My Gourami Has Something Wrong!

[cheerycherry]

My lovely striped female gourami hasnt eaten for days,She hides behind the plants and never wants to come out and now she has really really long white poo comming out

Ive been really concerned for days that she just wont eat at all and isnt long white poo a bad sign?

Edited to add ive only ever fed flakes

 

[Colin_T]

Stringy white poo is often associated with an internal bacterial infection. If you can get medicated food into her she might recover but treating fish for internal infections is difficult and doesn't always work.

 

[cheerycherry]

Her face seems to have gone a funny purple shade now which isnt normal for her.How can I try give her medicated food if she wont eat? she just sits there and wont swim or eat at all

 

[Colin_T]

Unfortunately when a fish starts to show signs of an internal problem, it is often too late. You might be better off putting her down or at least into a quarantine tank/container. This will prevent other fish from picking on her or at her if she dies in the tank.
The other option is to treat the tank with a broad spectrum anti-biotic medication and hope she ingests enough of it to cure her. But often it takes several days before you see any signs of improvement and the fish may not last that long.

 

[cheerycherry]

I only have the one tank right now so would a breeding net be okay to put her in? ill get some meds tommorow just in case but if she suffers (although I couldnt do it id get hubby too) whats the "nicest" way of putting them out of misery?
*sniff*

 

[Colin_T]

a breeding net should stop most fo the other fish from picking at her.

the quickest way to put them down is to whack it on the head but that isn't easy to do and gets a bit messy. I prefer to put them in a small container of tank water and pop it in the freezer until frozen. Then bury or burn the body.
If you can get Clove Oil, you can add a couple of drops of that to the container of water before you freeze it and that will put the fish to sleep, (not kill it just send it off to lala land). Then the freezing kills it.

 

[cheerycherry]

Ok well lastnight I moved her into a breeding net more so because the other fish kept nipping her.Im guessing they pick off a weak fish??


Came down this morning she was ok but 10 mins later she was dead my concern is now could there be a problem that could affect the other fish? What would be the best medication I could go out and get today just in case? dont want to lose any more fish.

 

[Colin_T]

The bacteria that caused the problem is quite often found in the tank and all the fish are probably carrying it in them. If they are healthy and well looked after they can live with it for a long time. If they get old or stressed out then the bacteria can over run their immune system and start doing damage.

Without knowing which bacterium caused the problem it is impossible to say what medication should be used to treat the tank. I would just do a partial water change and gravel clean each day for a week. This will reduce a lot of the pathogens from the water and then just monitor the fish. If more fish die from the same problem over the next few months then it could be something serious like Tuberculosis. But if they are fine and you don't lose any more for a while then I wouldn't bother treating them.