My piranhas had a string-like fungus on them. What could it be?

Question

I had a few pirinhas. they went from being fine to having a stringy fungus looking thing and dead in 45 minutes. It was white and a few inches long. There was no fungus in their mouths. Besides the fungus, the bodies looked fine. This happened years ago, but noone I have ever asked has ever heard of this..

The fungus was growing in spots all over their bodies.

The fish were all healthy, swimming good and eating good up until that 45 minutes. There were no signs of any problems whatsoever

Answer 1

This is called columnaris. Columnaris lesions on different species of fish vary in size, location, and appearance. They appear thread-like, particularly around the mouth, giving rise to the incorrect name of 'mouth fungus'. Columnaris is often mistaken for fungus, as most of us are taught that white fuzzy growth on the skin of a fish means fungus. Columnaris usually strikeswhen a fish is stressed, usually from poor water quality, sudden changes in conditions, wide temperature swings, high nitrate concentrations, low dissolved oxygen concentration, crowding, shipping, and bullying. Columnaris will also occur more frequently in temperatures above 77 degrees and hard water with a high Ph seems to make it worse. Since you are only asking and don't need to treat it, I won't bother with explaining treatment.

Answer 2

I dont know. They could have had a disease for a long period of time that you didnt recongize. Either way if it killed a piranha it would kill anything. I have one that has lived through about 4 spells of ick, and god knows what else. If you would have noticed it sooner you probably could have gotten an antibiotic for it, but oh well fish die.

Answer 3

does it appear to be coming from it's anus? i thought something weird was going on when i saw something string-like coming from my fish, but it was just pooping.