Mollie acting well daft

[nikkikl]

Hi all

One of my mollies is acting very strangley at the moment. Bought 2 new fish two days ago and ever since it has been skulking around at the bottom of the tank only occassionally swimming upwards. It is just lying at the bottom until I feed them when it decides its time to swim up again. Its not being picked on by any of the others and the other mollie is fine. It doesn't 'look' ill, just not doing a lot at the moment. Is it ill or sulky? It did this before when I bought a new fish then after a few days perked up again.

Any ideas guys?

Update - just went and had another look at it and caught it have a bit of a tussle with the other mollie. Hmm, never seen them do that before. It's back at the bottom sullking now! I am REALLY confused now!

 

[Alien Anna]

Mollies seem to play dead when stressed. Make sure you have some plants in there for him to hide behind and if you didn't do so already, keep the lights off for the first day.

 

[nikkikl]

Thanks for that Anna. I will turn off the lights and see what happens

Cheers

 

[nikkikl]

Hi All

I am thinking swim bladder now...Mollie is lying on the bottom and really struggling to swim upwards?

What do you think?

 

[nikkikl]

mollie died

 

[Aqua_Princess64]

I'm sorry about your loss. Do you still think it was swim bladder?

 

[Lithril]

Just out of curiosity how big is the tank? Adding the extra fish didn't send you ammonia/nitrite levels up did it?? Have you checked the levels since adding the fish?

Soz about the Mollie

 

[nikkikl]

Hi guys

Thanks for the interest. Since then my other Mollie died so maybe its a mass Mollie suicide or something? My crab died as well and he was new! Anyway, all the nitrate and ammonia levels are fine. I have not long ago, installed an under gravel filter in there and I can't help but wonder if this was the cause of their untimely demise. I have left the original filter in as well as the UGF so that the good stuff remains. All the remaining fish are fine and zooming around as usual. Remaining are 3 Clown Loaches, 1 Albino shark (?), 2 Plecs, 4 Banjo Cats, 2 Danios, 3 Khuli Loaches and 7 neons and they all seem to be very fit and healthy. I can't remember the tank size (my husband does the sizes thing!) and its not overstocked. Just seems strange that the 2 Mollies both went within such a short space of time together. The first one - I still think that was swim bladder as it had all the symptoms. The second one, I have no idea - no evidence of swim bladder, it just suddenly looked very lifeless and then very quickly died, no gasping for air, no struggling to swim, just died. Very strange.

Any ideas?

Cheers

Nikki
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