Culling A Guppy Who Looks Like Crap.

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

Tough one here. One of my original guppies I adopted looks bad. His tummy is sunken in and he looks sickly. I got him the same time as another guppy and that other one is rounded and vibrant, so I know it's the guppy himself, not the water quality, etc.

Is it wrong to cull him? Seems like when a fry doesn't look too hot, it's acceptable to put it to rest, but what about an adult fish when he still eats and swims around?

I feel bad because he's my son's guppy and even went to the store today to find a duplicate, but the guppies they had there weren't looking all that great either. There is another store that I believe may have similar colored fish so my son won't be able to tell the difference (hopefully).

Thoughts? I had planned to put him "to rest" a few weeks back, but hesitated with the guilt of doing this.

WILDER · Nov 17, 2009

Sunken in tummy can mean fish tb, bacterial infection, internal parasites, starving fish.

Have you noticed any other internal parasite signs.
Like long stringy white poo, or clear mucas poo.
Fish looks skinny or bloated.
Enlarged anus to red inflamed anus.
Bent spine.
Fish swimming on it's side.
Worms prutruding from the anus.

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

He has a look of a starving fish. . .but he is well fed (of course). No signs of parasites except looking skinny. Months back, I had a camallanus infested fish that I took out of the tank, which (tank) in turn was treated with levamisole. Since then NONE of the fish have had any parasitic poo.

I just took the fish out of the tank, along with a platy that was in there. The platy was suppose to be in a 10-gallon female betta tank I have, but the platy attacked the female betta and had to be removed.

So, the guppy tank currently has the healthy male, two female young ones, and a single male pygmy. I don't think I'm going to return the sickly guppy to the tank b/c I fear it may breed with the female guppies.

WILDER · Nov 17, 2009

Did you retreat the levaimsole.
Of not I think I would use it again.

Once fish are really skinny with internal parasites the damage has been done.
If he dosn't gain weight after the wormer I would end his misery.

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

Will add another dose of Levamisole. Will it hurt the little female guppies? They're very tiny. One is 1/2" and the other is slightly smaller than that.

I decided to end the misery of the guppy because he looked too frail and thin. I double checked my calendar and he had been in the tank for 2.5 months and hadn't been looking well for 1 month. I *might* replace him with a similar looking guppy tomorrow and then add the levamisole. Depending upon if my son notices this evening or not and if the other store (aside from the one in the paragraph below) I go to has that type of guppy (they previously did). If not, I may order online. Aquabid has a few pairs that have caught my eye and I'm thinking they probably will be healthier.

One of the stores I shop at had an entire tank of deformed guppies. They pride themselves on not culling any fish, but a few were humped back, one had litterally NO internal organs (paper thin), and another among the bunch was floating sideways. They had a second tank with a gorgeous guppy I almost bought, but then noticed a second fish in that tank was COVERED with ich. Not one spot, but at least ten!

Newgee · Nov 17, 2009

Hi GuppyGodess

I have just had the same problem which wilder was helping me with "sunken belly" i did not however cull my 3 platys
and 1 tetra and my only regret now is that i should of done, i was treating them with an internal parasite med and
they did not get any better, in fact symptoms got worse and suffering got worse i held out on them hopeing that they
would survive (i so wanted them to) but in the end each and every one died on different days, i now know all the symptoms
and the way they acted as to diagnose next time that they have this problem and i will next time put them out of their
misery.

Hope this helps

Regards
Scott

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

Scott,

Sorry about your fish. It's so difficult having to chose which method to take. Like you, I treated my fish for parasites in the past. After using Jungle Brand, I had noticed another guppy I had could barely swim for a day after, then he'd perk up and return to normal. Then after another treatment, what was left of his internal organs were hanging out. Quite gruesome. Even worse yet, he was still alive, eating and swimming! He was only the second fish I culled and I cried over doing the act. Now I've toughened up a bit. . .having to do it when other fish have been sick. It's difficult, mostly though, trying to explain to my 7 year old.

With your platies and tetra, did they all have the sunken belly or was it just one fish and then another later developed the same?

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

Here he is after. . .

Newgee · Nov 17, 2009

Hi GuppyGoddess,

It is a horrible task to encounter when you think "but if i could just save them" and in the end they pass on. :sad:

But im glad you have toughend up, altho that does'nt make the situation better it does help a little. :good:

With mine it started with my swordtail he started with sunken belly and was very lethargic and swimming weird it was kind of like wiggleing instead of swimming, then he past away around 3 days after starting with the sunken belly thing.
Next was 1 platy a few days later, same symptoms and immediately removed into a hospital tank with meds, the day after another
platy and 1 tetra, only difference between these last 2 was the tetra wasn't thin and emaciated in the belly region, the platy was.
They both went into the hospital tank and a couple of days later the tetra passed on, and yesturday the platy passed on :sad:

I'm still at a loss as to what and where my fish got the sunken belly thing from, i do believe its internal parasites
but not 100% sure where from, im kind of thinking and have narrowed it down to some bloodworm pellets i purchased from
ebay as these are the only thing i changed in my tank apart from an addition of 4 penguin tetras weeks before the outbreak
and these where quarantined for 2-3 weeks before going into the tank, thats why im suspecting the bloodworm pellets.

