Tiger Barb Not Eatting.

[severina]

We just got over a bout of ich, and I noticed one of my tiger barbs is not eatting, and looks very thin. (its the smallest for the 9) I sprinkled a tiny bit of flake over where she was and she darted for the food..caught it..and then let it go. She repeated this behavior several times and didn't eat a thing. I've isolated her and another fish (minnow) for going belly up and acting like it was going to die. I have no idea what to do with them. The only meds I have are PreventIch, Melafix, and an antibacterial that contains formalin, and benzalkonium chloride.

I completely lost my ammonia sticks, but my other stats are perfect except a very slightly detectable nitrite reading (less than .3)

If I don't get a response within an hour, I'm going to go ahead and add the melafix, because I don't know what else to do.

 

[dwarfgourami]

Sorry, that was snoring time in the UK. I expect you will have added the Melafix by now and it won't have done any harm, but don't expect it to do a lot of good either tbh. It is not an antibacterial medicine (that's Pimafix) but simply a gentle tonic to aid natural healing. The good news is, once you've diagnosed the problem you can go straight on and medicate, since Melafix can be used together with most other medications. It may be that your barb is weakened by the ich- hard to tell.

 

[WILDER]

To be honest sounds like the fish isn't going to make it, sounds like it got a bacterial infection on top of the whitespot, sorry, and if its not eating as you know not good news.

 

[severina]

They've had 2 doses of formalin, still alive..and not acting funky. Go me! So how long should I treat them before putting them back into the tank? 7 days?

 

[WILDER]

I would leave it a week once the spots have disappeared.

 

[severina]

...what spots?

 

[WILDER]

Sorry thought you meant the whitespot, best to isolate fish for a least a week after any treatment to make sure it has gone before you add a fish back to the tank.

 

[millym]

hi
sorry to hear about your tiger, in my experience once a fish esp a tiger barb has stopped eating theyre usually very sick and not a lot helps, tigers ive lost due to suspected internal bacterial infections usually stop hanging with the tb crowd & hide away in a corner, initially eating but then stop i have usually euthanased at this stage as i dont want them to start getting nipped/picked on by the rest of the gang & tankmates.
it sounds like your barb could have a some sort of problem swallowing/taking in food as it seems to be hungry poor thing but unable to eat properly, its prob impossible to tell but it may have something wedged in its mouth i dont know but if the poor guy is already thin & cant eat maybe the kindest thing to do is euthanase........
sorry i HATE having to euthanase a fish but even more cant bear to see a little creature suffer.
i find clove oil the best humane way although i know there is a continuing debate about this but i cant do the knock on the head/cut off head thing.
sorry i cant really be of more help.