Bn Catfish Pooping...bubbles

[Larkspur]

I have an immature BN catfish in my 5.5 gallon tank. He's an excellent cleaner. My tank is divided in 2 so every week I pick him up and put him on the opposite side to clean. Well, when I put him on the side where some new plants are decaying he started pooping long strings of poo and some of the poo has strips of air bubbles inside of it! Never seen anything like it. What to do? It's not as bad as it was, but he still has air pockets in his poo.

 

[WILDER]

Does he look bloated or thin.
What colour were the long strings of poo.
What do you feed the plec.
is his anus enlarged, or red and inflamed.

What other fish do you have in the tank.
Water stats in ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and ph.

 

[Larkspur]

He looked slightly bloated a few days ago. He's albino so I was able to even see "bubbles" in his stomach then too. Currently he's on my glass and looks normal. His belly is not abnormally shrunken in or extended and is currently dark in color like he's recently been eating.

His stools are stringy and the color of an algae wafer or slightly darker (grayish green toned) His anus looks normal. No redness.

He eats mostly algae with a piece of algae wafer every couple days. I have an algae overload in my tank. I keep my light on for about 12 hours a day at least hence the algae.

His tankmates are 2 male bettas. One side of the divider is one, the other side is another. There are also 5-ish ghost shrimp. I fed a couple of the shrimp to some cichlids recently so I'm not positive how many I have.

It's a 5.5 gallon tank established a year ago. Heavily planted. My BN is not very big yet. He's maybe 2 inches from tip of nose to tip of tail.

I don't have any way to test the stats without taking a water sample into town. I'll try and do that tomorrow after work.

 

[WILDER]

So you have a betta, bn plec, and cichlids in a 5.5 gal tank. Is this correct.

Any bubbles beneath the skin on the fish?

Also research the plec diet needs are some eat, frozen foods, veg, wood.

 

[bae1994]

i think he/she has a male beta in one side another male beta in the other side and ghost shrimp and in another tank they have ciclids and fed some shrimp to them thats the way i read it anyway

 

[WILDER]

Ok. Thanks.

I thought they had cichlids in the 5.5 gallon tank.

 

[Larkspur]

I'm no fish expert, but even I know no cichlids in a tank that size!!!

As far as my BN's condition goes...he seems fine. Haven't seen long stringy poo with bubbles encased in it. I think he overindulged on that decaying plant like I thought. We will see. This water change he goes back on that side of the divider so he may have a relapse as the plant is only on one side.

 

[three-fingers]

I wouldn't worry about it .

Plecs and other catfish like corys frequently dash up to the surface of the water to take a gulp of air, which goes into their intestines where oxygen is absorbed (helps them survive low-oxygen conditions).

The remaining oxygen depleted air comes out as a fart .

They don't always do it, but sometimes the gas can get stuck in the poo lol.

 

[WILDER]

Bubbles can be wind. But needed to rule other thing's out.
If any changes get back to the board.
Good Luck.

 

[Larkspur]

The depeleted oxygen thing makes a LOT of sense. He seems to have the bubbly poo when he's on the end of the divider that doesn't get a lot of water agitation. My filter isn't set up to flow towards the divider so the side the filter isn't on tends to get slightly stagnant. Not much of an issue for the betta, but apparently Hilton wants more air than what is being provided for him.