Sick Severum

[mandyatm]

Hi,

I am hoping someone can help me figure out what is wrong with my gold severum. She is about 5 years old and I really don’t want to lose her. I thought it might be dropsy but her scales aren’t really pineconing. I plan to go to a local fish store later and ask them if they have any suggestions, but thought I would check here also. Thank you!

Here are the parameters that I know at the moment. I will check nitrates later but I’ve been changing water frequently so they probably aren’t bad at the moment, but do get high at times.
Tank size: 75 gallon
tank age: 5 years
ammonia: 0
nitrite: 0
tank temp: 79F

Fish Symptoms (include full description including lesion, color, location, fish behavior): very bloated belly and anus, not eating.

Volume and Frequency of water changes: 50% every 1-2 weeks

Chemical Additives or Media in your tank: ceramic rings, bio balls, carbon in canister filter

Tank inhabitants: blood parrot, rainbow fish, pictus catfish

Recent additions to your tank (living or decoration): no

Exposure to chemicals: no

Digital photo (include if possible): attached

 

[Fishfunn]

It looks like dropsy, and the scales around the stomach look like pine coning is starting. Dropsy is actually a symptom of an infection rather than a specific fish disease. It is a bacterial infection of the kidneys causing fluid buildup and extreme bloating. Overcrowding, poor water quality, or rapid changes in water temperature can allow a specific bacteria that can cause this to thrive in your fish.
Seachem Kanaplex is the best antibiotic, and I would recommend treating her as soon as possible.

 

[Colin_T]

How long did it take for her to swell/ bloat up?

Any idea if she did a stringy white poop?

Generally when fish bloats up overnight, stops eating, and does a stringy white poop, they have a major internal infection or organ failure and the fish usually dies within 24-48 hours of showing these symptoms. Sometimes you don't see the stringy white poop, other times you do.

You can try an antibiotic but if she isn't eating, it's probably too late.

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When using antibiotics on fish, it's best to use them in a bare tank with nothing but an airstone, heater and maybe a plastic ornament (if needed). This is so the medication can work on the fish and not get wasted on bacteria in the substrate and on the glass. You should wipe the inside of the container down and change all the water before adding another dose of medication (unless the instructions state otherwise).

If you don't have a spare container to treat the fish, do the following before treating her. You should also do a massive water change and gravel clean before re-treating the tank.

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 75-90% water change and gravel clean the substrate. The water change 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.

Remove carbon from the filter so it doesn't remove the medication from the water.

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

 

[mandyatm]

Thank you both for your quick replies!! To answer your questions:

We were out of town for 3 days and came back on Monday evening (5 days ago). We noticed she was acting a little funny and her belly looked a little swollen. I thought maybe she was about to lay eggs as she does frequently. Then 2 days ago she looked way worse. I did a large water change. Today she looked even worse that yesterday. I did another large water change and cleaned the sides of the tank and the sand really well. I cleaned the canister filter last week so I did not clean it again. I do have a quarantine tank so I will move her to that today and try to medicate/use salt. I worry moving her will stress her more but I guess it is the best option at this point. Thanks again for the advice!