The Godfather

[Samage]

You may recall that I recently saved a betta from a nasty LFS. He was covered in fungus and had been kept with red tipped sharks, and his fins were in ribbons.

I was exceptionally lucky with this betta, he was uncommon as it ACTUALLY GOT ON WITH MY GOURAMIS! Better than that, he actually SHOALED with them! I named him The Godfather, and the Gouramis were his Mob!

Things were going well. He was happy in mu community, my community was happy with him. Bliss. However, today as I was cleaning the filter, for no reason the Godfather leapt out of the tank! He fell a good 4 feet to the ground, and hit the wooden floor with a real thud.

I quickly picked him up and wiped of the fluff off him, and then placed him back in his tank. However, he now floats on his side, breathing and twitching occasionally. He has been like this for 8 hours now.

What should I do? I can think of numerous possibilites as to what has happened...

1) He is merely dazed
2) he has broken his spine
3) He is very very stressed from the fall
4) He has damaged his internal organs

I'm holding out hope for 1, or to a lesser extent 3. He can recover from these. However, the angle his head is resting at, points at number one...should I euthanise him now, or see what happens?

I think he's on his way out

 

[billy61788]

maybe he damaged his fins or scales on the fall? id seperate him from the other fish so they dont pick on him and try some meds? i dont know too much about meds so maube someone else does, but i would try to wait and see what happens

good luck, hope he pulls threw

 

[White Whale]

Keep him isolated in his own bowl with very clean water but shallow. It could be just a misaligned swimbladder. And feed him sparsely - like 3 pellets - every 3rd day. If it's a swimbladder problem it should correct itself in time, maybe in a week, maybe in 3 weeks. Again, the water should be clean and shallow enough (about 4 or 5 times his body height) for easy access to the surface.

This happened to me 3 times before. All are still alive and doing well.

 

[Samage]

He's on the bottom of the tank - UPRIGHT!


Of course, it's not over yet, he still looks gravley ill

But the fact that he's finally righted means that it's likely his back/neck is NOT broken!

 

[jams.alaskan]

This is soo sad - I'm pulling for him!

ALASKA

 

[MerryCat]

Oh, I hope the Godfather makes it.. I'll keep my fingers crossed. Keep us updated!

 

[aquamaureen85]

Hope he is getting better!

 

[Samage]

I woke up today, looked in the tank, he's now swimming around

He's still a bit lethargic, and a little pale around the gills...still, it's progress!

Seems he's just dazed and shocked...or possibly just shocked. Do fish get dazed after a blow like many animals?

 

[StanTheBetta]

I think so. In the euthanizing fish thread I think it mentions hitting them with something hard to knock them and then cutting there head off because the blow only knocks them unconcious. So I assume (although you know what they say when you assume) that a fall of about 4 feet could have a dazing affect. Anyways I hope he makes it. Love the name Godfather heh