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One of our females is not doing so good.

She is having trouble staying upright. No physical signs of illness sept her tummy seems to be sunken in some.

Could this be dropsy?

No pineconeing going on tho. She is in a hospital now, but I fear she will not make it.

Edit: After closer inspection, I see her eyes look like they are bugging out a little.

Last edited by Shannen at 06-Mar-2005 10:34

If she's in isolation, you may want to try something. If eyes are bugging I'd go with antibiotic - something with nitrofurans in it like Fungus Eliminator, Furan-2, Furacyn. If the fish is eating, consider feeding something like the new Anti-Bacteria Medicated Food by Jungle. I'd also have on hand the Anti-Parasite food too, otherwise, if the fish recovers, you may consider dosing with Parasite Clear and let her have a round of Praziquantel just in case it originated with worms.

It's always possible the fish is suffering from something else like tumors, cancer, impacted eggs, etc. However, since those things are not readily dealt with, I like to try antibiotic to see if the fish response.

Look for blood at the vent, the base of the pec fins or points/streaks on the belly - indication of septicemia. The furans are good for that, but you just never know when damage is too much.

OK she will not eat. I don't think she can.

We are treating her with Maracyn. It's the only antibiotic we have on hand.

If she pulls thru I will follow up with medicated food.

Maracyn should work for internal infections. However, when you look to stock your medicine chest, always include something from the nitrofuran family. Furacyn specifically touts to be safe for scaleless fish too, for aquariums that have them.

Good luck and keep us updated.

She died.

R.I.P Lil girl...



I suspect she was harassed by the skunk loaches, although I am not sure. I did see them chasing her around. They have been moved to a different tank.

Last edited by ~jamie~ at 06-Mar-2005 14:04[/font]

Aww - sorry about that. R.I.P. little girl . I kind of figured it was too far gone, whatever it was. It's possible someone rammed her pretty good and caused an internal injury - thus, the bloat in one area.

Last edited by Cory_Di at 06-Mar-2005 16:12

That pic was taken yesterday. She seem ok, then today we found her sitting on the bottom of the tank not moving.

least she is in a good place now.

Thanks Dian

As a preventive measure, I'm feeding that tank with anti-parasite food.

Should I not do this?

Edit: We have recently put wild caught loaches in there. We would have QTed them first, but yeah, all our tanks are full right now.

The loaches look and appear healthy.

Last edited by Shannen at 06-Mar-2005 17:33

Wild caught, but how long separated from the wild?

Wild caught fish should definitely go into quarantine for a longer period. I'm terrible in that I would prefer to feed them anti-parasitic food in a single round, just to be safe. Those are hard to see and symptoms could take months or years to manifest.