Albino Senegal - Please Help

[darknyght5]

hi everyone - a friend of mine who has 2 senegal bichirs in a 125 gallon tank lost his albino last night and i was wondering if anyone knew what had caused it? he noticed the senegal swimming at an irregular angle and that there was a dark bulge at the end of its tail. at first he thought the fish was just suffering from constipation from eating beefheart, but the other senegal wasn't expeirencing anything abnormal. About 15 minutes later the albino was skimming the surface, not knowing where it was going. It died in his hands, and just before it's final breath, my friend squeezed that dark bulge, hoping that maybe it would ressurect the fish. No such luck, but what came out were these yellowish white spheres that we thought were eggs because some of the other fish ate them with enthusiasm. Whatever they are, we caputred about 9 of them and put them in a breeder net in a smaller tank. So my main question is, what killed the senegal, and what was it that came out of him? Thanks for your help

 

[Fruitbat]

darknyght...

It is possible that what your friend squeezed out were indeed eggs. It is not unheard of for a female bichir to become 'egg bound', meaning that for some reason developing eggs are neither released nor resorbed. In such a case this can lead to all sorts of problems, including death. Generally though, eggbound female bichirs develop very distended 'bellies' (i.e. - they really swell up) but that isn't always the case. I'm very sorry to hear about the loss of the bichir but if it was 'egg bound' then there really isn't anything your friend could have done to prevent or cure it.

-Joe