Huge Mystery - How Possible? Help Solve Please?

[HappyGuppy]

Hi folks, I got a huge mystery and would appreciate help from anyone to help solve this.  Are you a fishy Sherlock Holme's? 

This situation involves another OVAS member and from discussions it seems that we disagree.  Once you read the evidence below you'll understand the confusing mystery, why we both disagree with each other yet can understand each other.  In my mind this is super weird, and I need the assistance of others mental powers to make sense of this.

Ok, so I emptied out a tank of all fish to house the fish that I would acquire from someone else shortly.  The other fish were transfered to another tank upstairs.  After this 10g tank was 100% empty of all fish I then went to pick up the new fish.  He gave me approximately 20 endlers (including the fry), brought them home and immediately placed them into the tank.  It was late at night, so I briefly enjoyed looking at them and left.

The next day I enjoyed looking at them for longer, and while admiring them I noticed a female with these weird red things sticking out her butt.  I assumed that it might have been a miscarriage.  Note that this was observed in under 24 hours of getting the fish.  There were about 5 of these "things".  I didn't think much of it. 

For the next few days I kept looking at these things and started getting a gut feeling that these red things might be something more, especially after I noticed some, less amount, on another female.  I spoke with another member about this and googled to learn more about this, and discovered that it is "callamanus".  This realization occurred one week after getting the fish, and the time stamps of the PMs here can prove that.

This prompted an insane amount of googling, researching, and starting treatments.  I'll skip a lot of details, but will just say that I've decided to get rid of all my snails, jars & small tanks of little stuff, and a bunch of my livestock.  I'm now taking the precautions that I am mentally assuming that everything is contaminated and so all my aquatic stuff must be treated/sanitized completely.  I'm sure anyone reading this can assume what a PITA this is. 

One more point before getting to the mystery.

My other tank that includes the fish that were from that 10g tank has been fine.  Two or three days ago while doing my regular scanning for worms has turned up one fish with a tiny worm protruding.  Damn.  The tank is infected.  Unfortunately during that week after getting those new fish and before discovering the callamanus, I didn't practice proper hygiene between tanks.  The point of sharing this is to point out the fact that obviously my original fish, which I've had for a very long time, did not have this before, and thus are NOT the source.

Ok, so here is the mystery.

I told the guy from whom I got the endlers about the callamanus.  He was very good & apologetic.  I forgave him completely as my perspective is that if he's not aware of the problem then he's not done so maliciously.  S#!T happens, oh well, forgiveness is my active spiritual practice.

He gets back to me later telling me that perhaps it didn't come from him.  He checked out his tanks and sees zero red worms out butts.  I was of course polite, but in my mind I figured that he needs new glasses.  I came over to see for myself.  He hands me a flashlamp and invites me to inspect his tanks.  Honestly if I didn't NOT see any with my own two eyes I simply would never have believed it.

The next day I took a video to record some of the remaining callamanus worms (from treatment it has gone down) to prove it to him, as honestly I think now that he and his buddy must believe that I'm hallucinating.  I'll have to figure out a way to get this up on youtube (sigh, I'll create an account soon).

So as it currently stands they don't believe the callamanus came from his tank.  I am encouraging them to QT the tanks because I believe that it is completely infested despite seeing no evidence of it.  I entertained the idea that perhaps the callamanus came some other way, but after pondering the thought for a bit I realise that any alternate possibilities are impossible - it takes a long time for it to manifest, so how can you explain it being a visible problem within 24 hours of acquiring the fish?

So, is there any other possible explanations?  Is there something that might have been missed?  Please fire your questions, and hopefully together we'll be able to solve this apparent mystery.

So, did it come from his tanks, or how else might it have come?

The way I look at it is is that this is like AIDS or some other contageous disease.  I've QTed myself and am treating properly.  I think it is important to identify the source to help them to be aware of the issue to prevent further spread of the infectious parasite.  If the source is elsewhere help me to find it to help solve the problem... this could potentially affect any of us in the future if not kept in check.

[Fishnut]

Are you sure the worms weren't present before?  Some species of fish are much more prone to them than others for some reason.

When you checked the seller's tanks again, were there other endlers in the tank?

