weaning babies(HELP)

[carolerex]

We are fairly new Discus breeders and have successfully raised only one batch of young fish.
Can anyone advise us why after weaning subsequent batches of babies they start dying off in one's and two's. They are wormed twice one week apart while still on the parents. One would suppose they were not dying of fluke worm but their behaviour sugests that this might be the case. They are bred and then transfered to a bare bottom tank with 2 x daily 25% water changes a day. We start feeding frozen baby brine shrimp whilst still with the parents and continue with this in the raising tank gradually adding frozen Daphnia and later finely crushed flake.
We have had advise to dip them for thirty seconds (on removal from parents and transfer to raising tank) in a solution of formalin. Is this good advise has anyone tried this method.
Our breeders are healthy regularly wormed and fed on a very varied diet.

[carolerex]

We are fairly new Discus breeders and have successfully raised only one batch of young fish.
Can anyone advise us why after weaning subsequent batches of babies they start dying off in one's and two's. They are wormed twice one week apart while still on the parents. One would suppose they were not dying of fluke worm but their behaviour sugests that this might be the case. They are bred and then transfered to a bare bottom tank with 2 x daily 25% water changes a day. We start feeding frozen baby brine shrimp whilst still with the parents and continue with this in the raising tank gradually adding frozen Daphnia and later finely crushed flake.
We have had advise to dip them for thirty seconds (on removal from parents and transfer to raising tank) in a solution of formalin. Is this good advise has anyone tried this method.
Our breeders are healthy regularly wormed and fed on a very varied diet.Can any one help? still losing babies.

[pink66]

I am no expert but DIY's post of Breeding Log With Pictures may give you some assistance. He has been logging every issue the babies have had and what he has done to fix it..

I am hoping the answers you need will be there.

:wink:

[jimmyg]

This is DIY's link to the above post mentioned, http://www.discusforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17743&postdays=0&postorder=asc&&start=0

DIY you rae awesome man it is a good post

[mistakes r crucial]

If you worm and de-fluke the parents prior to them spawning you will help minimize niggly problems when growing out very young fry. Personally I wouldn't be dropping few week old fry in formalin although others may disagree. Prazi is gentle although flukes have become immune to it to a degree. There is a powdered form that worked for me and you can get it directly from Aristopet. However, the biggest thing is the parents, if your fry have a condition then it's only come from one place, them.
Cheers
MAC

[Hollowman]

I guess a couple of PP treatments might help.

[carolerex]

Thank you everyone for your helpful input. We checked out the post by DIY very good post.
We might try the PP treatments on the next batch (who are just startingt to free swim) when we seperate them from the parents,
Our adult fish are all wormed regularly with Praziquantel. Can I ask "mistakes r crucial" what would you use to "de-fluke" the parents? and how often.

[DIY]

WOW :shock: thanks for all the nice comments about my thread... :wink:

I think the biggest thing I've learn't with what I'm going through is exactly what MAC's saying - clean the parents before they breed :thumb

My first batch in the linked thread above, I had given the parents a 20min PP dip when I transferred them to the breeding tank - this was after already worming them with both Levamisole and Prazi. When I go back over what happened and when I didn't have any problems with the fry until I moved them to a tank that I hadn't "sanitised" so I believe I introduced them to parasites that were in the tank waiting.

My second batch with different parents I hadn't recently wormed, and I didn't do the PP dip on transfer... I have been losing large numbers of fry at only 2 1/2 weeks of age - much earlier and much bigger losses so the painful lesson I've learnt is clean parents = fry survival :wink:

[mistakes r crucial]

Hi Carol,

It's not a case of how often, it's a case of when you know your fish have them and aren't controlling them. It is highly unlikely you will ever 100% erradicate flukes although it is possible but not without 2-4 years hard work. If you have a fluke problem then really you should be looking at why, if you have just introduced fish to the same tank/system then fair enough but outside of that it's probably more to do with their water quality, environment, conditions.

I used Prazi whenever I thought I could but at times, in a large fish room that see's lots of new Discus recruits and new fish, you have fluke problems that Prazi just won't fix. I would then use Trichloraphon but never on fry.

I'm a firm believer that you use meds as seldom as possible and most certainly not when there's no apparent reason. Fish, like all animals and us, need worming from time to time and 2 or 3 times a year as a preventative measure, IMO, is fine providing the correct drugs are used.

I always had between 700 and 1200 fish in my room and if there is one thing I learned beyond any doubt, nothing beats water changes and the odd handful of rock salt.
Cheers
MAC

[Hollowman]

I'm a firm believer that you use meds as seldom as possible and most certainly not when there's no apparent reason. MAC

I totally agree with you MAC, too many people are too keen to throw a med at their fish without properly diagnosing the problem. 9 times out of 10 a water change and a regular water change regime is the best med we have to use.

Steve (H)

[carolerex]

Just a quick reply on our cleaning and water change regime. (Please comment on anything we might be doing wrong.)
Breeding tank b/b 500x500x450 . w/c every other day 25%. Sides and bottom cleaned every other w/c. 6.2ph. 27d temp
Fry tank b/b 400x300x350 w/c 25% daily. sides and bottom cleaned every other w/c. ph starting at 6.2 gradualy increasing to 6.6 30d temp