My gourami is sick AGAIN!!

[Hailey]

hey, i have talked about this before...i have a sick mae gourami...last week he was acting funny. he was jsut laying on the bottom of the water, still breathing and everything...its like he doesnt have the energy to do anything, and when he does manage to move around, air bubbles come from his gills....i dunno what to do! is it my water?? if i put him in a different tank will he get better?? PLEASE help!!

 

[technium]

let us know more, tell us what your tank readings are i.e. Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate etc and what fish are in the tank, what size tank etc etc

Then someone will be able to give you a more helpful answer.

 

[Hailey]

my tank is a 35gal, i have 2 male gourami's(only ONE is sick) 1 female beta, 2 angle fish, 1 common plecko, 5 neon tetra's, 1 male guppie, and 2 small fish that im not sure of the name, so in total there are 14 fish in my tank. none of te others are sick, they are all completely fine. but my gourami is no better, i noticed today that he has a lump on his side. i also dont have any readings of the ammonia, nitrite etc. is there one that would more likely make a fish sick then another? im going to go by test kits tonight, but before this i didnt even know that the levels in the water would affect them. what is a good reading for each? and what test kits should i buy? will it be ok to add things to the water while my fish are in there or should i put them in a different tank temporarily?? i really have no idea

 

[WILDER]

You will need a nitrite, nitrate, and ph test kit, nitrite should be 0, nitrate a good reading is 25 below if you can get it lower, ph well your test will tell you the ph of your tank, also you can test your tap water for readings in nitrite,nitrate,and ph, does the lump has any puss coming out of it as it sounds like an ulcer, and that type of fish are prone to them.

 

[yvez9]

don't forget the ammonia test kit as it is the first step of the cycle

 

[Hailey]

ok, i wrote all that stuff down that u said to test, and the levels and such, and i just chelcked if the lump was oussing, and its not. i am trying rihtnow to feed him a shelled pee. will that do anything?? sumone mentioned it to me....also when i was looking at him, i noticed that his fins were torn, likely from the other fish picking at him. i dont want to just do away with him after all this trying to save him, and i dunno if i could bring myself to do it anyways. right now i have him isolated from the other fish in a large bag in the tank, full with the tank water, i dont have a seperate aquarium right now that i could use. am i doing things right?

 

[Hailey]

what doesnt make sence to me the most is that this happened before, and then he got better, and was fine for about a week, now hes doing it again?
i know its the same gourami because hes the one with a broken wisker thing.

 

[WILDER]

If it is a ulcer you will need to buy an anti internal bacteria med.

 

[Hailey]

so i just took a sample of my tanks water to the LFS and they said that everything was surprisingly perfect ?!?!? what?? so ne ways, they gave me these caplets and said to put my gourami in a seperate tank and put the capsuls in it and see if it makes it better. the girl said that if its not the water that these caos should fix him up. the reason i have to put it in a seperate tank is because she doesnt want to harm the plecko....thans for all your help guys, ill keep you posted!

 

[WILDER]

Good luck.