Yuck! I have contracted an aquatically transmitted disease!
I received an order of a dozen chili rasboras 2 days ago, but was lucky and got 15! I would have stuck them in the quarantine tank if it wasn't already full of other fish... but I figured, hey... practically everything in that tank (plants, fish, shrimp) came from the same store, so it won't be a problem.
This appears to be ich, which looks like salt or sugar crystals attached to the fish's skin. Rasboras are so tiny that yes, the white spots on the back are actually salt crystal size. I saw a few fish that had 1 or 2 spots on them like this yesterday and thought it was weird, and the population of the protozoan just exploded by this afternoon! I hope that their small size doesn't mean that they are less able to live through the infection, and that I caught it early enough.
I'm treating the whole tank with Seachem's Paragard which anecdotally is the safest treatment for invertebrates, in the hopes that my shrimp and ramshorn snails make it through the medication. And I'm also hoping that the quarantine tank doesn't come down with anything, since I may have shared equipment between the two aquariums for a water change. >.<
Wish me luck. The shrimp and fish and I need it!
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| 3/4ths of an inch long... too small for a single-celled parasite to hide. |
I received an order of a dozen chili rasboras 2 days ago, but was lucky and got 15! I would have stuck them in the quarantine tank if it wasn't already full of other fish... but I figured, hey... practically everything in that tank (plants, fish, shrimp) came from the same store, so it won't be a problem.
This appears to be ich, which looks like salt or sugar crystals attached to the fish's skin. Rasboras are so tiny that yes, the white spots on the back are actually salt crystal size. I saw a few fish that had 1 or 2 spots on them like this yesterday and thought it was weird, and the population of the protozoan just exploded by this afternoon! I hope that their small size doesn't mean that they are less able to live through the infection, and that I caught it early enough.
I'm treating the whole tank with Seachem's Paragard which anecdotally is the safest treatment for invertebrates, in the hopes that my shrimp and ramshorn snails make it through the medication. And I'm also hoping that the quarantine tank doesn't come down with anything, since I may have shared equipment between the two aquariums for a water change. >.<
Wish me luck. The shrimp and fish and I need it!
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