Help! I think my discus have bloat!

[JackieR]

I have a couple of discus that I have had for a year and a half now. Two of them are now floating upside down with a bloated gut. they were fine last night and when I got up to turn on their light this morning I noticed that one was not swimming correctly. I also noticed that his gut was bloated. I did a water change and applied some epsom salt into the tank about 30 minutes ago in hopes it could help. I just went to check on them and now a second one is doing it with also a large gut. Why does it happen so suddenly? and if anyone else has had this issue before was epsom salt sucessful? I don't want to lose my fish and am doing all I can to keep them alive. Anymore suggestions?

[JackieR]

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?
floating upside down with a bloated gut. Colors are normal

2. Symptoms (i.e. turning dark, excess slime, not eating, clamped fins, flashing, darting, clamped gills, white/yellow/green poop, hiding, headstanding or tailstanding, white on tips of fins, rotting or fungus, blisters/white zits on fish, bloated, cloudy eyes, wounds). Can't swim normaly. Floating at the top upside down.


3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include dosage and duration of treatment.
epsom salt (1 teaspoon/ 10 gallon) water change


Tank/Water

4. Tank size and ages, numbers and sizes of fish.
20 gal, 4 discus, 2 inches

5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).
25% every week

6. How long has tank been running? Is it bare bottom? If you have substrate, what type and how deep is it?
it has been running for a year and a half

7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.
the pH of my water is 6.6

8. Parameters and water source;
Nitrate and Nitrite are low, no ammonia pH 6.6
Note: Water Parameters are important in diagnosing problems within a tank. If you don't own test kits for the following information, you can purchase them, test your parameters and post this info as soon as possible.


- temp ___84__

- ph ___6.6__

- ammonia reading __0 ppm__

- nitrite reading __0ppm__

- nitrate reading __0ppm__

What type of water or combinations of water sources do you use? If it is an RO/tap/well water mix, please list percentages in the mix.

- i use fresh bottled water and tap water 50%


9. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.
Clown loach added a week ago

10. Include any pictures or videos you have which shows the symptoms. If you can't add them to this post, please provide a link to them.

[trungnguyen]

Is your tank bare bottom?
It seems like you do not do enough WC for small discus.
You stated that your tank has been running about a year and a half, your water test should show some nitrate, not zero.
Did you quarantine the clown loach before putting into the tank?
What did you feed the discus? and how often do you feed them a day?
IMO, for Epsom salt treatment, you should do big WC every day like 70-80%, and it could take about 2-3 days to clean the fish system, and don't feed them anything during the treatment. be patient and observe them for couple days.

If you could, please let members on forum know more information, so members can help you out.

[JackieR]

Im not sure what bare bottom means. I have gravel in my tank.I have rocks in my filter that remove the nitrate from my water. I preformed a test today and the reading was 0ppm. The poach was separate from the discus before introducing him to their tank. I feed them frozen bloodworms one cube a day