Hi all, I am new to this forum. Last Sunday I bought 3 male and 2 female guppies. My tank is a small tank about 3 gallon as I am just starting and do not intend to get too big a tank yet until I am sure I can handle the fishes. I had cycled my tank before I got the guppies. Water parameter are OK. The first 2 days the guppies are doing fine but on the 3rd day, I noticed one of the female to be weird. It is still swimming actively and becomes very excited when I drop food in but it will not eat. On a closer look I notice that one side of its side fin looks smaller then the other side. It is not clamped to her body. She could still use it but it looks a lot smaller. I also thought her head area looks like there are some stuff on it. It's like some flakey white dust and 2 small white dots on her body. I thought maybe she has ich so I added some aquarium salt. By night, 1 of the white dot had disappear and I thought she is getting better. On day 4 I saw a small hole in one of the male's tail. Thinking he had torn in against a driftwood left him alone since he is still active and eating. On day 5 the hole in the male guppy had become a tear and he stays at the top of the tank most of the time and had stopped eating. On day 6 the male guppy with the torn tail was dead so left with 4 fish I tested the water and did a water change and tested the parameters again and everything is OK. Then about 2 hours later went to see the fishes and realise all of them have a white line on their lips. The female which is sick also has the white line on her lips and her eyes seems to be covered in a layer of whitish stuff but the white dots on her body is no longer there. She is still not eating, mostly at the top of the tank but still swimming around. The other female has a very small white dot on one of its eye too. The remaining males only have the white line on their lips. 3 out of the 4 are still eating. Any idea what is wrong with my fishes? Sorry for the long post. Any answers will be appreciated.
Cannot really tell based on your descriptions, would be helpful if there's some pictures of your guppies.
Most fish shops do not keep their guppies properly as the tank housing them tends to be overcrowded and disease spreads fast when the water is dirty. From your descriptions, my guess is the fish were already quite sick when you brought them home. Possibly the white flaky stuff you mentioned are actually fungus. Fungal infection spreads fast and is deadly.
Its hard to take picture since they cannot stop moving and i tried taking video but the video cant show what was wrong also. I ended up medicating the whole tank with an ocean free product that does ich, velvet, white spots and slime diseases after posting. Within hours, 3 guppies with the white line on lip recovered. Left the female who was the 1st to get sick. She does not have the white lip anymore but still has a bit of whitish stuff. I think the layer of white stuff maybe slime? Not very sure either. her fin tat was clamp is not as clamp anymore. She does not stay at the top that much and is much more active. Her whitish stuff seem to had gone down. At least i could not see the layer of stuff on her eyes anymore. But she still is not eating. I offered freeze dried bloodworm but she is not interested. I wanted to ask for the medication, the label wrote to repeat dose every 2 days for maximum of 4 doses if needed. Do i have to do a water change before adding the dose each time? And how long can the guppy not eat? Its nearly a week that she had not eaten and i am quite worried.
Yes please do water change before the next dose of medication. Since all the rest had recovered, please isolate the lone sick female and treat it separately from the rest. From the look of it, if the female is not eating since day one, there must be something really wrong. I do not think it will last long.
Thanks for the advice. I did tried to separate her in the beginning but she panic and keep banging around in the separate tank. So I just let her join the rest and she calmed down. Today her clamp fin is totally unclamped. She seems to be getting better day by day except for the appetite. I hope a miracle will occur and she will start eating soon. Thanks.
Hope she starts eating soon, all the best!
So the female guppy that is sick had recovered. She no longer has weird stuff on her and is active and swimming around well. The only problem I have is her eating. When I put flakes or freeze dried bloodworms in she is the only one that is not eating. She seems interested but when she take in the food, she just spit it right out. After that she swims straight to the bottom and wait for other fishes to break up the bigger pieces and then she will start to suck on the gravel as if eating the food. I am really not sure if she actually did eat any but to had been about 2 weeks since but she doesn't look skinny. Of course she is skinny compared to others but she is not emaciated. 2 days after she recovered, she actually had white poo string but after a day she started pooping normal coloured poo although I didn't see her eating anything. What is wrong with her? She will eat egg yolk that I drop to feed the frys birth by the other female. And she will try to eat the Fry's in the breeder tank also. Is there any way I can get her to eat normal fish food? I am not keen to feed her live food yet. Any ideas?
All the described symptoms seem to point to hexamita....treatment with Epsom salt might help. Alternative and more expensive treatment uses antibiotics like metronidazole.
Last edited by Guppendler; 7th Aug 2016 at 00:39.
So far my experience with guppies is they will die once gotten sick. I tried many types of medication the survival rate is 5% and eventually all will die and have to buy again
The trick is really to prevent any fish from getting sick, this is applicable to all fish and not just guppy. Prevention is better than cure as the saying goes
Can share how you prevent fishes from illness?Originally Posted by Guppendler
I did weekly water change, give quality food, quarantine new fish before adding. Fish will still go sick within 3 months and die off.
Do not overcrowd by keeping more fish than your tank can hold. Thumb rule is every inch of fish will roughly need one gallon of space (4L). Do not overfeed but do feed a varied diet to your fish.
Already doing this. Any others?
I do not know what advices to offer you any more as I looked through all your past posts and it seemed like everything is a challenge to you. Maybe you should try keeping White Cloud Mountain Minnow as I find they are easier to keep and very forgiving to water parameters.
I did exactly the same as what you posted and fishes still die. Maybe my water is better for terrapins
its like we can follow the same cake recipe but in the end the outcome can be quite different....when I started out fishkeeping in my primary school days I too failed in keeping guppy. I learnt that sometimes less is more. So do not give up keeping guppy but try some less demanding fish like white clouds, it's also known as the 'egg laying guppy'. Very undemanding and very adaptable to different water parameters.
But I omly like colourful guppy
Try till you succeed. It's not difficult
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks