Skin Fluke



At almost the majority of ponds that I have been called out to, to assist with serious health problems, I found skin fluke.

Skin Fluke is one of the major killers of Koi. It is often not the fluke as such, but a fluke infection very often goes over into a secondary problem being a bacterial infection and consequently death.

There are two types, skin fluke and gill flukes.

The above photo represents a slide with skin fluke, which is by far the most common. In all the years of having Koi, I never had problems with gill fluke, although skin fluke does occur from time to time.

Neither one of the two is visible without a Microscope.

The first sign of skin fluke is normally a lack of appetite, build up of mucus and sporadic flashing. If you see the signs, you should immediately do a skin scraping to identify and treat it, before it explodes in numbers and go over into a bacterial infection. Often, the fish scrape against the walls to rid themselves of the fluke, and by doing that, creates open wounds, which can result in infection and death.

If you find one fluke on a slide, it does not mean that you have a big problem. Ideally you should have no fluke at all, but it is fine for Koi to have the odd fluke. However, if you find more than one on a slide, you have to treat immediately. The secret to the success of treatment of Koi is to be able to treat before the problem becomes to serious.

I normally have a black fish(Haijiro or Hageshiro) in my ponds. On a black fish you can see any built up of mucus easily and identify a problem in your pond before it creates problems. They, together with a white fish that shows stress(red on the base of the dorsal fin) easily are my early warning signals.

Should you find fluke on the slide, you have to treat the whole pond, because you can expect fluke on most of the fish.

There are various treatment options available.

A common treatment is to use malachite green and formalin combination (if you do not have a high solution of salt in your pond and your water temperature is above 12 degree Celcius)

There are also various medication designed specifically for fluke like Flukeaway and Prazi but they are quite expensive.

I personally always use Potassium Permanganate at 2,5g per 1000 liters and continue with the treatment two days apart until I am able to maintain a pinkish colour for at least 6 hours. It normally requires three or four treatments depending on the amount of organic matters present in your pond. It is a cheap and very effective treatment and at the same time addresses any possible bacterial problems caused by the fluke. It will also sort out almost all other parasites if present at the same time. It does affect your beneficial bacteria, but if you bypass your filter during treatment, you regain your beneficial bacteria very soon. An added advantage is that it leaves you with a crystal clear pond. One drawback of a PP treatment is that you have to do a 20-30% water change after each treatment and you should never overdose. Therefore it is extremely important to know the exact volume of your pond.

Hi Paul,
Try Seponver Plus @ 4.4ml per 1000L pond water.
Once only.
I get mine at the local Co-op and it is the same as Supaverm which the Brits use.

Hi,

I even used SeponverPlus with salt and had no problems at all.
People having problems with “medicine” regarding Koi are those that fail to stick to the right dosage. It is easy to blame the treatment!

Quote :

Treatment

When treating Skin flukes it is normally only necessary to apply treatment once. There are numerous proprietary medications which are designed to treat flukes. All with varying results. An alternative to these is to use malachite green and formalin at a dose rate depending on the strength of the solution, be sure that water temperature is above 11*C , between 11*C and 7*C considering the use of Potassium Permanganate

Doses: Once only
Skin flukes:
*Salt 5kg/1000lt together with 1g/1000lt Malachite green or
* Malachite green and Formalin as mentioned above.
* Seponver Plus 4,4ml/ 1000lt water
* Potassium Permanganate 2,5 g /1000lt water ( mix Pot.P in a (plastic ) bucket with Hot water first)

Gill flukes:
*Potassium Permanganate 1,5g/1000lt water ( mix in Hot water ) use (plastic ) bucket repeat every 5-7days over period of three weeks.
* Seponver Plus 4,4 ml/1000lt repeat after 5 days – 2,2ml/1000lt

You can use salt 1kg /1000lt with Seponver Plus
WARNING Never use salt and formalin or Potassium Permanganate and formalin together

I personally preffer using Potassium Permanganate ( Its cheap and easy to use ). I havent really had any experiance with many other meds.

POTASIUM PERMANGANATE DOES NOTHING FOR FLUKES.
Only at very strong doses will it kill them.

I get excellent results from Potassium.

The secret is to stick to the prescribed dosage and procedure.

If your solution is too weak, it will do nothing and the fluke will actually build up immunity. If you have too many organic matter in your pond, Potassium will also do nothing to the fluke, unless you carry on with the treatments until you get at least to the stage where you are able to maintain a pinkish water colour after 6 hours, although some people recommend 8 hours.

When there are too many organic matters in the pond, the oxidising agent use all it's energy to oxidise the organic matters in stead of on the fluke.

If your water turns brown already within two hours, add another 50% of the dosage being 1.25g / 1000 liters and repeat the proces after two days.

On the second treatment the water will stay pink much longer and on the third treatment even longer.

You have to go on until you reach the 6 hour stage, otherwise your treatment will be senseless.

On ponds with a lot of plants, Potassium is not recommended, because the active agent will spend all it's energy on the plants in stead of on the fluke.

Gill fluke.


Did a scrape on one of my little Shiro utsuris today and found a couple of gill flukes...propably not that an amazing find but what was very exciting for me was that as i was watching this particular one under the microscope i it saw giving "birth". It basicly expelled a fluke of roughly half its own size and inside the baby fluke one could see that it was also expecting...

I have heard many times about it but this was the first time i ever ever saw it myself, just thought that i would share the story.

I need to get myself that connector that allows me to connect my camera to the microscope.