[philipraposo1982]

Here is the scoop.

75g with 6 geophagus tapajos and a 28 lemon tetras. I didn't quarantine..

Pretty dang sure the lemons have columnaris, I been losing alot very quickly. Showing typical symptoms. Greyish patches on the body or by tail fin. They quickly die.

Here is where I need advice. My geos seem very healthy and fine. Many of the lemons do to. Some look a bit rough.

I have furan 2 and kanaplex on hand ready to dose. I have read that columnaris is able to attach weak or stressed fish. Since my geos are neither of these is it possible that they will go unaffected if I DON'T medicate?

Or do I medicate the tank and fingers crossed that the meds don't do more harm than good.

I really don't want to loose more fish but I know I will end up losing more tetras. My geos will be very difficult to replace as they are not coming around here and we're a hard find.

Not sure how I should proceed... Advice?

 

[Dariofan]

Sorry to hear that. I'm not sure regarding your question- but do be careful with the furan 2- I had a betta die of columnaris (I think)-the furan 2 killed all of my plants for sure but it was a 5 gallon. I've used kanaplex by itself for other things and no problem with plants. The combo of those 2 also caused a mini cycle and in my experience aerate as much as you can if you do go ahead. I have a lot of tiny 3/4 inch fish that did not do well with that combo of meds. You should do better with the bigger guys though.

You have a lovely tank-I saw your other thread-Makes me want to start a geo tank-they are in stock last time I was at my LFS. I hope you get through this rough patch soon.

 

[Maryland Guppy]

I used this.
Seachem. ParaGuard

3 dozen feeder red mountain minnows to cycle a tank.
Day 2 began dosing, several fish looked they had cotton balls attached to their rotting fins and body.
2 days of treatment cured my issues, damaged fish did not make it.
The minnows came from extremely crowded tanks, they were intended as feeders though.

30 survived and are still swimming around in an outdoor pond today (1 year now).

Filled with Moscow guppies right after removal of minnows (5 week cycle).
No issues with cycle, plants, or the guppy farm.

 

[philipraposo1982]

Thanks for the support.

I would likely pull all the driftwood out, the plants are attached to them. And keep the lights off and only use room light for the duration of the meds.

I keep doing daily large water changes to keep the colony of columnaris as low as possible in the water column.

I think I will wait till I see a sign of it on my geos. It's super costly to treat a big tank plus it could do more harm than good.

I would still like more feedback from. Others who have experience with this. I have done a ton of reading on columnaris so I feel I can identify the symptoms once I see them.

 

[Ssyd]

You could try a salt treatment, it may or may not work tho. Ive never kept geo's so im not sure how they would go with salt. Ive kept other south american chiclids like oscars, convicts and fire mouths and used salt and they were fine with it.

I treated columnaris not long ago in congo tetras. One of the males when flaring and displaying with another male some how managed to skewer himself on my goldvine driftwood. And ended up getting a case of columnaris from it, well at least the symptons fit columnaris to a t. From what ive heard and read the bacteria that cause it don't like salt and it can kill it, so i used a salt treatment. But in conjunction i used triple sulfa tablets. Which are bacteriostatic, so it stops the bacteria from reproducing. And it cleared up the infection in a few days.

The plus side of using triple sulfa treatment, is that it won't wipe out your biofilter strait away. Biofilter bacteria are fairly long lived, so while they won't be reproducing i got an 8 day treatment done without any effect on my bio filter.

 

[philipraposo1982]

I think I am going to start treatment today for columnaris with kanaplex and furan 2

My geos are not showing symptoms but due to how many tetras I am losing and at such a fast rate I don't think it's wise to let this go on any longer.

Going to reduce the temps down a few degrees too, I read that this will slow things down for the bacteria.

Fingers crossed!