Re: Listless Eunotus and some notes about levamisole treatment

[Sarah LeGates <slegates@yahoo.com>]

Charles,
your eunotus may have worms (specifically nematodes).  I say this
only because I've been battling an infestation of these little
nasties in one of my tanks for the last month or so and they were
showing symptoms similar to what you've listed.  Do your fish have
reddened anal openings or small threadlike bits of material
protruding from their anuses?  Keep an eye out for these signs as
possible indications of nematode infestation.  Check out the archived
disease postings at the Krib for helpful treatment information.

As a side note, I was finally able to find a product containing
Levamisole at a farm and feed store last weekend.  The product was
Tramisol, a sheep wormer, and it was in the form of "oblets" about
the size of my thumb!  The archives at the Krib do not contain
extensive dosing information for levamisole, so I had to guess.  Each
Tramisol oblet contained .183g active levamisole HCl, so I worked out
my tank volumes in liters and dosed on a mg/L basis.  I dosed my 35
gal. tank at approximately 6 mg/L (numbers not in front of me right
now, so these are only the rough numbers I can remember), and my 56
gal. tank at a little over 10 mg/L.  The archived postings on the
Krib are accurate in their descriptions of the treatment process: the
water turned yellow (presumably from the dye in the oblets), and
clouded after about 24 hours.  Unfortunately, work intervened and
prevented me from doing a full water change on the larger tank. 
Early in the morning of dose+2 day (approximately 36 hours
post-dose), I found the barbs in the 56 gal. in respiratory distress
and sucking air at the top of the tank.  The H. bimaculatus in the
tank did not seem affected.  I was only able to change about 30% of
the water at that time, but it alleviated the distress until later in
the day when I did a full water change.  Since the fish were showing
no visible distress at the end of the dose+2 day (when the effective
dose of Levamisole in the tank was still at least 7 mg/L and the
water was still clouded and yellow) I am assuming that I had a pH
drop during the night, and that was what caused the distress.  There
are, however, no more worm signs in any of the fish in the infested
tank!  The fishes' appetites are back, their fins are no longer
clamped, and no one seems to be showing any signs of secondary
bacterial infections.  The treatment is a pain, but it seems to have
been effective.

Good luck with your eunotus,

Sarah LeGates

> She reappeared a couple days ago looking very pale and listless
with
> what looks to be a distended anal opening and absolutely no
>appetite. She tends to rest 
> near the water's surface in the roots of floating plants.
> 
> Yesterday my only male eunotus began to take on some of her
> characteristics, 
> with fins held close to his body and what looks to be imbalance
> when he's 
> not actively swimming.
>


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