Help my rainbow shark. Bloating?

[ScaryFatKidGT]

So I have had this guy maybe 1.5 or 2 years, when I first got him he was bigger than the other one I got and killed him eventually so I have had this guy solo in a 20g with a pleco, I wasn't keeping up on water changes so he developed fin rot and so I jumped on the water changes treated with melafix and after 2 week (about 2 months ago) moved him to a 29g and he got better really fast and started to regrow his fins then about 3 weeks ago I moved him to my 150g with 9 Lake Kutubu rainbows the pleco and a pictus cat which I origonally introduced in the 29g. He and the pitcus really don't get along and I thought I was going to have to return or give away one of them but the pictus started fighting back and holding his own and is able to get food etc.

Now the problem, my Rainbow Shark as of 3 days ago is getting huge and his scales are raised up and he has a red sore under his left fin, I was wondering if he maybe got caught by the pictus's spine or something there, aren't they mildly toxic?, be he has gotten bigger every day, lumpy and bloated and looks like he is going to explode the only thing I found was Dropsy? But my water quality is pretty good especially now in the big tank, I have been doing 15 gallon changes ever week and the tank probably only has 130ish gallons in it. He has always been "big" and even in another thread about a red tailed shark I told him his fish looked fine and that mine was fatter, but this is clearly a problem.

 

[ScaryFatKidGT]

So he looks way worse off than I thought and is all bloated and red/white

Whats weird is he swims and looks for food and everything just fine, idk if he will make it much longer of if he will be fine?

I read up a little more on Dropsy and pulled him out and put him in a quarantine tank which is now probably dirtier than my main tank.... dumped what carbon I could out of the whisper filters bags, stirring up crap everywhere, and put in APi salt for the water I had to fill the tank up with (it was my old 1/2 full 20g I used for my pictus when he didn't get along in the 29) and used melafix as it says it treats bacterial infections and is all I have :/.

I should say my 150 is fully set up, even tho its only 4? weeks old. I used 8 bags of eco complete along with water and filters and decorations from my old tanks to start it up and all the other fish are fine.

I'm guessing the issue with fin rot made him susceptible to this? Makes me feel bad cuz its all my fault for not changing the water and taking care of my tank like I should have vs just a freak issue.

I had some pics but its so much worse now there is really no point.

I'm going to pick up some antibiotic for gram negative bacteria tomorrow if my LFS has some.

 

[ScaryFatKidGT]

Well I went to the fish store and they hard the metha what ever blue and green stuff and just about everything from APi but the owner said he had used everything on the shelf and the only thing that worked for stuff like this was melafix :/, it does seem to be helping he hasn't gotten any worse but I just don't buy the "all natural" remedy's you know? idk...

I think I'm going to get some Ciprofloxacin from DRsfosters and smith?

 

[Delapool]

These are just thoughts but I assume you have looked into feed quality and type? It sounds like he has been under a fair bit of stress.

I would skip melafix and pimafix as well. This is only a suspicion but any fish that has bloating I wouldn't try pimafix.

Salt sounds good. Can't really comment on the antibiotic (goodness me ended up in survivalist websites trying to find anything) except that it seemed to make sense for gram -ve plus some gram +ve.

Water changes - I change out a third of the tank a week. Nitrates, etc have been fine but picked up a phosphate test and that was off the chart so some bigger pwc's were needed. So I'd suggest increasing pwc's just in case for what you are not testing (eg organic debris).

 

[ScaryFatKidGT]

These are just thoughts but I assume you have looked into feed quality and type? It sounds like he has been under a fair bit of stress.

I would skip melafix and pimafix as well. This is only a suspicion but any fish that has bloating I wouldn't try pimafix.

Salt sounds good. Can't really comment on the antibiotic (goodness me ended up in survivalist websites trying to find anything) except that it seemed to make sense for gram -ve plus some gram +ve.

Water changes - I change out a third of the tank a week. Nitrates, etc have been fine but picked up a phosphate test and that was off the chart so some bigger pwc's were needed. So I'd suggest increasing pwc's just in case for what you are not testing (eg organic debris).

Yeah I feed, Fluval/Nutrafin flakes and bottom feeder pellets along with frozen and freeze dried blood worms and algae wafers for my pleco. It's weird tho most of the fish seem to only like the flakes even why I try to feed other varieties of food's, all my rainbowfish want to eat is flakes. My giant danios in my 29 now will eat anything.

ve?

Idk I don't think the tank switching was all that stressful, the 29 was a mirror image of the 20g just bigger and he really liked the 150g unless the pictus was stressing him out? but it seemed more like the other way around. I know putting him in the quarantine wasn't good but I don't think there is anyway of avoiding that.

What do you think about the antibiotic? He's still alive and seems to be eating, not many hiding spots in my 20g tho. I cut way back on salt because of my plants but I have the quarentne tank dossed with salt and melafix.

I'm planning on getting the aqueon water changer for my big tank so I can do larger changes, after 6-8 trips with a 5g bucket it gets old fast lol.

 

[Delapool]

I'm not really up to speed on this but I believe brine shrimp may help and the blood worms could be reduced to see if that helps.

Aquarium Fish Constipation

Malawi Bloat | dreaded Cichlid disease

From what I could read, the antibiotic seemed broad spectrum and mostly treating gram negative (-ve) plus some gram positive (+ve) which made sense as gram -ve is meant to be more common in aquariums. Very little information on it I could find.