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Ok thanks guys, the missus is going to buy a test kit tommorrow morning but i'll do a 10% water change tonight and see how i go.

I found the PH tester and the PH currently says 6.2 (before the water change i'm about to do...)

Hello there fellow Oscar fan!

I have to agree with Cory - your nitrates are most likely through the roof, and this can be a cause of concern to the health of most Oscars. I'd suggest increasing the regularity of you water changes to at least 20%(about 50L, just like now) EVERY week. I have 2 Oscars about that size in a slightly bigger tank than yours, and i do 2 * 20% water changes weekly. Until you post your results, i suggest an immediate 20% water change. Depending on your Nitrate levels, you may have to start doing daily 10% changes until the levels drop below 40ppm.

The other thing to watch might be how hard the water is in Canberra. From my memory, it's a fairly calcium rich type water, and treated heavily by your water authority. You might actually need to "do it the hard way" and replace water 1 treated bucket at a time...

Anyway, i too am waiting with baited breath for your tank parameters.

Good to see you came back. So many people post a question and we answer it, then never see them again

Your specs for anyone else looking in on this post for a 4' x 18" x 18" tank is just over 67 US gallons or around 253 Litres.

I can pretty much guarantee that your nitrates are astronomical, and that will lower Oscar's resistance. I wouldn't be surprised to see them up above 100ppm or so. I guess I should wait to get Oscar's size. How long is he?

Like goldfish, they can put out alot of ammonia with their body mass, ditto with the angels who are tall and the larger species of catfish.

If you do water changes of even 25% every month, the nitrates will slowly rise with time, given the heavy bioload. Lets say that you start out the first month doing a watter change and your nitrates are 25ppm. You do your water change and nitrates drop to 15ppm. 3-4 weeks later, the are already up to 60ppm. You do another 25% water change and maybe nudge it down to 45ppm. 3-4 weeks later, its now up to 100ppm and you do your 25% water change, dropping it to 75 or 80ppm. See where this is heading. With time, the base nitrate level rises.

The method that I use is I set targets for my tanks. My planted tanks have a nitrate target of 10-15ppm, then I do a water change to get it back to <5ppm. Above that, and plants can falter from too much nitrate. In my goldfish tank, my target is 40ppm. Because I have two, 3.5 inch goldfish in a 36 gallon (136 litres), and they are heavy waste producers due to sizeable mass, nitrates rise quickly. Ideally, these fish belong in a 90-125 gallon (340-473 Litres). In the 36 gallon, I cannot keep the nitrates below 40 unless I do from 2-3, 40-60% water changes per week. Sometiems I do two in one day and then another mid week. If I were to move them to a 90 gallon, I could probably go every 10 days for now. But as they grow I'll have to cut that time down, which means, I'm likely to put them into a 125 so I don't have to change the water as often.

See where all of this is going?

Oscar may very well have a legitimate infection of some type causing pop-eye and cloudy eye. You say the pop-eye look has been there all along, but it struck me when I saw it. Cloudy eye can be infection, fungus, and it can even be the result of ammonia, chlorine, or chloramine. The first step is to make sure that ammonia and nitrite are in fact, zero, and nitrates are maintained below 40ppm. Ideally, when a fish is sick, I recommend keeping it below 20ppm. The ultra clean allows them to heal better.

If you find them high, just begin a series of water changes to bring them down, provided your tap doesn't have nitrates. If you can, do two daily for several days, minimizing water temp changes as you specify. Best to keep it as close to 1C as you can.

Once we do that, then lets see how he responds to that. I'd hate to suggest any med in the water before we see what ammonia and nitrite are. If your filters are overloaded, you could have trouble there too. Numbers will tell us. If anything, I'd probably suggest medicated food. I can post a recipe you can make and freeze with tetracycline powder in it. Oral is also better than water borne. It gets into the bloodstream. If the fish has popeye, then there is infection in a place where meds in the water can't really get to it - behind the eyeball. Fluid builds back there, with infection being one cause. It could also be early dropsy, but we'll consider infection first.

Smaller changes at a time are better too if they are exposed to water changes only 3-4 weeks, due to the pH issue. There can be a greater differential between tap pH and tank pH the longer the span between changes.

Really bad bacteria can grow in gravel that has become compacted. You may want to consider removing items from 1/3 of your tank and going right to the glass, slowly so that any bubbles in the gravel (hydrogen sulfide gas) go up into the tube, in addition to the compacted detritus. Hydrogen sulfide can creep into the water column and it is born in a pocket of gravel that has become so packed it can't "breathe". In addition, that gravel becomes anaerobic, meaning bacteria that grows in areas void of oxygen gives way. This bacteria is bad and responsible for infections. It works its way into the water column where it makes fish sick with any number of maladies. Do 1/3 of the tank with a good 5-7 days in between the next section, just to make sure we don't disturb too much good bacteria at once. You won't believe what comes up when you move stuff and go back and forth methodically, driving the tube to the glass.

Two exceptions to meds in the water are Melafix and Pimafix. These will not affect the biofilter, are safe, and are a good first choice if the fish does not look like it is in serious trouble (still feeding, interacting, etc.).

