# Feedback on Columnaris vs. Fin Rot vs. Aggression Damage



## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

I had recently pulled a bunch of extra male fish from my 110 and the tank had become very harmonious. Tons of breeding, some female on female aggression and fin nipping but nothing that I would consider anything too serious.

2 days ago i noticed one of my female yellow labs had developed a roughtly 1/8" in diameter translucent white spot in the middle of one of her pectoral fins. Definitely too big to be ich, didn't look like the fuzzy white of a Columnaris or fungal infection and so I assumed it had to be either a beginning stages of fin rot or some battle damage (she is one of the smaller yellow lab females, but has a ton of chutzpah and will often start drama with much larger Cobalt and Fuelleborni males). So i figured I'd just keep her under observation and see if things got any worse. Later that night I noticed a Acei Ngara Sub-Dominant male with a shredded and cloudy pectoral fin so I began to think more along the fin rot line of thought, but still was going to just do a big water change and see if some extra clean water would do the trick before treating with anything.

The following morning I was watching the tank before work and I noticed my Sub-Dominant Yellow Lab male had a small white and pink lesion on his side about 3 scales in size...it really looked like an abrasion as this fish loves to go fry hunting and wedge his body deep in rock formations to eat the little guys but now I was a bit more concerned. I fed the fish and everyone came out and ate heartily however I also saw a small pink lesion on the flank of the female Lab that had shown pectoral fin damage so now i had enough evidence to start a very basic Pimafix/Melafix combination last night.

This morning the sub-dom male yellow lab and acei are unchanged, still behaving normally--however my lab female has taken to hiding and appears to have an ever so slightly labored breathing. She still came out to eat, but the hiding worries me since it's not really in this particular fish's idiom to be submissive at all. Her stool was completely normal last night and I'm not seeing any outward signs of Bloat but I'm wondering if i shouldn't start treating more aggressively?

Sorry i can't get any good pictures of the lesions, one fish is now hiding constantly and the sub-dom male's never seems to come out in the pics. Believe me I've taken about 100 and no dice so far.

Water parameters are good, ammonia and nitrite at 0, pH at 8.0, Nitrates somewhere between 20-40, temperature is about 79 degrees.

So for now I'm going to continue with the Pima/Mela combo and hope to see some response, it has been less than 24 hours but I'm concerned if it IS columnaris, waiting another 24-48 hours could not just kill the damaged fish but a lot more of my livestock.

Should I begin a prophylactic treatment of Maracyn-II? Should I be concerned that this could damage my beneficial bacteria?

Should I add 1 tbsp/5 gallons of aquarium salt (seems to be a pretty common recommendation online for what I'm seeing).

Any advice would be superb!


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## newbiecichlid99 (Jan 17, 2012)

pictures might be helpful


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## GTZ (Apr 21, 2010)

I wouldn't use Maracyn II for columnaris, if indeed that is what you're dealing with. I've read that Maracyn II (minocycline) is a poor choice for high GH tanks, due to calcium absorbing the medication.
Instead, consider Nitrofurazone and Kanamycin combined. Barring that, a methylene blue bath would be my next choice.
If you're looking at the very early stages of columnaris, Pimafix is a good choice, however Melafix, being primarily gram-positive, will have little effect.
Salt is recommended at the rate of 1 tbsp per 5g. Premix and add gradually over a 12 hour timeframe.


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

It doesn't sound like columnaris to me... take a look around at online pictures and compare for yourself.

My guess is that it is aggression. With the recent social upheaval, it's likely you have several fish trying to climb the social ladder. Injuries can become infected, so I think the Pima/Mela fix route is a good call. I'd also like to see your nitrates closer to 10 than 40ppm... a couple extra water changes this week will help your fish fight off infection (even if it's something more insidious than battle wounds).

The next thing to do is to grab your beverage of choice, put your feet up, and watch the tank with the lights off for an hour. When we move around the tank or they can see us, they behave quite differently. Letting them forget you are there may be the best way to figure out what's going on.


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## newbiecichlid99 (Jan 17, 2012)

if it is cotton mouth piramix worked wonders and my 1 fish had it real bad it start out looking like missing scales then a red spot . worked its way into cotton mouth


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

So I sorted through my 300 or so pictures to try and find a few that gave us anything at all. I found a few but they're huge and I worry that resizing them will give me a .jpg artifact so i'll just post them as thumbnails, feel free to click for the full image!

