Dead Fish

[Kombat]

I found one of my lemon tetras dead yesterday. I noticed right away that he had no tail and no fins, everything was gone. After I netted the corpse out I saw that it had a wound on his left side. So I am wondering if the fish was killed or if it died naturally and the other fish were picking at it after it died. Over the weenkend the biggest lemon was bullying the other tetras in the tank, and he's still in there. So I don't know. I don't have anything in my tank that would kill another fish (I guess the betta could but he isn't fast enough to catch a tetra.) My first instinct was that the bullying fish killed it, but then I was thinking maybe it just died on its own and after it died the other fish picked the corpse apart.

Thanks,
Karl

 

[TammyLiz]

I don't think there is a good way of knowing. If I were to guess, I would say the damage was most likely done after the fish had died. Was the bully picking on all the other tetras or just that particular one? Is he still bullying the others? Sometimes when a fish is sick it will get picked on by the other healthy ones. I guess they try to drive it off so they don't catch anything.

Tammy