My fry are now about 3 months old. One is very large and the other is still quite small. I believe his growth is stunted because of a combination of being born into parasite infested water and what appears to be a slightly deformed mouth.

Because the fry tank also has chilo in it and the large fry was chattering, darting, twitching and yawning, I salted the tank to 0.3% two weeks ago. Both fry handled the salt very well. The larger fry is no longer exhibiting the unusual behavior. I ahve not scoped the tank again as I have been occupied with treating the parent fish (STILL!). However, because a salinity of 0.8% for 10 days in the parent tank did not kill the chilo and I then resorted to 0.5% salt along with PP (just finished this treatment so not sure yet if the chilo is gone), I am assuming that a lowly 0.3% salt for 2 weeks probably did not eradicate the chilo in the fry tank.

Do you think that is a safe assumption?

My question is: is it safe to leave the fry salted to 0.3% (which seems to be at least keeping the chilo population in check as the yawning, darting, twitching, etc has disappeared)? OR would it be better to give them a break from the salt, slowly remove the salt from the tank and see if the symptoms reappear (at which point I could raise the salinity once again)?

Quite a situation I've gotten myself into, I know. But these lil guys are sooo adorable and the big one looks excellent. I'm not sure how long the little one will survive. Once I've got the parents cured, I think I may set up separate tanks (or maybe just get a tank divider) for the fry. I've been feeding the larger fry crushed ProGold and frozen bloodworms but they are too large for the little fry. I continue to feed him Hikari First Bites and frozen baby brine shrimp. However I ahve a feeling the big one is eating some of the little guy's food too. I hope by separating them the little one will get more to eat and hopefully grow!

Any thoughts, recommendations, etc are greatly appreciated!

Hey woman - just wanted to say I've popped in and read, but unfortunately I don't know what to advise......hopefully Koko or someone with more fry experience will pop in.


If you have concerns about food consumption, I would certainly divide them for the time being. They are small enough to not cause much concern regarding space issues.


Good luck, sweets!!

Well, I'd say since those fry do well with the 0.3% solution for a whole 2 weeks, it definetely didn't hurt. But to be careful with those chilo - those buggers already seem to be pretty salt tolerant, so I wouldn't encourage that any further by keeping the salt solution up. The bigger fry is still too small to scrape him for any nasties, is he?

Yep, I'd say so. He's probably about 1" (not including tail).

Unfortunately the other fry passed away yesterday. He was probably about 1/5 the size of his brother. He just wasn't growing for the longest time. His mouth was deformed and there was something strange with his gills--probably due to the chilo. Very sad to see him go but I had a feeling he wouldn't make it much longer. He swam around and acted fine but he was just sooooo small (probably the size of a 3-4 week old fry and he was over 2 months old).

I've discussed the treatment with toothy and he thinks that perhaps once the remaining fry is about 1.5" I could salt him to a higher percentage and do a PP bath like I did with the parent fish.

I have lowered the salt to 0.1%. I am working on cycling a separate tank for him but in the meantime the tank he's in has a low amt of nitrites in it so I thought the low salt may help protect him from the nitrites.
If the fry's symptoms return (darting, yawning, etc), I'll salt him to 0.3% for a week or two then give him another break. I know this won't eradicate the chilo but at least it seems to keep them in check as his "chilo" symptoms have disappeared since the salt has been in there. I will scope the debris on the bottom of the tank and see what I can find . . . .

So, the salt/PP combo worked well for your adult fish then? Geez, that chilo sure is a terrible bugger to deal with once it is salt tolerant. Better fatten up the little guy so he reaches his "treatment" size soon...

Sorry about your other fry though. Anything can happen at that young age, and it is sad but realistic to say that most batches of fry are getting reduced in number due to deformities and illness on a regular basis. But you still have one to take good care of, so lets focus on him instead..

I'm not positive the PP/salt worked as it's only been a few days since we finished that treatment. I scoped 10 days straight after the previous treatment before I found chilo again. We'll see . . ..

And the little guy is growing like crazy!! He's a good inch (not including tail) so hopefully I'll be able to treat him in the not so distant future. In the meantime, I feed him 4 times a day!!

And, yes, while I'm very sad about losing the little fry, I am concentrating on the one I have left. This whole breeding thing came as a total surprise to me so I am lucky to have even one baby!!

I'm sorry about the fry! This seems to happen all the time. We'll have to focus on the ones we have left though...