Diagnose this ?

[lsz]

I saw a nice fish today.

it is a big fish in a small tank.

THe fish looks healthy except that the dorsal part and also part of the tail fin keeps protruding out of water. I tried to move the fish abit, and found that this is the natural position of the fish.....it just floats back up. It is floating, but upright.

This is clearly swim bladder problem.

Now my question is, can this problem be a result of bad water condition in the dealer's tank? The man told me it had been there for one week plus.

Is this permanent or can it be cured once water quality improves?

I am deciding if i should buy the fish.

[Tara]

If it is swim bladder it probably isn't a result of bad water, although it could be. Its usually caused by the fish injesting air, which then filters into the swim bladder or gets stuck in the intestine. Swim bladder can be easily treated most of the time, if caught soon enough. The most successful way that I have found to treat swim bladder is to keep the fish on a strict diet of frozen peas for around a week or so. Here is how you prepare the peas:

1. Make sure you are using nonsalted frozen peas with no additives

2. Nuke the peas in the microwave or boil them until they are no longer frozen and a little mushy

3. After the peas have cooled off, pop them out of the shell and feed just the insides to the fish. I have never had a fish refuse peas

Anyway, to prevent this happening again feed peas to your fish once a week or so just to "clean everything out," especially if you have a fish that has had swim bladder before. Good luck! Let me know how everything turns out

[lsz]

hey Tara
thanks for the tip.

i did not buy the fish eventually though.
but your info is valuable will keep in mind

[eZion]

Does this bladder problem cause the fish to overturn? I have a few cases of fishes overtuned without a cause and died eventually.

[eZion]

Or is it some sort of internal bacterias?

[eZion]

How do I treat this?

[lsz]

it is highly possible it can be due to secondary internal infection.

and bad water quality definitely is a cause too.

the first thing is prevention.
and if it happens, i can only suggest using something that treats internal bacteria infection. Intrepet no.9 has got a good record with me at least

[eZion]

I had put in GEO liquid to stabilise the water before putting them in. Won't that help?

[lsz]

honestly i have no idea what Geo liquid does..

but basically good quality water is achieved with understanding of the nitrogen cycle.