Hi, I just adopted Ian's sick discus since his shop is closing down. The fish looks like:
Jagged fins
Extremely malnourished i can see ribs and spine
The right eye has a "dent" around the orbit.
The fish is completely black at times.
Seems to relax when i approach the tank(shows blue/yellow colour with stress bars but not completely black)
Stress bars are always present
Fish seems to have lost use of it's caudal fin
Possibly blind/vision impared constantly bumps into glass
Any idea what can be done? Ian says the fish was given to him by a random shopper(probably in worse condition) and exchanged for some tetras. I'll send photos next week if i'm free.
Thanks
Can it still eat or find the food? If that is possible, there is a chance to nurse it back to health simply by giving it a nice home. You have to remember though that a cripple will always be a cripple so the damage fish will never be the same again. Hope that fish pulls through...
Regards
Peter Gwee
Plant Physiology by Taiz and Zeiger
It approaches the glass when i'm near the tank but it's not taking live tubifex, pods/daphnia or Sera granumix
It's an adult from what i can tell, approx 12cm in diameter, right now he's hiding in the Blyxa aubertii patch. Showing colour but stress bars are still present.
pH - 6.5
kH - 2
Temp - 26.5
I hope these conditions are ok for it.
I heard Discus like warm and clean water.
Cheers,
Andrew
26.5 degrees is fine with discus, they do not need 30+ degrees to do well. Think of the amount of oxygen available with higher temperatures.
Regards
Peter Gwee
Plant Physiology by Taiz and Zeiger
you could raise the temperature to prevent further infections from setting in.
Am i correct in assuming there's more oxygen in colder water? And raising the temperature is not an option.
XnSdVd, set up a hospital tank for this sick discus first. You don't know whats causing the problem and your fish may get infected. Check for unusual signs.
Some symptoms of a sick discus:
a) Its skin is excreting mucus,
b) One of its pectoral fins is always clamped,
c) The body is always black, even extends to caudal fin,
d) The fish is not swimming properly, it maybe shaking or worse turn horizontal.
This is how I treat my sick discus and it always works.
A bare tank with an airstone for strong aeration. Filter is not needed since medication will kill off all bacteria present in the water renders the filter useless. Heater is not necessary but do not use fan to bring down temperature. Make sure the water is 100% fresh as foul water will kill a sick fish quickly. Use water conditioner like API Ammo-Lock to remove chlorine and chloramine before you start treatment.
The medication that I recommend is Myercin-K from Aqumedi. You can buy a sachet from any discus shop or good lfs. Follow the instruction strictly and no feeding during treatment period. The fish is considered recovered when it no longer show the above symptoms. Do 100% water change once the fish recovers. Nurse the fish slowly back to health by feeding bits of food mixed with vitamins 3 times a day.
Since your discus is partly blind it may not be a good idea to put into the community tank because any food will be snatched away by the other fishes before it can start feeding. The poor fish will eventually die of starvation.
The best way is to keep the discus all by itself.
Only symptom A is present. But my concern is with a fish as malnourished as this, i'm not sure starving is the best thing right now... And he/she did manage to take some dried food. 2 measly pellets. Though at least it ate something. Had no idea Ammo-lock removed chloramine. Thanks
Will care for fish as best as possible. Updates will follow. Probably pictures on tuesday night.
Thanks WKS, was kinda hoping you'd see this... seeing as how you're the discus guru..
Of course, thanks to everyone else for the help. This is my first amazonian fish...And i consider it a present from Ian so.. must take good care of it.
XnSdVd, any one symptom which I mentioned means the discus is sick. You can't wait for all the symptoms to appear, by then it maybe too late.
I'm not a discus guru, still learning from many experts from the local discus forums and lfs.I will try as much as I can to help you to save this poor soul.
Ok.. new development. The fish is refusing to keep the food down. It swallows it and then spits it out again... Any ideas? WKS, would you be willing to take over? Feel free to say no but i'd really hate to see the poor thing die... Especially after Ian tried to save it from some... idiot who managed to mistreat it to this point... I wonder why they're so fragile...
Much as I want to help, I don't think I can manage your sick fish. My hands are full with one planted tank, one discus tank, two apisto tanks and a betta tank at the moment.
I will post your sick discus story in other discus forums and hopefully some kind soul will adopt it and provide proper treatment.
Tank bred discus is surprisingly timid in my opinion. So far I have seen two cases of very thin and sick looking discus in planted community tanks. Their owners acknowledged that the fish are always starving either because they are simply not quick enough or too shy to feed. The fish often end up with no leftover, courtesty of other hungry fast moving inhabitants.
To tell you the truth, i'm not too comfortable with someone else taking it... I'll let you know on tuesday? Also, are discus schooling fish in the wild? That might be the reason they're so timid in planted tanks... imagine a solitary rasbora
I'm not sure whether discus are schooling fish in the wild but I do know they don't venture far or into the open Amazon river.
I guess discus thrive best in aquariums where they are the dominating species. The only time I came across discus doing very well in planted tanks was when they were the only species with some otocinclus and corydoras.
Hmm... the slime seems to have disappeared today. Could it have been produced by the fish due to the stress of capture? Either way, he's eating miniscule amounts. Will photograph when i have the chance.
Never create what you can't control
I have no experience in keeping discus but I have heard of mixing the food with garlic extract and had good results on discus. Perhaps you may want to try this, won't do any harm except to monitor the water quality.
I'm still a beginner with discus, or fish for that matter. But my healthy discus also does the spitting-the-food thing once in a while. As long as it is attempting to eat, I think that's a good thing. If its appetite is no good, you might not want to feed too much -> quality of water.
When my discus is sick, I put it into a tank by itself, and do strong aeration (most important factor!). I also add a bit of salt (helps reduce the stress? maintain the slime coat?), and do frequent water changes to maintain the quality of water.
I read that some others add a heater too. If you have one, you might want to try raising the temp a bit, maybe 28C.
Ben
Hi XnSdvd,
This month, tempreature is kinda cold.
It might be a good idea to add a heater and raise the tempreature to 29-30 c.
Also do keep up with your water changes, the discus is perhaps the only exception in the hobby that can take, and should have large percentage of water changes. Might want to add an airstone as well.
A long time discus keeper/home breeder I recently got to know use 2 products for his discus, Oxycure and ph5, might want to ask around if any other discus keepers using it.
I read this book 'Penang Discus'
The author mentioned a short dip in salt solution as a way to induce mucus secretions as well as kill bacterias, this is based on his experience. You might want to check out if the book is available in a library near you?
http://www.belowwater.com/products/p...cus/index.html
- eric
?!?! pH5 ?!?!
And unfortunately, the discus is in my planted 6ft. Raising the temperature will cause the c. griffithii to melt and disrupt a few of the breeding fauna. As will large water changes. I'm going to stay away from water changes for now. My ammonia is in the "safe" range and the nitrates are below 5ppm.
Will go back on tuesday or wednesday night (Staying in rented place now). I'm hoping he'll put on some weight by then.
Yar the name of the product is ph5, but I don't know the brand.
Hope the fella will do well and recover nicely.
- eric
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