White Spot Or Fungus

I'm not experienced with white spot so will let someone else get back to you on that, however, corys in particular I know are sensitive to salt...

Hi @Sue 

The spots are not exactly sprinkled, no more than 10 - 12, which is why I queried fungus not necessarily white spot.  The first picture is a very large magnification from the original, then scaled down to meet the upload limitations of the web-site.  The originals of both and in the flesh show distinctive pin-head sized spots.  As it happens, the fluffiness around the mouth has disappeared this morning and turned into 2 distinct spots.  Overall, the number of spots has reduced from last night ,  I pretty much convinced it's white spot.

As you will imagine, I've checked all the other fish and can't see anything untoward, yet...

Our water is hard/very hard according to Cambridge Water Co.  Since I got my liquid test kit (JB Labs) I consistently get GH ^odH of 18-20 in the tank.  KH is running at around 8.

Taking whatever action I could last night, I quarantined the sick Molly and raised the tank temperature to 28^oC.

I went to my nearest LFS first thing this morning.  The very knowledgeable manager there also espoused the theory that white spot is present all the time.

I was recommended, and bought, some Waterlife Protozin which seems to be a cure-all for White Spot, Fungus, Trichodiniasis (No, me neither.  I Googled it but am still none the wiser.) and Neon Tetra Disease.  Probably gets little Boy Scouts out of horse hooves and stains out of carpets too.  Actually, not stains out of anything as it has Malachite Green in it.  Just as well we didn't get round to getting a replacement snail at the weekend, as the Copper Sulphate in it would have been a problem.

LFS man was adamant that correct dosage of Aquarium Salt wouldn't harm our Corries.  Even though all the web-sites I checked last night (plus @Matt's comment late last night) say that they don't like it.  Rightly or wrongly, I was persuaded to get some.  I know you're of the "never trust LFS advice persuasion", but he's well aware I'm not getting my fish from him (sticking with MA for consistency) and is he going to risk his reputation for £3.99?  Erring on the side of my own caution though, plus LFS advice to build up slowly, I've only used a half dose so far.

Normal water change is due on Saturday and I'll make my decision then on going forward with the salt or not.  I'll also need to drop the temperature back a little, as 28 is a tad too high for Corries.

After our Gourami, the next largest fish we have is this sick Molly. Although the Mollies have the largest mouths, by far.  It may be that after 4 days of weekend stick feeding, when not much of the sticks has been consumed and the fish appearing to need some effort to bite pieces of them, this one was getting a more hungry than the others and, therefore, stressed.

I had a discussion with the LFS man about the holiday feeding, but I'll leave that for a separate thread once the current "crisis" is out of the way.  I'll also post something about why I chose NT Labs, as opposed to API, for my test kit.

Thanks for the help to-date.

@Sue

Try googling trichodina. The -iasis bit just means a disease produced by the first part of the word so trichodiniasis means a disease produced by trichodina.

Quite.  Some of the Google replies mentioned this.  But I'm still none the wiser.  Can't get my head around anything except what is it out of White Spot, Velvet or Fungus at the moment.  From the brief look I took, I think this only affects Cichlids?

After I wrote my previous post, I went and checked on Sick Molly in particular and another once-over for the others.

Would you believe it !  All the pin-head spots have now turned into light, slightly fluffy, patches.  Maybe what happens after the spots burst and the parasite goes into the next stage of its' lifecycle?  She also displays fin clamping of the dorsal and anal fins and a shimmering (sometimes) swimming pattern although the pectorals look fine.

Now I'm not convinced it's White Spot .  I don't think there's any more I can do though.  I've accurately dosed the tank with Protozin and a half dose of Aquarium Salt.  I'm going to leave it for tonight and let nature take it's course, helped by the chemicals.

The other fish are still fine, except maybe one of a pair of blue/silver Male Guppies (i.e. just one out of the 8 we have) where the tail has gone from a dark to lighter blue, when compared to the other.  Another sign of stress?

None of the "well" fish are displaying any spots, lesions, cotton wool like patches, odd behaviour, etc., etc.

I'm also finished with the Weekend Feeding trial.  Everyone is back on "normal" feeding with, mainly Tetra  Pro Colour, supplemented by the odd day of brine shrimp or bloodworm (none of them seem to really like bloodworm) and occasional pellets as supplements for the Corries stuck on the glass near where they hide away.

Sick Molly doesn't seem to have lost her appetite.

Small amounts of salt for short periods won't harm the corries etc, it's when people go mad with it that does the harm. The usual 'if a bit is good, a lot is better' syndrome.

Ah, now I understand what LFS Man was on about.  Same with the temperature comment he made that a degree over limit, for a short time, won't unduly affect the Corries either.

 

Thanks @Sue.

Just a waiting game now.  Given we've had the Mollies since 14th January, should the worst happen, I don't think I can go back to MA with a complaint.  I think their guarantee on fish is just a few days.

If Sick Molly goes , we'll have to put it down to another unexplained demise, like Jimmy the Snail.  The 2 Gourami we've lost went from their own curiosity/stupidity.  But it means we've now lost 4 critters since we started stocking the tank on 3rd November, only 2+ months.  Is this "normal" attrition?

I'll let you know how things go/went after the weekend.

I agree with @fcmf
Discussions with LFS are always useful, and I'm sure that most stores appreciate customer feedback, even if it's not always positive, as it helps them to improve standards.

That does sound odd - but it does suggest something wrong with the batch of black mollies.

And yes, I always finish the course of medicine as well.