find. Do you have any other recommendations at this point? Keep an eye on things and continue the water changes/metro food dosing?

Sorry, I don’t have a clear direction for you to go here. Metro is typically dosed 3x either every day or every other day, and then stopped. I don’t know what happens if you go longer than five days with it……

Jay