Help!!! Eye is swelling and threatening to burst!!!

[Cichlid4life]

Please help me!!! I bought this wonderful OB peacock at the size of one inch, now he is about 7 inches. I have only had him for about a year now, and he is the tank boss, he is the only male with three females and a bunch of fry. Yesterday he started to develop cataracts, one eye was slightly swollen too. I have not have pop eye recently in my OB peacock tank, and this is not pop-eye! He has one eye that has a cone -shaped white bubble on his eye, and it has a small hole in it and it grew bigger this afternoon regarding the hole. and the other eye is now developing a cataract too. Please help me as this is getting bigger by the hour and it seems to be a fast working thing, what ever this thing is, and that usually indicates a faster death rate when it develops quickly, and no other fish has this in the tank. i have not bought any new fish mates either for about 5 months.

 

[Cichlid4life]

ugh i hate the pictures not working!!

 

[Cichlid4life]

the picture make it look much smaller and flatter than it really is .

 

[Colin_T]

The pics aren't the best but it isn't cataracts. Cataracts appear on old fish and the dark middle part of the eye goes white.

In this case the white on the outside of the eye and that is usually caused by poor water quality or physical damage, with the white stuff being excess mucous produce by the fish to try and protect the injured eye.

-------------------
Check the water quality for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, pH & GH.

The pH needs to be above 7.5 and the GH needs to be above 250ppm.

Wipe the inside of the glass down and clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. Then do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate each day for a week.

Most eye issues will heal up quickly if the water and tank are clean.

If the water quality is good and there is no improvement after 2 days of water changes then you might need to treat the fish with a broad spectrum medication, but try water changes and cleaning the tank first.

 

[Cichlid4life]

i said that it seemed like a cataract two days ago, but yesterday it was swollen, and the other eye has just the cataract-like part. I have crushed coral/shells in my substrate along with the gravel to help buffer the Ph ever since i started the tank, and yesterday i did a 18-20% water change in the aquarium. If the water quality were to cause this, how come it is that only one fish has this and none of the other do? The eye with the white stuff on it is also swelling up a little bit just like pop-eye does, but then the white stuff on the eye is also swelling.