worsening popeye...

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klaude

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Oct 24, 2016
Messages
11
Location
Illinois
Hello!

I have an electric blue cichlid that has been sick for about 3 days now.

Tank background: 55 gallon brackish tank, just the electric blue cichlid and a type of catfish (not sure what kind, its silver with grey dots). Had both fish for about 10 years, never had trouble with either of them, other than the fact that they would kill anything else I put in with them including plecos and snails (super aggressive, but they've never actually harmed one another). They have been the only two in the tank for 4 years now. Tank is well aerated and filtered. Heater keeps it 78-82F pretty consistently throughout the year. I have been feeding both fish sinking cichlid pellets for years, never had an issue with that.

Saturday morning I noticed the cichlid's one eye was protruding slightly. just one side. he was still looking fine otherwise, eating and swimming as normal. I figured he just busted it on the filter (they get pretty rowdy at night). I came home Sunday morning and the eye was doubled in size, looked like it was about to pop, still just the one eye. I did a 50% water change and added more aquarium salt to try to bring down the swelling. I did not check water parameters until after I already did a 50% water change, but ammonia reading is zero. Later Sunday afternoon I noticed he wasn't swimming right, couldn't control his position in the tank. and the eye was turning white. I QT'd him, did 1 tablespoon/5g of aquarium salt and started treating with tetracycline (per petsmart recs, not sure if that's the right abx though). Tonight he looks worse, there is some hemorrhaging around his mouth, eye is maybe a little less swollen, but he has a bump on his side now too (opposite of the bad eye). no longer eating. I did a 50% water change in the QT tank and retreated with tetracycline and aquarium salt (same tbsp to 5g ratio for the replaced water).

not sure if this is all connected or stress related... He is a 10 year old fish, not sure how long they live but this doesn't seem like an old age thing. The catfish in the original tank is doing fine other than missing his buddy. still eating and not showing any symptoms.

I'd hate to lose him but if it's hopeless I don't want to make him suffer either. Not sure what else I can do... any recommendations?

Thanks
 
If you have those fish for 10 years there's no question about you knowing what you're doing you must be doing a great job. Unfortunately those fish at 10 years old have lived a seriously good long life not to say it can't live longer but with the description of what you got going on it sounds like it's starting to decline. Medicating an old fish like that could do more harm than good. I don't have any big words of wisdom for you but it sounds to me like he might be near the end. Hopefully somebody will chime in with the fix for you. In the meantime good luck and I hope things go better.
 
Popeye is a bacterial issue if not injury.
Epsom salt can help to relieve the swelling in some cases...
Good luck.
Lots of links on popeye out there..
 
I know I read up on popeye, thought injury initially since it's just the one eye and he's kind of a crazy fish. I was treating it as that with clean water and salts. Now he seems much worse with other symptoms. Antibacterials don't seem to be helping...
 
Often popeye is like dropsy in the bacterial action.
Meaning by the time you see the outward physical symptoms the internal damage has been done beyond repair..
Sorry about your fish man ...I feel your pain...My clown loaches are 10-15 years old...
Kind of starting to think they will outlive me...
 
the tetracycline is the way to go I had a tang with pop eye it took around two weeks before his eye cleared up and swelling went away,
 
Well I quarantined him, epsom salt and tetracycline and 50%+ water changes for 4 days and he kept getting worse. Finally died this morning poor guy. Not sure what this was but whatever it was I did everything I could. Thanks for the suggestions.
 
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