Help Tail Standing

[Kristin43]

I have a discus that I got from the LFS two weeks ago and he was doing ok for the first couple of days, not eating, but swimming around and checking out his new surroundings. He has since gotten sick, he is not eating at all and he almost looks as if he is standing on his tail and when he swims he looks to be standing on his tail?

I have him in a tank where I began treating him with Parasite clear to be sure he did not have anything along for the ride. He hangs out at the upper part of the tank alot, and the water is fine, I do 50% water change every other day.

Please help, have never heard of this behavior before and not sure what to do, he is beautiful and don't want to lose him.

[Kindredspirit]

I have a discus that I got from the LFS two weeks ago and he was doing ok for the first couple of days, not eating, but swimming around and checking out his new surroundings. He has since gotten sick, he is not eating at all and he almost looks as if he is standing on his tail and when he swims he looks to be standing on his tail?

I have him in a tank where I began treating him with Parasite clear to be sure he did not have anything along for the ride. He hangs out at the upper part of the tank alot, and the water is fine, I do 50% water change every other day.

Please help, have never heard of this behavior before and not sure what to do, he is beautiful and don't want to lose him.


Hey Kristin!


If you could give a little more information, it may be helpful:

How big is your tank?
Bare bottom, or planted/gravel?
What are your tank parameters? Nitrites, nitates, ammonia and so on..
Did you quarantine him?
He is alone in the tank?
When you treated him with Parasite Clear, did you see worms? Did you complete that treatment?

In the meantime, I would do wc everyday and add salt, i think 1tablespoons to every ten gallons...what is your temp?? Someone will come around to help, so gather your info! Hang in there!


Marie!:angel:

[White Worm]

http://www.aquaworldnet.com/dbws/symtreat.shtml

[brewmaster15]

Hi Kristen,
Is there any swelling in the fish visible? tail standing is often a sign of swim bladder disease or can be a side effect of some medications.

How long ago did you treat him with parasite clear and how many treatments did you do?


-al

[Kristin43]

He is in a 55 gallon tank with 4 other discus, the others are fine and show no signs of being sick.

He is not bloated but is loosing weight and getting bony he has not eaten a bit of food since he was brought home.

He was treated with Parasite Clear 36 hours ago and I just did my second water change after the administer of 1st round of medicine. I do believe it stresses him because he gets swimming more after the water change.

I really do not want to lose this guy but am losing hope of curing whatever this is. As for seeing any worms, I did see stringy white poop after putting in the parasite clear from two of the 5 discus in the tank he being one of them. But it was not very much.

K

[Cosmo]

Kristen,

This is the reason you read so much about quarantine tanks, and keeping new fish separate for 4 to 6 weeks. Even a healthy looking fish can be sick when you bring it home, and it's best to find out before it infects your other livestock.

If it's a swim bladder infection, these are very difficult to cure and are best treated with Kanamycin. It could also be a bad case of tapeworms, which is much easier to treat with Prazi, but in a bad case secondary infections are likely, in which case the Kanamycin would come in handy as well. These meds usually aren't available at the LFS so you'd need to order them online.

Regardless, you should move the new fish into a hospital tank as quickly as possible in hopes of minimizing any impact on your other fish.

The white stringy turds are a concern so you need to observe your other 4 fish and if this continues, treatment with Metro at 93 degrees F would be recommended.

Increasing your WCs to 50% daily would also be beneficial for all of them at least until symptoms disappear. Make sure the replacement water is same temp / ph as the tank water to avoid stress.

hth
Jim