malawi chiclids and black spot

Question
Hi,
I have a fish tank with some Malawi cichlids and two of them(electric yellow) have few black spots on their body. According to me it is black spot but I don't know how to treat it. Besides this I don't have an other tank where to put them and treat them. So can you please give me some advice.
PS. The sales person at the pet shop suggested me to add tonic salt the the water.

Regards

Ismael Cutajar

Answer
Hi Ismael,
  There are two kinds of black spots that I know of.  The one kind is essentially little bruises caused by bites from another fish.

  The other kind is one life stage of a little aquatic parasite. It forms little black spots which are actually little tiny mounds on the fishes skin.  The good news is that you don't need to do anything about these.  The parasites come in on plants and snails I believe and only one life history stage lives on the fish. Eventually they need to get to their next host which is a bird I believe.  Since that isn't going to happen in a fish tank, eventually they will simply disappear.  

 I would not add anything to try to get rid of them.  No good can come from that and there is a lot of potential harm.

-- Ron
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
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