Fish Out Of The Water!

[fatmonkeyryit]

I woke up this morning to a dried up golden algae eater on my floor! He looked like he had been out a while but I decided to put him back into the water just to see if he could recover. After about a minute, his gills started to move and after an hour he was able to swim a bit.

He's always very active but since his "accident" he doesn't move at all or go to his favorite hiding spots. Is there something I can do to help him recover?

 

[WILDER]

He's slime coat dried up give him chance lucky he's still alive.

 

[Elaine2]

It may be that he was just out of the water too long and suffered lasting damage, or maybe it will just take a bit of time for him to recover from the trauma, like people. Keeping the lights off for a while should stop him getting too stressed. Other than that, I'm not sure but there's other folk on here who have more experience of these things and who may have more ideas.

 

[Tolak]

Clean water is a major help, as the slime coat dries up on fish that go overboard, leaving them prone to infection. A little melafix can't hurt either.

I had a bristlenose plec take a leap about a month ago, big healthy male. I picked him up, he was half dried, and motionless, and was walking out of the fishroom to go toss him in the garden, when I noticed some gill motion. Back into the tank he went, I moved him back & forth for a couple of minutes, his gills took off, and he took off.

It was a high tank, a 20 gallon with the top rim at eye level. Easy tank for water changes, I did 50% daily for a few days, then every other day or so, for almost two weeks. I also dosed with melafix.

He had a little fungal thing start up after two days on his side, where he was really dry, so I treated with copper sufate pentahydrate at 3/4 maximum dose. Copper is a good med when used properly, but there is a fine line between therapeutic & toxic, you have to know your water hardness, and be sure there is no algae in the tank.

 

[fatmonkeyryit]

Unfortunately, he died yesterday. I did water changes and melafix but he was too far gone. .

 

[3ndl3r]

shame. the only fish i have had jump out was a swordtail. got through a 1 inch gap in the hood. luckily saw it happen and managed toget him back in.

 

[kewskills]

its a shame to hear that, i thought he may have been OK, reading the post earlier.