Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

My one surviving Bluegill appears to have Lymphocystis Disease, a virus which causes grotesque but benign tumors. Other than his horrible tumors, he looks great, very active. My question is, will I have to cull him and every last Gambusia from the system, which means discarding all the water and starting from scratch, before I get new fish? Apparently this virus can be dormant and then express itself when the fish are stressed.

What would you advise?

I missed this post.

When you have disease in a system, it can be problematic to remove without sterilising the entire system i.e. starting from scratch. You can progress slowly to overcome the disease by using potassium permanganate or sodium hypochlorite to treat the water, or even chlorine bleach (with extreme care in a running AP system). Products like Melafix can also be used (discussions already exist on the forum about the food-safe-ness)(if such a word exists?).

Do a search and let us know what course of action you decide.


Scott

Its also worth noting that of the 3 common disease types (virus, fungus, bacteria) viruses are the most difficult to treat, and as far as I'm aware there is no cure for Lymphocystis. As long as you have infected fish, introducing any new fish will result in them becoming infected also.

In my opinion, sacrificing one sick bluegill and some gambusia is probably worth it for a virus free tank. If you can find out how long Lymphocystis can survive without a host and it isn't too long, you may be able to destroy the fish, and simply wait the virus out before restocking, rather than going through the rigmarole of draining and sterilising. But if you do this you need to make sure every last host fish is removed, down to the smallest gambusia baby.

Good luck either way