parasite or fungus????

okay i got this pleco from this guy he couldnt get rid of this thing on his tail so i was wondering u guys think. he tried melafix and more but would prefer more input. its on his tail.

Take the fish and place it on a wet cloth then carefully paint iodine with a q tip on to the affected area......Be careful not to get any anywhere else on the fish or in your eyes...........You have to hold the fish still but not so firm as to tangle it into the cloth fibers.............When you do it, don't leave it on the fish too long, then pour water on the tail to remove the iodine.......You may need to do this a couple of times.....A good antibiotic in the tank will help also.

okay i put some copper safe and melafix would that help the fish thanks i didnt know u can use iodine, should i get that at walmart or somewhere else?

it does look like some type of fungus.., yes i will try something harder that melafix.

ya the guy said he did melafix so im like hm so i put some melafix and copper safe and wanted to see wat u guys think ill get some iodine today and q tips which we deparatly need anyways.

DO NOT PUT ANY IODINE IN THE TANK!!!!!!!!!Melafix and Primafix are very weak solutions and have little or no effect on advanced disease........I would not use any copper based med in anything except as a dip or in a quarantine tank.....The exception being Quick Cure or Maracide for Ick or Velvet, where the entire tank must be treated......Always do 25% water changes to dilute out any med after it has done it's job (per the instructions on the bottle)

Keep in mind that copper is very harmful to most inverts (snails, shrimp, crayfish, etc...). If you have put it in your tank, and you have inverts, keep a very close eye on your water parameters. If you end up with a sudden die off of your inverts (many of which aren't real active during the day), your water parameters will start going crazy as they decompose.

copper is more dangerous than helpful in my opinion. Like stated before Melafix is not strong enough for your infection. I use quick cure most but would add tetracycline or another antibiotic also. It looks rather infected.

I agree with the antibiotics. You should be able to find something at your LFS (not a chain, they won't usually carry much in the way of meds).

Good luck!!

I have some leftover Amoxicillin that I can send you if you don't want to buy anything. I can get it in tomorrows mail and you will have Monday, unless you want to meet me someplace.

wat would amoxicillin do and how to treat him? im using the tetracycline, i got him like that so im trying all kinds of stuff tonite im doing a water change of course and im getting the iodine to treat him and wont put it in his tank. i dont hav any inverts beside the pleco in the tank. i took everyone out before i even put him in there. im going to try to cure as soon as possible. he eats and does all that very healthy beside his tail.

are you sure 100% thats a fungus?

amoxicillin is a broad spectrum antibiotic as well as the tetracycline.

Amoxicillin and Tetracycline are for control of some common bacterial diseases of fish. Effective against aeromonas and pseudomonas genera and mysobacterial group (gill diseases chondrococcus).

keep us posted...

oh def would luv that stuff for him, i got him for free to try to heal him and i luv yawls opinion for everything and helped alot. i thought u wer talking bout the human amoxycillin lol, im allergice to that stuff hahaha and im like i may hav to hav geoff do that one.

That's a rubber lip pleco, they are nearly all wild caught as not many if any people breed them. Being wild caught theres a whole bunch of stuff that could be. I know at my lfs when we get rubber lips in we hit them with metronidazole first thing.
I hope that was some help.....

ya im treated him with all kinds of stuff that i can think of. im going to use the iodine treatment to see if that works, if not then ill get that stuff u wer talking bout fern and ya hes a rubber lip. the guy said he got him and he thinks wen he was cleaning the tank he accidently put a rock on his tail but idk if that would do that. well ill hit with everything u guys can think of lol, hes a free pleco but his meds will make up for the free part

is hydrogen peroxide the the same thing as iodine bc my bf couldnt fine iodine.

No, they are not the same thing.

a CVS or walgreens will have iodine.

i thought so ya ill pick some up tomorrow since i told my bf to not get anything and i know where to get it and he doesnt. my bf doesnt really look at things either he just randomly picks things up like oh here we go. especially wen hes doing something i wont mention, so he can get on my nerves bout that stuff. he never bought my sand either and that was a week ago!!!!! argh

his boo boo is getting smaller!!!! it starting to shrink so im hoping that it will get better, hes been a trooper with all this too.gettin takin out and rub some painful meds then rinse and put back in hes been very unhappy with me but i think he know that im helping him bc hes not runnin away.

cool