help fish swimming vertically

[shadow]

i just walked in when i noticed that my mollie is swimming vertically. It seems like he is being pulled up with his tail. sometimes he will swil around the tank (when i tried to take him out of the tank). the nitrites are high (too) but everything else is normal. none of the other fish are doing this. what could it be?

 

[cutecotton]

maybe swim bladder disesae?

 

[Fiddlesticks]

Id say swim bladder too. Also you'll want to brink the nitrite down with a water change or two.

 

[tstenback]

Yah, ihave to agree. Also it could possibly be nitrite poisoning. Mollies are pretty sensitive fish when it comes to nitrites. (I know not all mollies) and as Fiddlesticks said you have to do water changes to get the nitrites down below 1 ppm.

 

[shadow]

how much of a water change? between yesterday and today, i have done close to a 50% water change. and what should i do about my mollie?

 

[shadow]

he has survived through to today. i noticed that he is swimming in an "L" shape. if it is swim bladder, what can i do? i feel really bad and it doesn't seem like it's hurting him (though last night was rough. he kept swimming near the bubble stone and it was "tossing" him since it looked like he didn't have enough strength to swim away) he was confining himself to a corner last night but this morning he was swimming around the tank.

i keep doing water changes trying to bring down the nitrItes but am currently unsuccessful. i bought amquel + which is supposed to remove nitrites...hopefully it'll work.

i am unsure what to do at this time or if there is anything i can do, please help!!!

 

[cutecotton]

if i'ts swim bladder, fast him for a few days and let his digestive system clear out. Get a cooked pea and peel off the skin, cut it to bite size pieces for him and feed it to him.

Swim bladder is usually cuased by overfeeding or someting like that. peas are a natural laxative for fish i believe. keep him on the pea diet (one pea every few days) and see if it improves. If he starts to swim correctly again, start feeding him regular food LITTLE by little, but you'll have to be careful with him from then on so it doesn't happen again

but sometimes swim bladder can cause permanent damange and no matter how many peas you give them they won't seem to get better

 

[MrMashashin]

this is just a really stupid question.... but are you letting the watter sit and lose chlorine or do you have drops for it becuase that can put some enormous stress problems on a fish if it got a gill full of chlorine.


ps- i had an angel fish that was doing that about 2 months before one of the crabs got hungry. Let me tell you it was amusing. He would swim in complete loops. Then he stoped doing it one day as i was laughing at it.

 

[shadow]

i have a filter on the faucet so i use that and i use the drops. none of the other fish have this problem. it's sad to see him like this. as of right now, he's not eating when i try with the pea. (i have to take him out otherwise the others will try to eat it).

 

[Rusty_S]

I believe you can get medication for swim bladder infections, if the pea diet doesn't work, perhaps you could try it, I think Waterlife do a swim bladder treatment, although I'm not certain But you can definitely get treatment for it

 

[cutecotton]

hmmm...the pea thing shoudl wokr if you can get him to eat it, are they small enough for him to peck at? maybe he's a picky eater.

 

[MrMashashin]

try riping it up that should work for him if not mix it with from floating food

 

[shadow]

i did try the pea thing yesterday, and he mostly spit it out
i think he nibbled on it but the passed it off. i don't know where to go for the medication i looked in petco but there wasn't anything there (all i have around me is petco, petland discounts, and an aquarium store(which i looked in toady).

 

[Rusty_S]

Hmm that's odd, I was in my LPS just yesterday looking at swim bladder treatment, not that I needed any, I just noticed it!

 

[MrMashashin]

check on the internet for treatments