Pleco Died

[bmonki]

Well the common pleco was very active yesterday and today doing lots of jumping up to the surface, only today he kept bashing into the lid. Not sure why. About an hour later he was found on the bottom of the tank and wasn't moving, his tail balanced on a plant. He was around six years old and just over ten inches long, but was severely stunted when we took him in. What do we think killed him? Could he have knocked himself out? There was a slight light patch on his side by his fin but not easy to tell if that was a side effect of being stunted. No other signs of injury.
So sad, he was gonna go to his new tank tomorrow

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Sorry for your loss.

A few things spring to mind...

Check other fish for signs of external parasites
Check your water stats are perfect with a liquid test kit
Ensure there is plenty of rippling on the water surface to aerate the water

 

[bmonki]

All other fish are fine, none showing any signs of anything at all. Waters perfect, Amm 0 nitrite 0, water change two days ago so no massive nitrate could have built up. About two thirds of the surface ripples quite vigorously, the other third you can see the water moving but no massive rippling.
At a loss tbh. I wonder if it was just his time as he had loads of bulges along his back and was really stunted from pictures I've seen.

 

[RaynoVox]

Plecos in nature have a dry season where they are often trapped in puddles, when this happens they constantly jump out in an attempt to find bigger water, unfortunately this can be triggered in aquariums. Its decently common for plecos to commit suicide by smashing into the top of the hood because something triggered a survival instinct that they have. The water level getting too low and bad water conditions can commonly cause this, but for other reasons its unknown. Sorry for your loss

 

[bmonki]

what would a wide open red bumhole mean?

 

[Mamba]

I dare say someone else will answer the above as I don't know but, from previous posts I read this Pleco of yours had a hell of a rough time in bad water conditions before you had it.
Lord knows what it picked up as a result.

 

[bmonki]

I dare say someone else will answer the above as I don't know but, from previous posts I read this Pleco of yours had a hell of a rough time in bad water conditions before you had it.
Lord knows what it picked up as a result.

hiya, yeah i cant be certain of the water chemistry where he was before - but i know it looked green and the water he came in kinda smelled so i'd guess the water was less than good! Plus he'd been mauled to the point his fins were in shreds, and he had massive bulges all over his back. Just glad we gave him a nice place to live for the last month or two of his life, he seemed to have a ball in our tank

RIP mr Teddy