Does a fish tail grow back?

[lazybug]

i have a friend, she has a 75 gal with one baby oscar in it, hes no more than an inch id say

she has one of those corner filters and i dont know how but her little O manged to sneak in behind it and when it tried to swim out its tail got snagged, imagine a fish sandwiched between platisc and glass and trying to wriggle its way free !

and before she could help get the O out of its predicament, the little guy pulled out and the part of his tail that was stuck between the glass and the filter was well, missing . cut of pretty much, and i just want to know.. will it grow back?

however, he seems to be doing fine, eating well and happy, though he does have a little problem with cordination (no surpirse) and has to put in alot of effort to swim in the right direction since he pretty much has no tail left. :-|

is there anything i should recomend to her to feed her O that might maybe help? im goin gto be taking the O from her in a months time when i get a bigger tank, so i want to help it get healthy!

Bug

 

[happygirl65]

Really the BEST thing your friend can do to help the little oscar is do really frequent water changes. Super clean water will help tremendously in healing. If it was mostly the tail fin it will grow back. I have seen some fish with barely a nub after a bad case of fin rot and it grew back with lots of tlc.
You really want to watch for signs of an opportunistic infection though, lots of clean water will also help prevent this from happening.
I wish you all the best!

 

[Jnam]

Happygirl is correct I have seen the same thing. One of my baloon mollies had her tail completely rot off and it took about 2 weeks and there it was again.. lots of pwc. i would suggest if you have one put the oscar in a smaller QT tank it will make PWCs a little easier

 

[sooju]

I have two bangaii cardinals (B&W with long fins) and the bigger one was picking on the smaller one to the point where the smaller one's bottom fins were 1/2 as long as they had been. I was so pleasantly surprised that they have mostly grown back while the cardinals are in a hospital tank being treated for ich. And a side benefit of having them in a smaller tank with no rocks to hide behind and water changes every other day has been that they seem to now get along!

 

[lazybug]

i have a mean little golden BP called Jaws, cause he picks on everyone and steals all the food, had him in with my O Bahful in one tank, but he kept bullying Bashful so i seperated them, and i decided to try out a bottom feeder whome i named Mop and another red BP i named Patience for my tank and put them in with Jaws ( a diffrnt tank then Bashul).
im not sure to the type of bottom feeder Mop was as they only seem to sell one specific species here ( its ugly and black with lots of dark spots and weird looking fins).

Mop was in there for two days, and eating well and looked happy, though i started to notice that his weird looking fins were missing!.. and i noticed my two BPs poking him whenever they could reach him. then i went out for a few hours and came back and found Mop on the bottom of the tank dead, tail half eaten and all fins gone. and the criminals responsible swimming around him. i never read it anywhere about BPs eating a bottom feeder alive, and it just freaked me out.

and now i think i have a mating pair with me, Jaws in showing the pink colouration under his gills and the sharp egded anal fins said to be common to males and Patience the rounder anal fins said to be common to females, though i know these are not accurate ways to sex BPs, they have been seemingly more agressive and have been having alot of beak lock ins which im suspecting is courtship. so i guess i might just have to rename my little fin eating murderes to Bonnie and Clyde. (how they got about to actually nibbling the fins off with the state of their mouth being unable to close baffles me)

 

[xander]

what are BPs ?

 

[lazybug]

BP's are Blood Parrots.. =) Blood parrot cichlid - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[tomherndon]

I had a near finless danio (attacked by tiger barb) that I thought had died turn up in a plant cluster - no caudal, pec or dorsal to speak of. I nearly iced it. Months later they grew in all crazy like - with extra flair. Deformed and functional, larger than any other danio in the tank. . .

 

[reun]

well, also along with the water changes, i cant help but wonder if some form of stresscoat medication would help. others with more experience may be able to pipe in, but i have found some of the differant medications with aloe vera and other passive ingredients helps keep a nice slime coating on the fish when they are injured or sick.

im not reccommending dropping in any of those nasty wonder drugs availble at most grocery stores, but a good addative with a good reputation may not be a bad thing to toss in the tank.

i can say the stuff has helped my fish recover from some nasty scrapes (bettas with ripped fins, corrys that got sucked on by evil BNCs, the list goes on). maybe some of that along with frequent water changes would speed recovery.

 

[lazybug]

well since i have no experience with sick or hurt fish, i dont want to risk telling her to use any sort of medication at the moment, could just end up hurting the fish even more. shes been doing the water changes, his tail looked like a half moon in the beggining when he just lost it, but now ist forming back again into a nice rounded fin.

 

[MU-fishies]

I'm not the best fish keeper seeing as I'm in college and can barely stay awake for five minutes, haha. But I have 4 fish and a snail. They are all in a cube-like 1.5 gallon tank. I know I push the limits, but I love fishies!! Lol, recently I had to clean out the tank because Brain (my snail) was lazy and didn't clean the tank, haha. Well, when I was putting Bubbles (my guppy) back in the tank he wriggled around so much as I was pouring him back in, that he flopped out onto my desk, in a panic attack, I grabbed him up and plopped him back in the tank... unfortunately, in my rush, I might have snibbed some of his tail off. It started bleeding and I got a little worried that I hurt him bad. He swims kind of gimp with his back arched because the top of his tail is gone. Now Bubbles has half of a tail. I can't tell if it's growing back or if it even will. And what about the part that's still there? Will it fall off? Or what?

