Callamanus WORMS... updated 2/5/2013

[msawdey]

For the last 6 months.. i have been periodically losing bolivian rams for no reason.

After having another issue in the tank this week where i lost half of the inhabitants to a stupid error, read here (but this has nothing to do with the worms) http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/sh...570&highlight=

I realized this morning that one of my small angels had a vent that was huge and that a worm was sticking out. I had not noticed this prior. I had just fed the others, when I noticed that they ALSO had small pink thread like things sticking out of their vents. I lost the small angels tonight. He had been eating, but stopped yesterday and then sucumbed today. Are these Callamanus worms?

I have no idea how to treat these things. The entire tank has to be infected at this point so i would need to dose the entire column. I have Quick cure (formalin and malchite green) and prazipro (praziquantel) on hand, but dont know if either will work

HELP!!!!!

[Diana]

Prazi pro is for internal parasites, I am looking now to see if it is specific for Camillanus.
... seems it is not.

Levamisole will work.

http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/CamellanusTreatment.pdf

Fenbendazole will work.

"Camillanus is easily recognized as a small thread-like worm protruding from the anus of the fish. Control of this nematode in non-food fish is with fenbendazole, a common antihelminthic. Fenbendazole can be mixed with fish food (using gelatin as a binder) at a rate of 0.25% for treatment. It should be fed for three days, and repeated in three weeks."

[msawdey]

Originally Posted by Diana

Prazi pro is for internal parasites, I am looking now to see if it is specific for Camillanus.
... seems it is not.

Levamisole will work.

http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/CamellanusTreatment.pdf

Fenbendazole will work.

"Camillanus is easily recognized as a small thread-like worm protruding from the anus of the fish. Control of this nematode in non-food fish is with fenbendazole, a common antihelminthic. Fenbendazole can be mixed with fish food (using gelatin as a binder) at a rate of 0.25% for treatment. It should be fed for three days, and repeated in three weeks."

ya... that was where i found my information earlier. Both drugs seem to be semi hard to obtain and even harder to determine what to dose in an aquarium. I don't know what to do. Upon further inspection of other fish in tank, they all have it. This hit quick and hit hard.

Any idea on where I can obtain this that isnt sketchy? (ie i wouldnt feel weird putting my credit card number into some crazy website)

[msawdey]

looks like it can be bought at petsmart and mixed with food..... I will probably mix it either with spectrum pellets or bloodworms and water and let it soak for an hour. I am not sure how many times to dose those, but according to that site, he did it 3 times and then once a week later...

http://www.tropicalfishkeeping.com/m...ndazole-19108/

[lipadj46]

The most effective treatment will be levimasole:

http://www.jefferspet.com/product.as...2-pi&camid=liv

you need a good mg scale though. Food with fenben. will work in a proper food preparation, just soaking pellets is going to reduce the effectiveness by a wide margin. Angelsplus has flake foods that have either lev. or fenben. already in it.

[msawdey]

I ordered from angels plus this morning.... the only thing i am worried about is that the eggs are in the water column. I am extremely leery putting a medication that is meant for something else into a tank. Just worried about poisoning them in some other way.

[msawdey]

I am really curious if anyone else has had this issue lately. I went and talked to my LFS that I buy from and they did admit that they had a batch of Angels come through about 6 months ago (i bought 2) that supposedly had the worms.

After days of research on these horrible creatures, it sounds like they are becoming more and more common among aquariums and causing major issues for keepers.

[wkndracer]

Originally Posted by msawdey

ya... that was where i found my information earlier. Both drugs seem to be semi hard to obtain and even harder to determine what to dose in an aquarium. ****
Any idea on where I can obtain this that isnt sketchy? (ie i wouldnt feel weird putting my credit card number into some crazy website)

Charles Harrison (owner of the referenced website) happens to hold a Ph.D.

I've purchased from Doc several times without complaint.
Flubendazole and Levaisole hcl are water column dosed.
http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/ItemsForSale.html

[CytoEric]

I had camallanus worms that came in with an infected celebes rainbow and spread to the rest of my fish. They really suck. Prazipro won't work, but I was able to get rid of them using fenbendazole. You can buy it at petsmart in the dog section. It's sold as safe-guard and is used as a dog dewormer. It does not mix with water well, so soaking the fish food in it won't work (I tried). I ended up mixing it with unflavored gelatin and pellet food that I'd ground up in my coffee grinder. After it had solidified, I cut it into tiny pieces and the fish gobbled it up. Fed it that way for around a week and it took care of the adult worms. You do have to retreat after 3 weeks (I think) to take care of the eggs that have reinfected the fish. I did treat the tank with the prazipro in that time, just in case it was able to help with the eggs. Don't know if it helped at all, but I had it on hand and figured it couldn't hurt.

