Chances Of Survival

[Morquinn]

Last night around 4am I was awoken by a splash and a thud, I turn on the lights and see Blade (Tiger Oscar) lying on the floor.. I have no idea why he jumped, as I thought they pretty much slept through the night (Well everytime I looked at them at night, they were always sleeping) anyways.. it took about 2 minutes to get him back in the tank, at this point he layed lathargic on the bottom, but breathing. This morning he seemed perfectly fine and even ate and swam around like normal, but he has injuries, im guessing from hitting the plastic on his way out (the gap he got out of is very small) and he has two gashes, one on each side of the head. On one side the gash is pretty deep, some meat has been taken out. Im wondering what I should do, and whether he will live through this ordeal. Thanks alot for any imput, our two oscars mean alot to us.

 

[WILDER]

Check your water stats to see if there ok in ammonia,nitrite,nitrate, and ph.
I would add some melafix to stop infection as he lost his protection with the deep gash.

 

[vancouver]

It's very hit or miss when it comes to fish jumping out..

I've had fish do fine, and others just lie around and waste away... so it really depends on the fish.

 

[Ferris]

I would expect an Oscar to make a full recovery from that - they are extremely hardy fish. A bit of Melafix wouldn't go amiss though just to help the wounds heal and prevent any infection.

Guaranteed sulking for a few days though.

 

[Morquinn]

Ok thanks I will try the melafix... is there any reason why he would jump out of the tank in the middle of the night??

 

[vancouver]

Could something have spooked it?

Any other fish in the tank that might have attacked it and caused it to freak out?

 

[Morquinn]

Well, I have the other oscar with him, but they are buddies.. other than that I guess the frog could've spooked him. I have an adult female ACF in with them, I havent set her tank up yet, guess thats a possibility. Guess I'll never know, I just hope he survives, he seems to be doing perfectly fine now, but that scared me to death, as Blade is mine and our Albino oscar is my boyfriends, we now have that gap covered lol

 

[LisaLQ]

Could something have spooked it?

Any other fish in the tank that might have attacked it and caused it to freak out?

From profile:

55gallon with 1pleco, 1gaint danio, 1blindcavefish, 2silverdollars, 2Blackfinned Sharks, 1africanClawedFrog, 1Banjocatfish, 1Albino Oscar, 1Redtigeroscar.

Edited to add - oops, posted same time!

 

[-*-MicHAeL-*-]

Also it could have been something like a loud noise or a light being switched on.

 

[Morquinn]

Hmm I should edit my profile..
The tank is larger now...
Blind cave fish are gone, along with the blackfinned sharks (moved into a brackish tank) giant danio was moved to a different aquarium and yes we still have the silver dollars in there, but they arent active at night either.. the banjo catfish is pretty small (actually probably eadible for the oscars, but they grew up with him so they leave him alone) the ACF is still in the tank..


No chance of light turning on, as its in our bedroom about 3 feet away from the bed.. and we were sleeping hehe

 

[GrantyBoy]

I think your Oscar should be fine after his little adventure.

My Oscars used to jump or try to jump at night. They would do it some night and not the other. Thankfully they couldn't get out of the tank as the lid was secure.
Took me ages to work out what couls be causing it. Finally turned out to be the blinds on the window. Usually I wouldn't close the blinds at night and street light would get in keeping the tank in a soft light. The nights I closed the blinds and put the room into total darkness was the nights they would jump. I think they were spooking each other in the complete darkness. To stop this I added moon lights to the tank and they hav not even attempted to jump once.

I'd also reccomend getting a better lid fitted to stop this happening again in the future, just in case

Hope this helps.

 

[Bullrock74]

I've witnessed my oscar being slightly spooked by reflections off the tv onto the aquarium walls. It happened to be a close-up of a rodent on tv that sent the oscar swimming quickly away from where it was. Of course, it could have just been a coincidence that the oscar went into flee mode at the same time a close-up of a rodent was being shown on tv...

 

[ox5477]

He might have been cruising around the tank like he would in the wild looking for something to eat and maybe saw a little reflection off the surface off the water and thought maybe it was food. He then would have preceded to lunge at it and prob propelled himself out of the tank. My JD does this alot and I can hear him at night when he bangs his head on the lid... DOH!

 

[WILDER]

Hows the fish doing.