Here is a picture of the female yellow lab's flank:



I also noticed on looking at my pictures she has a small pink lesion on the ventral side of her gill plate:



My sub-dom Male front and back view of his lesion:



Subdom Acei right Pectoral Fin x 2:




@*GTZ* - I'm gonna start infusing the salt per yours (and countless other websites recommendations) slowly over 12 hours. This is just a temporary treatment and once symptoms resolve I should be golden to discontinue it, correct? Also do you think seeing the pictures an aggressive prophylactic approach for columnaris is wise?

@*triscuit* - My gut instinct is that you're right and it isn't columnaris, but as I mentioned I've only seen it in tanks where it has been allowed to progress, never have seen it from day one. I'll do an extra waterchange this week and keep those nitrates down under 20 for the duration of the treatment.


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## newbiecichlid99 (Jan 17, 2012)

looks like fin rot if you look at your sub dominate lab his rear tail is showing signs of it also


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## GTZ (Apr 21, 2010)

After seeing the pictures, I think Triscuit is correct and it's just battle damage from aggression.
Increased frequency of water changes should be all that's needed, you can likely forgo the salt. Use the pimafix/melafix if you like.
For sure observe the fish over the next week and watch them after lights out as Triscuit suggested.
Curious, what's the full stock list?


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

@*GTZ* - I went and did a 75% water change and cleaned out all the mulm from my canisters to help get those nitrates down. Right now I'm a little weirdly stocked and a little on the heavy side of things as I had some bad luck with my juvenile gender ratios but this is what's in there currently and my largest fish is just about 4"

Tank is 60 x 18 footprint with 3 Rena xP3s and a Maxi-Jet 900 running a Hydro III sponge filter.

Stocklist:
1m/5f Metriaclima Sp. Msobo
2m/8f Labidochromis Caeruleus "Lion's Cove"
3m/5f Pseudotropheus Elegans "Ngara"
2m/3f Metriaclima Callainos
2m/2f Labeotropheus Fuelleborni "White Belly"
6 Synodontis Lucipinnis
1 BN Pleco
Currently 2-3 3/4" Callainos fry, and 8 or so Ngara fry living in the rock work.

I'm currently growing out more Callainos and Fuelleborni to fix those ratios at which time I'm pulling all the extra males (less 1 extra Acei male who the wife loves) and 3 yellow lab females so my final stock list will be very close to 1m:5f, 5 harem groups.

Currently the tank is a pretty decent harmony though I've noticed that msobo females and lab females scrap a bit from time to time, and the Tank Boss Callainos can be a bit assertive when he's breeding (hoping that having a few more girls there will at least spread his aggression around). No real interspecies aggression to speak of at the moment, but i'll be watching more with moonlights to see if i can catch something i'm missing.

An aside question, how do you get such beautiful green algae on your rockwork? I'm currently still having a lot of diatoms and only a smattering of green here and there.


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## GTZ (Apr 21, 2010)

Doesn't look terribly overstocked, 5 species is about right for your tank, the numbers are off a bit as you've stated.
I've wondered about msobo and labs but there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of information one way or the other as far as aggression issues, due to the females' similar appearance.
There is a crossbreeding possibility with Met. callainos and L. caeruleus however.
About the green algae...it ended up going brown on me. It always does. I need to update the pic, the sand is now black and there's no algae on the rocks at all thanks to 2 newly added bristlenose plecos.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

So after a day of watching semi-regularly it looks like something is definitely spreading through my tank. My female now has a pink and white lesion on her opposite side, several of my msobo and acei females are showing white patches. I'm going to assume it is columnaris at this point as the lesions are growing in size. I'll try to find the nitro/kanamycin but all the local fish stores are closed on sunday, i may have to go with a maracyn I and II combo and hope for the best. I'll come back and try to post pictures tomorrow.


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## GTZ (Apr 21, 2010)

Keep an eye on your water parameters while treating, Maracyn can be harsh on nitrifying bacteria.
Your best bet for both Furan-2 and Kanaplex would be online with next day shipping. I found both at thatpetplace.com.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

Sadly, That Pet Place is out of the Kanaplex so I won't be able to get it through them. I've already started the Maracyn and I will keep an eye on my water parameters. I'll probably go to my LFS store and see if they have the combination tomorrow, but having already begun the maracyn cycle I've gotta finish it.

