 
| Argulus is a crustacean or branchiurian aprasite most commonly encountered
in ponds, but they are also found in aquaria. They are easily detected when they strike and
are visible to the naked eye. T
hey are greenish disc shaped organisms with suckers and small legs. They even have a pair of
eye spots on the anterior end. They spend their time darting around in the water away from,
and also directly on the fish. They lay their eggs in tubular structures on the glass and ornaments.
They can be very destructive to fish stocks. They carry Aeromonas and other bacteria on their
feeding stilletto and thus infect each fish they bite. These are very nasty parasites
that cause a lot of wear and tear of tissues by the spines and suckers they have and
cause intense irritation.
Treatment is by the application of the insect growth regulator, Dimilin, or Diflubenzuron.
Greyish-green flat parasites about one-eighth of an inch across, can be removed
with a forceps from a netted fish. Anchors Away is perhaps the only fish-labelled form of
Diflubenzuron which is commercially available. Dimilin also offers "cure" of the crustacean
parasites within 5 days in most cases.
Here again, if you can see the parasite, you can kill it with Dimilin. It's wonderful stuff
but sometimes hard to get.Dimilin is dosed at 0.5 to 1 ppm or one gram per thousand gallons. See
Anchor worm section for details on Dimilin.
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