Bala Shark Not Swimming Well

My 6 inch Bala shark is swimming vertically - head up - and appears to be struggling to stay off the bottom. She hasn't eaten for days. I know the tank is too small for her - 2' x 2' x 1' and have bought her a new one. The new tank is twice the size and has been cycling with five Buenos Aires Tetras for just two days. Obviously, for now, the water parameters are good! The nitrates in the old tank are very high with nitrites at zero. Have done 2, 25% water changes in the past two days, removing water from the bottom with a gravel vaccum and she perks up for around half an hour after the water changes. I'm afraid she won't make it for the thrity days it will take my new tank to cycle and I think she will be a lot less stressed in a bigger tank. Should I risk moving her to the new tank right away or will she definitley die?

I, personally, even though unexperinced, would immediatly try to clone your tank into the bigger one.

Meaning, add the filter from your old tank to the new one, and toss your bala and other fishies in.
If it could be with a 6" bala, it should be able to live with 5 Buenos ares tetra...

Beware, this will cause quite a bit of fluzuation, but not so bad, but a change of placement is probably the best i can think of, besides adding one TBSP of aquarium salt per 5 gallons, and perhaps a stress coat to the water.

It sounds like swim bladder and to be honest i agree she sounds bad and probably won' make it, sorry.
Yes bala shark need very large tanks like 90gal, and for them to be happy need to be kept in groups as they are a shoaling fish.

http/www.fishtanksandponds.info/care-mai...swimbladder.htm

hmm.. im not sure about the problem with the fish, maybe put him on some kind of bacterial infection med. i noe a way u can "cheat" the 30 day cycle. just take a spondge if u use a power filter in ur already running tank and scqesh out all the gunk into the new filter b4 it hits the spondge in that 1 this way active bacteria will be introduced and u can get ur fish in there faster

No.... heck no....


Squeeze the gunk out? that could seriously damage some fish! the filter has bad things in it too! that's why it is a "filter". It gets the bad stuff and keeps it.

What you do is hook the filter up to the tank itself and let it run like normal, with the other filters you plan to permantly use. That way it safely transfers the good bacteria.

what i was sayin is 2 sqeese it out b4 it gets into the new spondge part, this way that "gunk" will get stopped by the new spondge and help create new bacteria, in case u didnt noe not all bacteria picked up by the filter is bad...

That's why you hook the filter up silly.

I said take the old filter, and hook it up.
That way, only the good bacteria is going to get in hopefully.

Drevil said:

My 6 inch Bala shark is swimming vertically - head up - and appears to be struggling to stay off the bottom. She hasn't eaten for days. I know the tank is too small for her - 2' x 2' x 1' and have bought her a new one. The new tank is twice the size and has been cycling with five Buenos Aires Tetras for just two days. Obviously, for now, the water parameters are good! The nitrates in the old tank are very high with nitrites at zero. Have done 2, 25% water changes in the past two days, removing water from the bottom with a gravel vaccum and she perks up for around half an hour after the water changes. I'm afraid she won't make it for the thrity days it will take my new tank to cycle and I think she will be a lot less stressed in a bigger tank. Should I risk moving her to the new tank right away or will she definitley die?

Click to expand...

Thanks for all the advice. I thought about swim bladder as I think that's how my Plec died. I treated the tank for 5 days with Myaxin to see if that would help but no change. I'm going to move her though to give her a better life even if she does eventually die. She has another shark friend and I'll put him in with her too but I don't want to transfer all the fish as I want to give my 2 surviving neons a break from her. They've only come out of hiding since she got sick and I suspect she ate the other 6. So, since I need both filters, should I swap them around on alternate days?

DiscusLova said:

what i was sayin is 2 sqeese it out b4 it gets into the new spondge part, this way that "gunk" will get stopped by the new spondge and help create new bacteria, in case u didnt noe not all bacteria picked up by the filter is bad...

Click to expand...

The good bacteria isn't the gunk on the outside of the sponge - that's just debris and, well, gunk. If you squeeze that out in your tank it won't cause too much damage to the water parameters - but it's deffinatly not recommended

It up to you but i don't like the sound of an uncycled tank, bad water quality can cause swim bladder, but it your choice, good luck.

wouldn't a cloned tank be better than what's happening now?

Hows the fish doing.

Wilder said:

Hows the fish doing.

Click to expand...

She's actually doing quite well. She is moving around the new tank and only swimming vertically now and again. She hasn't eaten yet but she is looking at the food which she wasn't doing before. I think her swimming strangely was a stress response. When I see her and her mate in the new tank, I can't believe I kept her in such a small space for so long. She still looks too big for the four foot tank so I guess I'll have to save up for a biggie. One thing that surprised me. When I moved her, her mate was only in the tank alone for five minutes and he became extremely stressed. He even tried to jump out the tank and he's never done that before. It's worthwhile noting that for anyone who is thinking of keeping a lone Bala Shark - they really don't like it!
I don't think she's out of the woods yet but she's definitely happier. Attached is pic of her with her mate.

Or bless her, try some shelled peas, bala shark are ####tish fish and they do jump, what your water stats as fish can try to jump out if stats are bad too.

Wilder said:

Or bless her, try some shelled peas, bala shark are ####tish fish and they do jump, what your water stats as fish can try to jump out if stats are bad too.

Click to expand...

Still can't get her to eat and she used to be such a gannet. Tried frozen bloodworms but that just makes her mate chase and nip her as if he's guarding the food. I will try cucumber since she used to like that. Both the sharks have become very skittish and try to jump every time I open the lid - water changes are very stressful! I read about their jumping before I got them but they never did that in the small tank and the little one never chased the big one before. Do you think its because they have a bigger tank and can behave more normally or do you think they might be stressed because the tank is in a busier place? (The other tank was set into a hole in the wall). Should I cover the tank for a few days to let them settle down? I don't mind their chasing each other about if this is normal. One more question. Since I am new, I'm not sure of protocol. I would say that, apart from the eating thing, this appears to no longer be an emergency. Should I now move my posts to a different section?