Thanks for all the help! I'll keep this updated.


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Sorry that it looks worse than it sounded.  But- if this is columnaris, at least you caught it right away. We usually hear about nasty infections after they are full blown...

Check your lfs, and if they don't have it, you can get Kanaplex from Amazon quickly.

I'm still wondering how the infection was introduced... any new fish introduced in the last month? Any new fish in another tank with shared equipment (nets, siphon, etc)?


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

@*triscuit* - OMG now I'm in a state of panic as I do use the same siphon for all my tanks including my grow out tank. I've almost assuredly moved this infection into all my tanks now, haven't I? I have 2 fry tanks as well a grow out should I start a prophylactic treatment of the other tanks our just keep the under observation? I guess a bleach solution and let it soak between uses?

And yes the fish in the grow out tank were added about six weeks ago...along with 3 rescue yellow labs. Those came from different sources so either could be the culprit since I've been quadruple doing my stupid siphon.


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

I wouldn't panic just yet. For disease to occur- there must be a pathogen and a susceptible host. Watch all of your other fish very closely, and treat if there's any sign of disease. Your prophylactic here is extra water changes...

When I have a quarantine tank going, I siphon it last, and refill it first- then I rinse off the part that was in the tank with really hot water before moving on to my next tank. But with a disease outbreak, I would use a separate siphon. (You can pick up an piece of garden hose from the hardware store for pretty cheap, and refill using your old siphon hose.)

A 5% bleach solution is good for sterilizing equipment, and thorough rinsing is enough make it safe for fish again. If you can still smell bleach, soak the equipment in a bucket of water with a double dose of dechlorinator before using.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

So some mixed news on my situation. My main tank ask fish and lesions are showing marked improvement since I began the maracyn I and II combo. The female is no longer hiding. So I'm pretty pleased on that account.

The bad news is Twofold and it involves my 40 gallon below out tank. A zebra is showing a whitish patch that could either be a small abrasion or the first fish to show a sign of the same infection. I also saw a Labeo sitting food this morning which looks like he might be stressed enough to be in the initial stages of Bloat. I plan on watching the tank for another 24 hours before treating with marsden, but I really feel like I should start treating the tank for bloat using metro. Can I treat with metro and maracyn simultaneously?


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

First of all, it's a wonder anyone can understand anything at all that I type on my stupid auto-correcting smart phone. It's so smart it makes me look dumb.

I'm going to treat the growout for bloat using metro as recommended by the forum article while closely monitoring for any suspicious lesions before swinging the maracyn hammer on my juvies. I'll keep updating with information as it occurs, and feel free to chime in at any time with advice! You guys have been great and have made a very stressful situation for me a great deal easier!


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Any updates?


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

Absolutely *triscuit* sorry for the delay.

The main tank where I initially spotted the problems in is doing much better. The pink and white lesions are all but cleared up. The two yellow labs that looked the worst still have a bit of healing tissue where their lesions were, but now it definitely looks like healing abrasion now instead of spreading disease. My msobo females are all cleared up as well, and the fin on the sub-dom acei is about 90 percent healed with no more hazy white spots in it. There are still a few acei that have a few light spots here and there but those definitely look like mild abrasions on dark scales. They get a water change and some carbon in the filter tomorrow and then i'm going to just monitor the tank closely for a few days. I picked up enough kanaplex and furan-2 just in case it was columnaris (which I still don't think it was....i do think it was some kind of bacterial infection but It wasn't nearly as aggressive as the columnaris I've seen) and it's still lurking in the tank.

The spitting labeo juvie unfortunately isn't responding as well to the whole-tank Metro treatment recommended in the new bloat article, although part of that is my fault as for day one of treatment I did inadvertently leave a bag with some Seachem Purigen in my filter and I'm pretty sure that did pull a good deal of it out of the water. So not counting that this was the third day treatment of the tank. The fish is hiding and gasping a small amount and is still spitting food, though it does look like he may be getting a very small amount down. He also still comes out and tries to eat which in my experience is a decent sign. Today i noticed about a 1/4 inch stringy feces from his anus. If he doesn't eat tomorrow morning then I'm going to buy a hospital tank and use a seasoned sponge filter and give him a clout treatment. The rest of the tank will get one more day of whole-tank Metro and then 5 days of metro soaked food just to make sure that doesn't get around.