[wandmangels]

http://www.loaches.com/Members/shari2/levamisole-hydrochloride-1

really the ONLY med that works any local store bought stuff will not work
(i have experienced these from a LFS)

[littlelil]

Was he using old fish bags or brand new?

[HappyGuppy]

I'll address the points, point form...

* Yes, he has some more endlers, a few, as well as other fish in the tank.  I didn't spot anything on them.

* After extensive googling I've decided to go with mebendazole from the febendazole family.  My shrimp survived, snails all dead (I dosed heavily).  The treatment is working as the callamanus worms turned brown and started to disintegrate.  Certainly working.  I'm doing multiple treatments, every week (weekend), for a couple of months.  Probably overkill, but I'd rather be 100% done with it, rather than chance a relapse.  Furthermore, I am treating the entire water column and internally via food.  I am satisfied that it is working now.  Once I am done the treatments I'll then clear out the chems from the water and try to bring snails back (from other sources - killing off all of mine, not risking relapse).

* I am not sure about the bag... it was one of those kordon breather bags, but unsure if new or used.

* I got a PM with an interesting hypothesis - and am pursuing this possibility.  Someone suggested that the worms might have already been in the tank and the fish ate them.  After all I didn't notice the worms until about 24 hours later, so I  will concede that this *might* be a possibility, though somewhat lower on my ranking of likelihood.  I did get some plants from two sources recently that ended up in that tank.  I will investigate by contacting those people to ask if they have callamanus.  This doesn't explain why the fish that were in there previously, but got moved out, didn't get the worms like that.  However the tank was empty of fish for over a week (waiting for the endlers) so it might be possible (?) that the worms grew in size during that time in the tank alone, then a fish came an ate them up, and thus 24 hours later display the worms out anus.  I don't know, this theory does seem a slight stretch in my mind, but again, it is a possible explanation, so will explore that possibility further.

* You may notice that I've abstained from revealing who the other person is.  I have chosen not to divulge that information just in case I am wrong and he really is clean... so that he doesn't get treated like a leper by the ovas community.  I don't mind sharing the fact that I've got this infection and have canceled all trades with anyone that is still contacting me for something.  The message that I want to portray is that I am taking full action to eradicate this from my home, losing a bunch of nice stuff, mentally treating 100% of all my aquatic stuff with the assumption of being contaminated, and that once I eventually resume to sharing stuff with others again that I do so with the confidence in my heart that I am sharing clean stuff.  In HappyGuppy you can trust.

[Fishnut]

Bleach and hot water is great on stuff...even gravel as long as it's rinsed well.

[Soeman]

It is possible that the unmentioned individual from whom you received has the parasite. As you have already stated, there seems to be very limited information available on the web regarding callamanus. However, some parasites (and other diseases) require alternate hosts to complete their life cycles. Does this individual have any snails? Snails are a common alternate host for fish diseases. It is possible that just one of his fishes (one of the fishes he gave to you) were infected, but fighting the infection effectively enough to never show symptoms.

Consider E.coli in humans: we _require_ a small colony of this bacteria in our guts to promote healthy digestion of the food we consume. It is also found in almost all natural water sources. In the right (wrong) conditions, these colonies bloom and can cause problems (especially when they mutate into virulent strains).

If one of the fishes you obtained were infected, and you provided the alternate host that the other individual did not, this parasite was thus able to complete it's life cycle and infect the rest of the fishes.

[HappyGuppy]

@ Soeman - I speculate that your thought might possibly be correct.  I have thought along similar lines, that that first fish that I saw had it might have been the bad fish that was first to catch it (a worm came into his tank through a trade?) and coincidentally happened to be one that was captured to give to me.  My tank might have had the right (wrong) conditions for it to explode like it did. 

I don't know, to be honest, about anything.  I've tried thinking of every possibility, and honestly none of them make sense to me.  I am glad that the other guy has no signs of callamanus, because he is a nice guy and I don't want this hassle for him, however it does irritate me that he has NO symptoms because it my mind all his fish ought to be dead by now.  How the heck this is possible really mystifies me - I'm beginning to think about calling Molder & Scully (sp?) to investigate further.

BTW, the person, who I won't publicly disclose, is closely monitoring tanks for possible outbreak.  We figure that if nothing shows up by April then his tanks probably are indeed clear, but for now he is QTing.  He strikes me as the kind of person who would not knowingly pass this infection along to others.  I trust him.