EBA not eating well

[Stefan3289]

Hello all,

I just went to feed my fish in my 75 gallon tank (listed below)

1 red spotted severum
1 Electric blue Acara (EBA)
5 Pb parrot convicts
2 boesemani rainbowfish
1 synodontis catfish

I normally first feed the small pellets that the rainbowfish and PBs eat as they cannot fit the larger ones in their mouth, my syno will come up for his veggie waffers that I feed to him directly, and then I feed my severum and EBA the large pellets as they are nearly fully grown. I have been doing this a long time but the last two times I have fed them, my EBA acts very timid, only taking about 2-3 pellets, then swimming away. Today specifically, I thought he ate them but he then ended up spitting all 3 back out as I was putting the food back. I tried to then feed him one pellet and he did eat it but would not go for another. He otherwise looks healthy, no fit rot, no shining, no mucus around his gills, no gasping for air, no worms I can see protruding. No other fish in the tank is acting like this and they are all eating well. I know sometimes he and the severum will get into a little beef especially at feeding time so I feed them on opposite sides of the tank, but not eating much and spitting it back out was strange. Should I be worried? I put a picture of him currently watching me while I type this out, though it looks a little funny because of the angle.

 

[DoubleDutch]

Any signs of Hole in the headdisease ?

 

[MaloK]

Are you feeding them something else ?

Maybe time for Bloodworms, Brine shrimps, Daphnia, blanched Zucchini, Cucumber, Spinach...

To try to bring back the voracity a little. If I feed the same thing too long, The fish gets bored and start to play with their food and waste it.

But still, continue to closely monitor them all for any early sign of illness or possible stress cause.

 

[Stefan3289]

Any signs of Hole in the headdisease ?

Not any signs that I see, he has a few small marks on his whole body (not open sores but more surface level damage) as him and the severum in the past would have their territory disputes that has died down.

 

[Stefan3289]

Are you feeding them something else ?

Maybe time for Bloodworms, Brine shrimps, Daphnia, blanched Zucchini, Cucumber, Spinach...

To try to bring back the voracity a little. If I feed the same thing too long, The fish gets bored and start to play with their food and waste it.

But still, continue to closely monitor them all for any early sign of illness or possible stress cause.

I will definitely try changing the diet and pick up some brine or blood shrimp at my LFS, if I have some cucumber I’ll prep some for them as well. I do also acknowledge I have not been the best fish keep the past few weeks as I was in a major car accident and was not able to clean the tank for a few weeks but had my brother do it once to the best of his ability, but will try to clean it middle of the week and do a large water change, filter clean, etc.

 

[MaloK]

I will definitely try changing the diet and pick up some brine or blood shrimp at my LFS, if I have some cucumber I’ll prep some for them as well. I do also acknowledge I have not been the best fish keep the past few weeks as I was in a major car accident and was not able to clean the tank for a few weeks but had my brother do it once to the best of his ability, but will try to clean it middle of the week and do a large water change, filter clean, etc.

Test your water for nitrates. One of the first sign of high nitrates are lethargy, loss of appetite and pale gills.

Then rapid breathing and clamped fins are next sign before starting to have high stress and difficulty to swim.

If you can do your cleanup / water change sooner, the better.

 

[Colin_T]

Post a video of the fish eating. Upload video/s to YouTube, then copy & paste the link here.
If you use a mobile phone to film the fish, hold the phone horizontally (landscape mode) so the footage fills the entire screen and doesn't leave black bars on either end.

How often do you do water changes and how much do you change?
Do you gravel clean the substrate when you do a water change?
Do you dechlorinate the new water before adding it to the tank?

What is the ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH of the water (in numbers)?
What sort of filter is on the tank?
How often and how do you clean the filter?

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Basic First Aid For Fish
Test the water quality for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. This removes the biofilm on the glass and the biofilm will contain lots of harmful bacteria, fungus, protozoans and various other microscopic life forms.

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week or until the problem is identified. The water changes and gravel cleaning will reduce the number of disease organisms in the water and provide a cleaner environment for the fish to recover in. It also removes a lot of the gunk and this means any medication can work on treating the fish instead of being wasted killing the pathogens in the gunk.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it. Wash the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and re-use the media. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the garden/ lawn. Cleaning the filter means less gunk and cleaner water with fewer pathogens so any medication (if needed) will work more effectively on the fish.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration to maximise the dissolved oxygen in the water.

 

[Stefan3289]

Hello all,

Thought I would update the forum as I believe I figured out what the issue was in case someone has a similar incident. So in order to avoid my severum and EBA clashing during feeding time as my severum gets jealous when he seems the EBA eating, I “trained” my severum to go to the corner of the tank to get his pellets on the left while the EBA is usually in the right. I believe the 2 times that happened, it was because the severum turned around and that would cause the EBA to move back towards the filter, and I think the current from the filter interrupted something for him and causes him to spit up the food. He has been eating normal since and very happy. Just ate him normal 8 pellets I give him every other day.