If you can offer any suggestions for the Bloat any differently than I'm doing now I'd appreciate it greatly. I'd also like to offer my humble thanks, you guys are great on this forum and really helped with feedback and advice. I hope one day I'm able to pay it forward!


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Oh- don't apologize, :wink: I just wanted to hear how your fish were faring. Can you provide more detail about dosages and timing? We hear too often about the fish we fail to cure, and can use as much information on the successful treatments. :thumb:

Bloat- I take a different approach than some other folks. I* stop feeding anything before and during the metro and epsom treatment*. 250mg metro per 10 gallons every day, with large water changes in between. Epsom- 2 TBS per 10 gal, readded with every water change. I have had excellent luck only when my fish are not fed- it's just a guess, but my thoughts are that the treatment has a much better chance to work in an empty gut. Food in the gut can harbor the pathogens.

I've only killed fish with clout... but some folks swear by it.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

The main tank I treated as follows:

1. Maracyn - 11 packets (i treated the total volume of the tank, not the water present) once every 24 hours (I did mine at around 7pm) for 5 days.

2. Maracyn II - 22 packetss on day one, 11 packets a day for the 4 days after that, also at 7 pm.

3. Assuming it was columnaris I lowered the temperature of the tank from 81 to roughly 76 over the course of the first 3 days, very slowly (everything I read said columnaris likes very warm water).

4. Added 1 Tbsp Aquarium salt predisolved in tank water per 5 gallons over 36 hours, I only added 20 total tablespoons instead of the 22.

5. Left all lights off but the moonlights except for a half hour in the morning and an hour in the evening when i fed the fish.

6. Reduced amount of food given to about 75% of normal.

7. Checked water for nitrites and ammonia daily -- the maracyn combo did not cause any long term damage to my biological filtration.

8. There was also still one dose of Pimafix and Melafix in the water when i started the Maracyn combo, but I discontinued that when going with the Maracyn. Don't think it really had any effect on the infection, as during the three days before that where i just used the Pima/Mela the lesions spread and increased in size.

As for the Bloat treatment, I'm doing day 4 following the epsom and metro combo that was in the article...sadly the article mentions 30% daily water changes, so I'd only been changing 15 gallons or so...I know i can do the metro for up to 10 days without a rest so maybe I'll kill their food for a few days. How do you tell if the treatment is working if you don't offer any food? If i extend and do another 5 days of the metro without feeding can I still use metro soaked food after that or should I give them a rest?

Honestly I have a 50/50 success rate with Clout myself...just not seeing any improvement with the little guy however I have been trying to feed the tank 2 amounts twice daily.


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## 702Cichlid (Feb 28, 2010)

As a follow up for the growout tank:

This is now day 4 of the metro/epsom/no feeding treatment (day 9 of the total metro treatment) and tonight after my water change this evening i'm going to try and feeding a small amount of metro soaked food this evening (probably going to use a combination of metro/garlic guard/focus) over a small amount of crushed pellets (some of the Fuellies are still a bit on the small size for full 1mm pellets.

The juvenile Fuelleborni that had been showing bloat is now showing marked signs of improvement. He is no longer panting or hiding. I haven't seen him pass any stool, but he also looks like he's less swollen through the ventral area and his color has improved a bit. I'm hoping that tonight he'll take a little food and keep it down! Another update or two to follow after this one.

As a follow up for the 110:

Things look great except i've noticed a bit more flashing since I added the Aquarium Salt. I'm working on slowly taking it out by changing 5 gallons an hour 2 or 3 times an evening and seeing how the flashing goes, but otherwise it looks like the Maracyn and Aquarium Salt combo did the trick!

Having just said that I decided to go check the tank again and that same dang female has a HUGE lesion on her right flank at the edge of the pectoral fin (which also shows some damage) that's white and pink...easily 2-3 times the size of the original lesion and much nastier looking and that i didn't see this morning. Nobody else is showing any signs and the fish isn't hiding like she was before...I'm going to try and take a picture and include it in a follow up post. I have Kanamycin and Furan-2...do I wait a day or so to see if anyone else has any problems?

Man! I thought I had fixed the issue! She is a pugnacious little thing, could this just be more aggression damage?!

Edit For Pictures:


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