without having opened him up to look for the granulomas there is not way to tell for sure. What you CAN do is get a disinfectant FOR the mycos.. treat everything.. and start fresh watching the health of your new fish. If it was not TB.. you are no further behind. And if it was..you have at least taken the steps to kill it right then and there.
Sorry for the loss..
What is TB ?
Thank you so much for your advice.
I have to take care of my fish, and then new fish.
I'm beginning to think that my tanks have some form of mycobacterium. I have had. Few mysterious death/illnesses. I'll explain one by one....
Guppy ------ Definitely some sort of tuberculosis.... This fish had extreme bloating, and lesions.. It was like this for around two weeks, i then euthanized as it was the most humane thing to do. This escalated slowly.... MAY 2012
Guppy------- I'm not sure on this one. He got a bit bloated and then all of a sudden died, within two to three days. OCTOBER 2012
Betta -------- He started to bloat really bad, and was on the bottom of the tank for a while. Sakura helped treat with metronidazole, worked like a charm. Came back on Monday night, died Tuesday. OCTOBER 2012 AND JANUARY 2012
Platy ------- On Tuesday night, had raised scales, fin rot, and white bit on her, all of a sudden. Died Wednesday morning. JANUARY 2013
Platy and two guppies were from same store and lived in same tank. I use all the same supplies.
"Mycobacterium causes a chronic disease, usually characterized by wasting. It should be suspected when fish are in poor condition and also have scale loss, skin ulcers, or a history of reproductive problems. Occasionally, deep hemorrhagic skin lesions will be seen in addition to the more common superficial lesions....."
The article says that "the disease can masquerade as a number of other conditions," and the only way to determine whether it's a Mycobacterial infection is by having the fish analyzed by a lab. (They open it up to examine the internal organs, etc.)
Last edited by LittleBlueFishlets; 01-17-2013 at 07:54 PM.
What is TB ?
Thank you so much for your advice.
I have to take care of my fish, and then new fish.
Thank you,
TB is tuberculosis. Its scientific name is Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB).
Fish do not get this particular disease, but they CAN get other types of Mycobacterial diseases. Therefore, a lot of people call it "Fish TB," but it's not really TB.
Taking care of your fish is important. Per the article Mycobacterial Infections of Fish, "The disease is most often seen in animals reared under suboptimal conditions, including those that may be stressed or immunocompromised."
This means that even if your fish has been exposed, keeping it in 'good conditions' (good water, good food, etc), you can help it to stay healthy.
Actually, I think this may be why a possible reason why it takes good breeders so long to realize their fish have it.... Good breeders keep their fish in good conditions. The result is that it's not readily apparent that their fish have been exposed....
Sakura, I came to this thread late.. this morning, so I didn't see the first post. Based on what I have seen, I responded to how it made me feel reading everything. To me, arguing with someone warning others just annoyed me.. and I too started to become argumentative. Easy to jump on the bandwagon it seems.
As I had not seen the original post, I can't attest to how it was presented. I have seen BB in different places other than this forum, so I judged based what I had seen and experienced off of those, why I jumped to her defense. Not saying I wouldn't do it again - but my wording would most likely be different. BB is someone I respect, among some others, when it comes to breeding/caring for betta fish. I have not seen anything from her that I have ever questioned, disagreed or disliked. So I got upset reading what I did.
Either way, we can still turn this around and have a proper discussion over it.. no reason to argue what scientists have actually said to her personally, as no one else from here was there, and she has no reason to lie.
BB herself has said, as have several other published experts, that there is no way to tell if a fish truly has this strain of mycobacteria without these tests to see if the granulomas are present. Pointing out the external symptoms does not help because many diseases have symptoms that mimic each other and in addition, as Callistra pointed out, there are also many secondary diseases to be dealt with as well that could be causing physical symptoms.
Well if it can not show up for months then I have no way of knowing that a potential pet will have it or not....so I am going to forget I read this at all because I never believed in buying sick looking fish and I don't breed.
I wouldn't worry too much finfin. All 50+ of my bettas were sickie fish when I picked them out and not one of them have had the mystery disease or anything even similar to it. Although I normally do not go for one's on death's door either.
Put yourself in her shoes.. how would you feel if after years of working lines (remember it takes 3+ months in order to breed the next generation), and killing hundreds of your fish including ones you have fallen in love with, etc.. how would you feel? Anger? Sadness? Disheartened? Wouldn't you be a bit passionate when telling people what happened? Whether it's anger or sadness coming through.. you will still make a point in warning others, and that point can easily be very straightforward and blunt and there is nothing wrong with that.
It wasn't until she got attacked for no reason did the words get stronger.
Put yourself in her shoes and then tell me you would be very calm and pleasant when describing what you had to do to your beloved fish.
If this were to be rewritten, I would use the article she wrote along with her personal story.. but the facts are still the same.. this was a warning, not an attack, on her part.
I was thinking this same thing. Yes, there were some harsh words in there... Some I did find offensive... But I can see why. I have five bettas, and I would be absolutely devastated if this happened to them, probably beyond mad (at no one in particular but it would help to have an outlet) and also, out a lot of money. This being said, I have four tanks and one is still empty. I have no doubt it my mind that the amount this costed her far exceeded the entire amount of money I've spent on my fish in my lifetime (and its quite a bit, especially considering that my fish are only pets and I do not breed). It seriously scares the life out of me to think what would happen if this got into my fish tanks, but it is a good warning, and intended to help people. I'm sure anyone who lost that many fish in one day would act the same way... And of course she would be angry with others for not trying to get rid of this mycobacteria because she doesn't want it to end up back in any of her tanks.
That being said... I'm really confused about this, now. Considering the fact that all this scientific language does nothing but confuse me, it needs to be kind of "dumbed down" for me to understand it. I've seen a lot of scary symptoms here and also scary outcomes of this mycobacteria crud, but I also understand that there are different strains. It can live in a fish for weeks, months.. Even years, correct? Are there differences between the life spans of the fish? I'm understanding that healthy fish can live with certain strains but other strains will kill any fish it touches, correct? How much do we really know about each specific strain? Which are more dangerous? Which kill faster? Are the symptoms the same for all of them?
I guess what I would like to see is maybe a chart of some sort that kind of explains what we know about the specific strains, how long they take to kill a fish, symptoms, etc... Because this is just all over the place and I'm more confused than I was to begin with.
I guess what I'm saying, in one sentence, is that I get the point of the thread to spread awareness but with the scattered information, its very difficult for me to pinpoint what exactly I'm supposed to be aware of because I feel like this thread is not solely focused on one thing...
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