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| Bacterial infections are
usually the most severe problem you will face with your collection.
Causes could be - Failure to quarantine, and Japanese style shows where
the koi varieties are are all shown together in the same show vat and
may belong to more than just a single owner - those are just two ways
bacterial infections get spread around, but of course there are others.
With only a few rare, unexplainable exceptions, bacterial infections are
more than likely the result of deterioration in the water quality or a
parasite has been introduced that will weaken and and eventually kill
the fish.
Bacterial infections may take the form of at least five different conditions. (1) Mouth rot (2) Sores on the Body (3) Fin Rot (4) Sudden Death (5) Dropsy or pinecone desease. Bacterial infections are generally the result of several different poor conditions which causes the fish to have to adapt - such as: (1) Parasites (the number one cause of Ulcer Disease) (2) Cold water - note: Koi are not cold water fish although it is widely believed that they are) (3) Winter's starvation - in other words the koi because they are having to live in sometimes freezing cold water do not wish to eat and of course without food they, like every living thing, is in danger of death or at the very least open to any bacterial attack (4) Over Crowding - too many fish in the same pond (5) Poor wheat germ based diets during the colder months .. but now that there are many 'All year round foods' that have the protein necessary to maintain a healthy balance the practice of feeding wheat germ based foods is considerably less Dropsy, also known as Pinecone disease or Malawi Bloat, is usually caused by a bacterial invasion of the kidney, although dropsy can occur quite fast with a koi that perhaps has a wound or ulcer on the lower sections of the koi which may have gone unnoticed.... There is a sporozooan parasite
that can damage the Kidney this way, called Mitraspora cyprini, but
Dropsy is, for all intents and purposes, untreatable, based on over 10
years experience, I have tried using the following drugs: Baytril,
Chloramphenicol, Gentamicin, and Kefzol, none of which resolved the
problem. By the time the fish "blows up" and the scales protrude form the body, the damage to the kidney has already been done so much that recovery is impossible. If you must try to save the fish, Isolate the specimen, although I am reasonably sure that this problem is not infectious - although there are some who may disagree with me on this particular point, and lift the temperature of the water while also lifting the oxygenation. You could also feed the antibiotics in a medicated feed, which are available in the UK from selected outlets with a veterinary prescription - be warned you will not be able to obtain these medicated foods without that prescription ... |
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