Fish disease case nr. 38: Angelfish Pt. scalare with Spironucleus (Hexamita) infection

Dear fish keeper today, fish case number 38, about an angelfish. Angelfish that came from breeder, different strains, but having a similar problem. And I show you the fish in the fish tanks, how they react, how they swim, what they do. But the microscope will tell you what exactly what is going on. And my PowerPoint will explain you that those angelfish, the scientific name is pterophyllum scalare, had sparrownucleus parasites. Pyronucleus used to be called hexameter. That's the old name. The new name is parnuclus. By the way, it's case number 38, not 37. Well, here we see the fish that look stressed in the aquarium. Not all of them. Some look damaged. But look, those in the back here, this one here, they're not swimming so actively like those here in the front. So not all show the same kind of weakening. Some were dying. We didn't. I didn't show them here dying. You know, I don't like to show fish that are dying. But you can see here the fish suffering, damaged, weakening, not looking for food because the other fish have the Pavlov syndrome. Coming to look for fish food because I'm standing in front of the aquarium, and those are still pretty healthy. That means not so badly infected, not so badly damaged. Here is a another view of the fish tank, of the different mix of angelfish. And you see this fish here. This is not normally. This respiration is off, Is slowly, I can say, wasting away. And he might be dead in the next 24 hours. Here is another video of those beautiful silver, platinum. But you see one here at the back. This is one which is suffering. You see the tail rod, the damaged, the weakening of the fish. That fish is dying. It's too far gone. But it means this fish gives a sign to you as an aquarist that, hey, save my friends, Take me out of the aquarium for examination and use me for a microscopic observation so you can find out how you can save my friends in the aquarium. The first thing we noticed when we diagnosing the fish, we didn't see anything particular on the skin or the gills, was the intestine. Here you see the intestine, which has very little food inside and a lot of fluid, the fluids inside the intestine. That means there's a problem that can tell you something. You know, we could have taken excrements. I showed that in other cases. But in this case, we collected the intestine because of that one, Angel Fitcher was dying. And we see that in a microscope Here at the magnification of 200, you see here thousands of thousand little buggers moving around just at the intestine. This is food. These were excrements and these are parasites coming out of the intestine due to the cutting and applying the material and pressing on your slide with COVID slip. Those are bubbles, air bubbles or fatty cover grease bubbles in the fish. And here is another observation. What does spiral nucleus parasites, thousands and thousands, causing a very badly irritation of the mucus, the lining of the gut. And that is irritation is producing a lot of mucus on the lining of the gut. And that is causing the extra mucus, the fluid into the gut and the poor digestion of the fish. The fish will have a less chance to absorb the necessary macronutrients, vitamins, minerals. The fish will weaken, the gut will not function properly. You will see it at the 300 magnification. You also see some bacteria here in between, which are not moving around. I will show again. You see the little stacks here, the little spots here. The moving things are the flagellate, spiral nucleus, parasites moving out and the bacteria are more sitting still. So you can see here, the bacteria between here. So you see some bacteria, you see the parasites. Well, you can see this is an infection and this is causing the immune system to collapse because the gut is a very important immune system. I explained that in a lot of my YouTube videos. If the microbiome is damaged, if the gut is not working properly, a very important immune system of the fish falls apart and it's going to weaken, it's going to have less nutrients taken up and he's going to get other diseases like bacterial infections also coming up, which normally he can have a resistance against, but not with all those parasites. So the treatment of this angelfish with spiry nucleus is of course first thing to do is avoid overcrowding. Overcrowding is again a good chance that the parasite reinfects very heavily, the whole population. The feeding of mosquito larvae, I see quite often as a case that it's affecting the microbiome, bringing in other microbes and making the microbiome weaker, the fish guts weaker and easier. Infected with spiral nucleus, is it related? The mosquito larvae does not bring in spironucleus, but it seems to have an impact on the intestine, the gut, that it's more proneable to be infected with the parasite spiral nucleus, which are sometimes around in the aquaria in small quantities and not being infectious. But when the fish are overcrowded or kept in very poor conditions, poor water Quality overfeeding with mosquito larvae, no proper feeding. It can all be a case that the parasites take over. So you have to treat with a real medication like metronidazole or Hexamor from Aquarium Unster or other similar medications which are available in the pet shop. Sometimes you have to apply also an antibacterial medication because those secondary infections appear and also kill off the fish or cause damage. Fish getting sometimes tail rot like we show the one which was suffering. And you like to use like antibiotic. Antibacterial drugs like Feraltadone or nitrofurazone are very helpful in these kind of cases. With spiral nucleus infection, we developed a couple of years ago a specific food to help your fish to fight off the parasite. And that's the Dr. Besler biofish food Lapacho, which you have to feed at least 20 days and not feeding any other food meanwhile. So enough of the lapacho is absorbed. It also contains garlic. It also contains chlorella for the restoration of the fish, repair of the fish and the lapacho, which helps you to control the parasites, to help to expel the parasites together with the garlic. So I tell you, these things help together medication and fish food combined and improving the conditions, the healthy environment for the angel fish. So this was another case. And more cases will be coming in the next coming weeks. So stay tuned and stay on top of the fish health. Observe your fish every day, twice a day. Particularly you have a shop. Do it in the morning and in the evening. Spend time for this. This is quality time. Thank you.