My Male leopard tail guppy been laying at bottom of tank for a few day’s he ever really started swimming around again seemed perfectly fine eating and swimming with the other but now he’s back at the bottom again this time with red spots on his head and raised scales, the other guppies are fine but they do like to attack my leopard guppy a lot! I dont have another tank and currently we cannot afford another one as we are struggling financially as it is. I’m also still new to this so please don’t judge.
Guppy has red spots and raised scales?
- Thread starter Lozza98
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Hi and welcome to the forum 
The fish could be getting picked on, which might be why it's hiding at the bottom.
The scales sticking out is normally caused by a bacterial infection and is pretty hard to treat.
The red spots on the head look like physical injuries, possibly caused by other fish biting the guppy.
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Check the water quality for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.
Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge.
Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.
Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, do not clean the filter if it's less than 6 weeks old. Wash filter media/ materials in a bucket of tank water and re-use them.
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Add some salt to the tank. You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), sea salt or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 2 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water.
If you only have livebearers (guppies, platies, swordtails, mollies), goldfish or rainbowfish in the tank you can double that dose rate, so you would add 4 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres.
Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.
The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria but the higher dose rate will affect some plants. The lower dose rate will not affect plants.
After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.
If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.
The fish could be getting picked on, which might be why it's hiding at the bottom.
The scales sticking out is normally caused by a bacterial infection and is pretty hard to treat.
The red spots on the head look like physical injuries, possibly caused by other fish biting the guppy.
------------------------
Check the water quality for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.
Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge.
Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.
Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, do not clean the filter if it's less than 6 weeks old. Wash filter media/ materials in a bucket of tank water and re-use them.
------------------------
Add some salt to the tank. You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), sea salt or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 2 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water.
If you only have livebearers (guppies, platies, swordtails, mollies), goldfish or rainbowfish in the tank you can double that dose rate, so you would add 4 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres.
Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.
The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria but the higher dose rate will affect some plants. The lower dose rate will not affect plants.
After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.
If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.
Do you have a plastic food safe tub or large container that you could move the guppy to so it can rest? Use some of the tank water to fill it.
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