bubbles in dorsal fins

[guppler]

I thik I have about a hunderd male guppies. Really they've been dying off faster than they've been breeding for over a year, so probably less that a hunderd, but i haven't tried actually counting since the first litter of 50. One of the fishes I bought at a store started to develop bubbles in his tail as he aged. His name was Fuego and he was a nice silver tuxedo with yellow-centered orange delta tail. At first his fin just looked kind of twisted or wrinkled or even atractively wavey and very long. As his back got hunched with age i thought he might have actual bubbles in his fin. Now about 80 % of my males have bubbles in their dorsal fins. The shorter fined fishes don't seem to develop bubbles, but it isn't only the tuxedos. I think the gupplers with good Endler shaped fins don't get bubbles even if they are pretty long, but the tiny tux's that i think got their size from my prolific Endler do get the long bubbly fins.
What I'm wondering is if this is a genetic thing or something that happens to most guppy guys when they get old, or if it could be a defect or sign of disease. I haven't seen it in fishes outside my tank, but maybe that's because they're not old. It does look interesting.

 

[lee_an]

are those with bubles dying

 

[guppler]

sometimes the ones with bubbles die, but most of them swim around looking fine for months.

 

[The-Wolf]

the following was supplied by Silly Me in another post

Gas Bubble Disease is caused by a sudden dramatic change in gas pressure in the aquarium. This can happen by changing too much water at one time or by adding cold water to the fish tank. Gas bubbles form in the fins and skin of the fish. The bubbles look like blisters and are very easy to see. The skin will crackle if you run your finger across it. If not treated in time, gas bubbles in the bloodstream will kill the fish. The treatment is to add alot of aeration to the aquarium. Lights should be left off to minimize stress. If you see alot of bubbles that have already popped, consider adding a general antibiotic to guard against secondary infection

I HTH

 

[guppler]

That gas bubble thing could be it. I do tend to change a pretty large amount of water and the way I've been doing it, I sometimes have to pour it pretty fast to keep it from dripping all oover, so it's probably pretty stressful. I always use stress coat and i'm trying to add more aeration. This could even explain the frequent infections and fin rot. Right naow i have a girl with a bad case of fin rot and cottonny tufts on her back and head. She didn't have bubbles. As far as i've seen, only the boys get bubbles. I did burry 2 boys today. One was a pretty little endler type and the other was my last delta tailed tux besides Hook. I noticed him acting sick, but didn't notice the endler sick until it was dead. They both could be over a year old and didn't show obvious signs of infection, so i'm not medicating that tank right now. sometimes i'm medicating multiple tanks at one time and it seems like I barely get one finnished when i have to start again. I'm medicating both girl tanks now because of the one with fin rot in tank 2 and there was one with dropsy in tank 1. I didn't see her today, but i don't know if I need to keep looking for a body or if she recovered so well i don't recognize her. There is one who has the same tail markings, but i'm not sure there wasn't more than one like that before.
Does anybody know the normal life expectancy for guppies? One of my girls is about 2 years old, but I imagine that's above average, and i heard that boys are not as hardy. I've been putting off selling some for about a year partly because i don't want to sell them when they might be sick, but maybe getting some out of the tanks would really be the best thing for them.