[tiggity]

I used a dog dewormer I bought at petsmart. Since it doesn't dissolve in water very well, I crushed it, mixed it with water and let some bloodworms soak for half an hour. Fed it once a day for a week and did a huge water change.

Also, it's not safe if you have snails in your tank. Forgot the name of the medicine but it was fenbendazole based I think

[DarkCobra]

Originally Posted by wkndracer

Charles Harrison (owner of the referenced website) happens to hold a Ph.D.

I've purchased from Doc several times without complaint.
Flubendazole and Levaisole hcl are water column dosed.
http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/ItemsForSale.html

+1. I used his recommended Levamisole water treatment of 23mg/L, repeat 3 weeks later. Though I did not order from him - given the number of tanks I had to treat and to have some left over for addition to QT protocol, it was cheaper to order "Vermisol", commonly sold for treatment of avians. Google turns up a number of sellers.

Flubendazole is supposed to work also, but will also kill snails.

NOTHING ELSE WORKS. I can't stress that enough.

Even Fenbendazole is iffy, in my opinion. The Angels Plus Fenbendazole flake was completely ineffective. Not all fish will eat enough, and even for those that did pig out, it was still insufficient to cure any fish in my case.

You can put more in food with dog dewormer, but still you may have fish that won't eat enough for an effective dose.

The Angels Plus Levamisole flake wasn't out yet when I had callamanus, so I haven't tried it. But since it's so water soluble that it has to be eaten within 10 seconds to deliver full potency, I expect it too will be hit and miss.

[Bettatail]

Originally Posted by wkndracer

Charles Harrison (owner of the referenced website) happens to hold a Ph.D.

I've purchased from Doc several times without complaint.
Flubendazole and Levaisole hcl are water column dosed.
http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/ItemsForSale.html

+1, I ordered the levasole(levamisole) from Charles too, one package less than the recommended dose, the worm disappear over night, have never seen them again in my tank.

before I ordered the levasole, I used pure fenbendazole 50-100 times more than the recommend dose for two weeks, both in fish food and water column, only suppressed the worm (or possibly wipe out the eggs) , but didn't kill the adult worm.

[msawdey]

Originally Posted by wkndracer

Charles Harrison (owner of the referenced website) happens to hold a Ph.D.

I've purchased from Doc several times without complaint.
Flubendazole and Levaisole hcl are water column dosed.
http://www.inkmkr.com/Fish/ItemsForSale.html

HA!... i see what your getting at, but I also happen to hold a PhD in public health. Just because he has a PhD doesn't make him trustworthy (I have plenty of colleagues that aren't!). But I definitely believe you all if everyone vouches.

I am going to try the flakes from Angelsplus first and see what happens then probably order from him to eradicate from tank. My first concern is ridding them of the issue to make sure they are able to take in needed nutrients, then i will bomb the tank with the meds from Charles

[msawdey]

Originally Posted by Bettatail

+1, I ordered the levasole(levamisole) from Charles too, one package less than the recommended dose, the worm disappear over night, have never seen them again in my tank.

before I ordered the levasole, I used pure fenbendazole 50-100 times more than the recommend dose for two weeks, both in fish food and water column, only suppressed the worm (or possibly wipe out the eggs) , but didn't kill the adult worm.

Oh NOO???? Really???? Scratch the above post... I am ordering now

[DarkCobra]

Originally Posted by Bettatail

before I ordered the levasole, I used pure fenbendazole 50-100 times more than the recommend dose for two weeks, both in fish food and water column, only suppressed the worm (or possibly wipe out the eggs) , but didn't kill the adult worm.

This demonstrates another problem with Fenbendazole I forgot to mention. It's so poorly water soluble that it makes an ineffective water column treatment. Unless premixed with a strong solvent like acetone, and there have been some successful treatments using that method; but often with fish deaths due to the acetone!

Originally Posted by msawdey

Oh NOO???? Really???? Scratch the above post... I am ordering now

Excellent. This really is the best way, hands-down. I don't know what Charles' creds are, but he sure knows his callamanus worms. Took three months research and other failed treatment attempts before I finally followed his advice, and it did the trick. Though I wouldn't regret the previous order from Angels Plus, it may come in handy for something else. I have about a dozen of their products, and love and recommend them, but just not for callamanus.