Last edited by Cory_Di at 03-Apr-2005 23:11

Cheers, thanks, i will get info on the water setup soon.

The tank size is a 4'x18"x18" which i think is about 210 litres (not sure how many gallons, i'm an Aussie!)?

I normally do a 25% water change every 3 to 4 weeks as he has been by himself for a while until recently. Recently i have put some tank mates in from another tank for company (although his eyes were bad before this, so its not related).

I normally treat the water with 30ml or so of some bottle of magic monkey stuff (geo-liquid??) comes in a red bottle and looks very milky. Accoring to the instructions this is all i need, but i do have some dechlorinating salt as well (blue colour) and various other chemicals i have aquired over the years available (ie tank clear,algae killer etc). I only use these if i run out of the geoliquid.

When i change the water i siphon out with a gravel vac out the window and then just connect it up outside to the tap and turn on the hose until the tank is back up to full (geo-liquid is put in before i turn on the tap). I've tried using buckets and so forth and treating the water before i put it in but it takes hours given the amount of water i have to put in (~50 litres or so?) which is like 8 or nine buckets. The temp only changes by about 1C or 2C when i do this, and if its cold then ill only do 5-10% change over two or 3 days. (I'm in canberra and the water quality is probably not too bad im guessing as the smaller tropicals get the same treatment and they never got sick in the 2' tank)

I'll get the name of the meds when i home later and post their names.

Currently in the tank with him is:
1 adult Angel fish
4 Peppercat catfish
1 sucking catfish
2 Clown loaches
1 tetra (although not for long... lol)

With the exception to the tetras, he generally leaves the other fish alone, he had a go at the sucking catfish a week ago and promptly spat it out (poisonous barbs i guess?). These fish have only been in the tank for about 2 weeks and look pretty healthy.

Oscar is about 2 years old and the tank is the same. The other tropicals are probably 3-4 years old.

Currently the tank is running on 1 large external filter, but i have another 2 available to run if need be (from other 2' tanks the other tropicals came from) one is external and one is a smaller internal type filter.

Tank temperature is set to 25C

I normally feed once a day and Oscar will normally get 1 frozen bloodworm or cichlid cube and i will throw in a few flakes and some sinking pellets(4-6) for the other smaller fish, or even just another bloodwork cube (instead of the flakes/pellets). Oscar likes the bloodworms and pellets and his appettite hasn't changed much (except for the sucking cat fish incident, which slowed him down for a day).

I think his eye-poppyness has always been like that since i got him, i thought it was an oscar thing? He has always had googly looking eyes.

As for the filter i clean it out every month or 2 and put in some carbon. I have no idea how the filter works or how the plastic and ceramic things work, but i always just wash off the excess grime and put them back in the same spot (there a 3 plastic holders in it)

Cheers for any assistance

Hi Simon and welcome to Fishprofiles.com

Oscar looks like he's in trouble and I do hope you come back soon to see how we can try to fix it.

First things first. When fish get sick or have physical or behavioral changes, the first thing we do is rule out any environmental factors. This means water testing for starters.

We need to know the following and you can have a fish store test this for you if you take a bag of water into the fish store, but it is important to bring us numbers, not general descriptions like "safe" or "within range".

Ammonia:
Nitrite:
Nitrate:
pH:
kH: This one is not absolute but will save another trip if pH is really low.
Temp:

We also need to know what size tank it is and how you maintain it. Do you perform water changes and gravel vacs weekly, monthly, etc.? Do you ever remove things from teh tank and gravel vac right to the glass?

How old is the tank? How long have you had the fish and what other fish are in there?

What do you feed him (list all from live foods to manufactured foods).

If you cannot get to a fish store immediately or don't have test kits, lets err on the side of good water quality. This is needed even if meds are provided as fish immunity relies on low stress. Even a slightly bad water issue or low levels of toxins can cause the fish's ability to fight infection to drop.

Do a series of daily water changes for the next few days of about 15-20% (hopefully, you have a python gravel vac and don't have to use buckets).

Your ammonia and nitrite should read zero.

Your nitrate level should read 40ppm or lower.

pH should be at a reasonable level and we'll know when you get it. We wouldn't want to see 6.0, for example or 8.5.

Lets start there because some eye problems can clear up on their own when water quality improves. This doesn't mean you are doing a bad job. Its simply a matter of how much waste a big fish can produce.

Make sure you are using dechlorinator/chloramine remover because those things can cause cloudy eyes.

In a worst case, your fish could be undergoing dropsy - a conditionw where they hold fluid due to failing kidneys or heart. It can sometimes be rooted in infection, but sometimes it is also age or even water quality.

We really can't recommend any meds right now until we get a look at the water quality. His eyes look popped out, in addition to being cloudy.

I should add that your water changes should not alter the overall temp of the tnak more than 1C. This is shocky to them and if he's sick already, he doesn't need a drop or rise of several degrees during a water change.



Last edited by Cory_Di at 03-Apr-2005 10:30