 

[KatieJ]

...get a bigger tank, please. :/

 

[absolutangel04]

Hello, welcome to the site!
I do need to suggest you get a bigger tank. I know space can be be an issue, but it will be easier to keep fish in the long-run in a bigger tank. Truthfully, they will probably not survive very well at all in the tank that size.
To answer your question, yes, fish can re-grow fins/tails. Infections/fin rot can happen though if the water is not clean and an open wound is present. It will be pretty hard to keep the water clean enough in tank that size IMO, and the fish would be better off in bigger tank for space reasons as well.

EDIT: Whoops, sorry, in the future you should start your own thread rather than add onto a different one.

 

[jlk]

Really the BEST thing your friend can do to help the little oscar is do really frequent water changes. Super clean water will help tremendously in healing. If it was mostly the tail fin it will grow back. I have seen some fish with barely a nub after a bad case of fin rot and it grew back with lots of tlc.
You really want to watch for signs of an opportunistic infection though, lots of clean water will also help prevent this from happening.
I wish you all the best!

Good advice! Healthy water (0amm, 0nitrites, little nitrates) with lots of pwcs is the best solution for right now. The damaged tissue will grow back over time, however, if any of the rays (bones) were snapped off they will most likely not return. Keep an eye on the fish for infection. If there are signs of redness or inflammation or further degradation of the damaged fins, a course of treatment with antibiotics will be necessary. Good luck!

 

[MU-fishies]

Hello, welcome to the site!
I do need to suggest you get a bigger tank. I know space can be be an issue, but it will be easier to keep fish in the long-run in a bigger tank. Truthfully, they will probably not survive very well at all in the tank that size.
To answer your question, yes, fish can re-grow fins/tails. Infections/fin rot can happen though if the water is not clean and an open wound is present. It will be pretty hard to keep the water clean enough in tank that size IMO, and the fish would be better off in bigger tank for space reasons as well.

EDIT: Whoops, sorry, in the future you should start your own thread rather than add onto a different one.

Thanks, I was short on money at the time but wanted some fish. What size should I get? I asked the guy at Wal-mart and he said 5-6 was fine in a 1.5 gallon tank. Also, Bubbles' tail has a small stub on it. I think its starting to grow back. I didn't know how to start a thread yet, so I put it on the most similar to mine, sorry!

 

[absolutangel04]

Thanks, I was short on money at the time but wanted some fish. What size should I get? I asked the guy at Wal-mart and he said 5-6 was fine in a 1.5 gallon tank. Also, Bubbles' tail has a small stub on it. I think its starting to grow back. I didn't know how to start a thread yet, so I put it on the most similar to mine, sorry!

Sorry, but the guy at WalMart gave you really bad advice. No worries though, its great that you love fish and care about them, so thats what is ultimately important.
What kinds of fish do you have? If you have the space, I would recommend just starting with a 10g tank. If you have space for something bigger, thats even better, but I know how space in college tends to be in short supply.
A 10g tank is only about $30 at WalMart, so its not even very much higher than most of those tiny tanks are. You need to make sure you pick the right species that will be happy in there, but you can get some cool fish for a 10g. It works for a few guppies.

 

[MU-fishies]

Sorry, but the guy at WalMart gave you really bad advice. No worries though, its great that you love fish and care about them, so thats what is ultimately important.
What kinds of fish do you have? If you have the space, I would recommend just starting with a 10g tank. If you have space for something bigger, thats even better, but I know how space in college tends to be in short supply.
A 10g tank is only about $30 at WalMart, so its not even very much higher than most of those tiny tanks are. You need to make sure you pick the right species that will be happy in there, but you can get some cool fish for a 10g. It works for a few guppies.

Sorry for not getting back to you earlier, but thanks! I have a yellow glofish, a black skirt tetra, a guppy and a snail. I live in a double room, but I paid extra for single. So I have a whole other desk I just need to look into getting the right size tank cheap.

 

[absolutangel04]

Sorry for not getting back to you earlier, but thanks! I have a yellow glofish, a black skirt tetra, a guppy and a snail. I live in a double room, but I paid extra for single. So I have a whole other desk I just need to look into getting the right size tank cheap.

Cool. Honestly, the skirt tetra gets big, so I would recommend rehoming it unless you have room for a 29g. The glofish should be in a 20 long at least. But, if you do not have space for a tank that big, a 10g can be really fun and there are definitely some awesome fish that would be very happy in a 10g. You should see what you have space for and then plan your stock accordingly. I just had a little betta tank until I moved out of the dorm into an apartment where I had more space.
I have had pretty good luck with just getting tank kits. they don't always come with the best filters ever, so it helps to understock a bit sometimes.