I hope this helps you, keep me posted

Regards
Scott

GuppyGoddess · Nov 17, 2009

Newgee said:
Hi GuppyGoddess,

It is a horrible task to encounter when you think "but if i could just save them" and in the end they pass on.
But im glad you have toughend up, altho that does'nt make the situation better it does help a little.

With mine it started with my swordtail he started with sunken belly and was very lethargic and swimming weird it was kind of like wiggleing instead of swimming, then he past away around 3 days after starting with the sunken belly thing.
Next was 1 platy a few days later, same symptoms and immediately removed into a hospital tank with meds, the day after another
platy and 1 tetra, only difference between these last 2 was the tetra wasn't thin and emaciated in the belly region, the platy was.
They both went into the hospital tank and a couple of days later the tetra passed on, and yesturday the platy passed on
I'm still at a loss as to what and where my fish got the sunken belly thing from, i do believe its internal parasites
but not 100% sure where from, im kind of thinking and have narrowed it down to some bloodworm pellets i purchased from
ebay as these are the only thing i changed in my tank apart from an addition of 4 penguin tetras weeks before the outbreak
and these where quarantined for 2-3 weeks before going into the tank, thats why im suspecting the bloodworm pellets.

I hope this helps you, keep me posted

Regards
Scott

Seems like your fish had something entirely different than mine did because of how quickly yours went. Mine was thin like the above photo for a LONG time! Still ate and swam just fine. Yours seemed to have had a fast-acting issue. . .almost like food poisoning of sorts (as you stated - the bloodworms possibly being suspect).

Newgee · Nov 17, 2009

Hi
Yep thats exactly how mine looked, i have a photo that i will try to upload for you and it looks almost the same.
I took pictures of mine when she was dead as i wanted to keep a log and look of just how she looked when passed on.

Regards
Scott

WILDER · Nov 18, 2009

Sunken in belly can be internal parsites, fish tb, bacterial, the fish is starving.
Is there an inflamed red patch near his gill.

He looks in very bad shape.
Are any fish showing any different symtoms as need to rule out fish tb.

GuppyGoddess · Nov 18, 2009

Wilder said:
He looks in very bad shape.
Are any fish showing any different symtoms as need to rule out fish tb.

Yep. That picture was after I culled him. Thanks for confirming the decision was the correct one.

After I took the photo, I buried him in the back yard next to a few of his buddies.

There was inflamed red around his gills. When I put him in a bag (while still alive) I looked down onto the top of his head and his entire head was red.

Today, I tried to find a duplicate fish. Only one out of the four LFS I visited had a similarly colored one (that would pass for the same fish), but it was hanging out at the bottom too much. There are a few more stores I can try, but I'm burnt out on driving around. I ended up buying an orange guppy instead and am going to tell my son that the pet store cleaned the fins of the fish (who died) and then colored them orange to match our other fish so all the babies look the same. Talk about major "white lie." I don't want to tell him another fish died. He's so thrilled about all the fry we're going to make that he's painting pictures of fish and making a book!

Lucky us. 100s of orange guppies with TB or whatever! eh.

WILDER · Nov 19, 2009

Ok.
Need to know the symtoms so you can keep a look out.

GuppyGoddess · Nov 19, 2009

I'm going to keep a close eye on the guppy I still have, plus the new one. He was entirely fine until I put the platy in and I think that fish must have been eating all the food. I went from feeding two guppies (plus pygmy scavengers) to feeding four guppies and the platy and was giving them freeze-dried brine shrimp (for about 5 days), so he may have thinned due to that, since I wasn't use to adding more food, that could be another reason. If he thins up more, then I'll take him out. He looked so healthy a few days back.

Good news is my son is thrilled that we were able to color the guppy (who died) orange! He told his dad as soon as he got home from work.

Right now, one of my female babies is about 1/2" long and has a huge tummy. I wonder if she is pregnant.

One thing that concerns me (and I need to research more) is that on one website a person said that bleach doesn't kill TB. If that is the case, then I'll have to toss everything. . .I wanted to move some of the fry to my 10-gallon, but cannot risk ruining two tanks. My son's guppy tank is 5-gallons and has all the equipment (adding up to $80, but cheap decorations. The 10-gallon is all decked out. It'd be too expensive to replace both and I don't want to buy a used tank set-up b/c who knows if THAT tank had TB or another disease that be difficult to get rid of.

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Culling A Guppy Who Looks Like Crap.

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