YouTube video by Gerald Bassleer presenting case no. 265: wild cardinal tetras (Paracheirodon axelrodi) from the Amazon with multiple worm infections. The presenter describes field observations, necropsy findings (encapsulated worms in liver/spleen, small nematodes in intestine), implications for fish health (weight loss, deformities), and recommendations for prevention, husbandry and immune-supportive feed.
Chapters
Hello, Dear Akarist, today you selected a video on a cardinal tetra, a South American Amazon tetra, the Parachyrodon axorrodi. And of course I show you in the back one of the boats I was on during my travels on the Amazon, starting from Manhaus, enjoying studying the biotopes, the ecological systems where the fish live in the diseases we can encounter. Yes, something I learned through the PIABA project with the University of the Amazonas to explore nature and understanding fish diseases. Of course, I'm dealing as a consultant in the industry with fish diseases because I observe diseased fish that come on my table or come with my microscope to learn to diagnose the problems that can occur. And today it's a cardinal tetra to case number 265, which has worm infections. Yes, wild fish, like cardinals, can have worm infections. I explained that also in my books on fish diseases, how that can occur and what you can do about it in prevention, control and treatment. And here some of those carnal tetra were skinny. You can see them swimming between the more healthy ones. Not all of them were very skinny, but only few. You can see they're trying to be part of the group also to get a chunk of food where they have to fight for because it's competition for food. And usually the weaker ones get weaker because they have less chance to take food. Here is another part of that video and you will see even some deformed fish because they're getting so weak, lack of nutrients, and that can happen in nature. And you will see the deformed fish appear in the second areas in between. It's only a few, but it shows that the fish had some damage during life and had a risk of deformation because of mostly a lack of the beneficial nutrients that the fish would need. Well, this is interesting. Like here we see that skinny one here, that's the one we take out. And then we found internally all different worms encapsulated, taking away healthy tissue. Parts of the liver, parts of the spleen will go here, another worm encapsulated, which is dead. But the dead worm, of course, didn't survive because they use the fish as an intermediate host. And if it's not eaten on time by the final host, the bird or the predator fish, well, they might die. And the fish can try to fight off these kind of worm infections. Here, more here you see a few here, next to the liver meta c are a few here. And here also more encapsulated next to the spleen. While they have an effect on the organs that they're not are working properly and weakening the fish sometimes. We found still some worms alive here is small nematode. It's alive in the intestine. It's a small one, but maybe not causing on this moment a lot of damage. It's more likely that we found here that the organs were badly affected by the many different worm infections that caused the fish to become skinny and waste away. So some fish are more badly infected than others. And some fish it's too late to treat, put them gently asleep, euthanize it, use an Archomorphous or an otter tranquilizer. We suggest here that you take good care of all the other fish. Give good water, good food, no stress, so the fish can survive. Those with have a few worm infections or which were able to fight off all the worms. You can help the fish to fight off all those infections by giving a good immune system. The immune system. Well, we learned that in the last couple of years how important the immune system is for mankind. Well, it's also for fish. And we have a special food for that that our Dr. Basler buy fish food forte that helps the immune system of the fish to fight off infections and to become stronger. Learn about fish diseases in my books. The link is below. Or get your training at my Patreon channel where you can get more specialized. Thank you for watching. Because understanding fish diseases is learning is reading is watching videos or reading books. Be careful not to watch too much all the the details posted on social media. A lot of errors can occur there. So if you have questions you want to debate with me, write your remarks in the comments. Thank you for watching.
