YouTube case presentation (case nr. 43) by Gerald Bassleer describing a Chilodonella parasitic infection in Corydoras paleatus. The video documents clinical signs (abnormal swimming, surface hanging, darkening, emaciation, gill bleeding), diagnostic confirmation via skin and gill scrapings with microscopy showing heavy Chilodonella colonization and gill damage, and management steps: anti-parasitic treatment (FMC — formalin + malachite green — and related treatments), possible antibacterial therapy (e.g., oxytetracycline), improved water quality and reduced stocking to prevent proliferation, and supportive nutrition (Dr. Bassleer biofish food). The presenter reports visible improvement within 24 hours of treatment.
Questions this video answers
Case number 43.
August 3, 2022.
Corydoras paleatus.
Chilodonella (diagnosed via skin and gill scrapings and microscopy).
FMC (formalin + malachite green mixture).
Chapters
Today we will talk about our fish disease, case number 43. It's about another kind of fish which is a common fish in our hobby. And the Corydora paliatas, which I will show you here today, is a fish which is very common by many fish keepers. But the problem we discovered here that it had a very abnormal swimming behavior. And we found that they had the parasites, the parasitic infection Chelodonila or Heliodonella. The fish, like we show here on the video, showed a stressed behavior. Some were getting very dark and very skinny. They were hanging at the surface. You can see here, I show you the next video. Here you see them hang at the surface, you see like a bleeding reddish gill. And you see them, they're suffering of respiration distress. And we had mortalities every day, a very few. And after a couple of days, the mortalities were going in higher quantities. When we took a skin scraping, like we show here, on a part of the tail of the fish, we saw some small circular organisms in the water. Well, this is the microscopic photo of Chylodonella and of the same thing we also found in the gills. We see them here sitting next to the gill tissue. Of course, with a microscope, with video, we have a better view of those parasites which are moving around. And of course, a parasite are easily detectable when they move around. You can distinguish from other tissues, from the fish. You see here the large quantity of Hylodonella, which are all around the gill. And as you can see, those kind of organisms, they damage the gill tissue, that cause a risk of poor respiration, difficult absorption of the oxygen, a poor release of the gases, even ammonia gases which are not released from the gill. So the fish eventually will suffer badly. And then also secondary bacterial infections can occur. So luckily, this is an easy case to detect when you use a microscope, then you know exactly that you're dealing here with a parasitic infection. And this was already an advanced case. You can see that quite some of the parts of the gill tissue are completely covered with those parasites, and those are permanently scraping and damaging on the gill cells or the gill lamellae in this case, and, and causing a risk of secondary bacterial infections. So our conclusions here was that we had to deal with a parasitic infection called Chylovanilla that weakened the fish, damaged the fish, and a big risk of bacterial infections. So again, always check your water quality and avoid overcrowding because that would give a better proliferation of the parasites. Add medications like fmc, that is the formalin malachite green mixture which I describe in my books or farnamorpharmac or other anti parasitic treatment. Maybe you also need to treat with an antibacterial medication to control the secondary bacterial infections which might occur after this or during this parasitic infection. At the same time, we recommend that you use our Dr. Basler biofish food alloy. That helps the fish in repair and helps the fish to protect them from these kind of infections and to have a better immune system. After one day of treatment, I show you the video. We can see that the fish with a treatment here with FMC or formalin, malachite green and oxytocitracycline do much better. Already within 24 hours we see a better behavior, better swimming, less hanging at the surface. We saw already a quick improvement because we installed quickly a proper treatment Here on another video you see the dark colored water because the mitigation is inside the water and you see the fish are more relaxed, they are less nervous swimming and the treatment has a positive effect. That's important to check if your treatment has a good result, please continue your treatment. If not, do big water change and check if it is any other problem causing the losses of your fish. So this was a case on a parasitic infection of this Corydora palliatus. And the microscope of course teaches the lesson what medications we can apply. I hope this teach you a good lesson. Thank you for watching my video.
