Neon Missing An Eye?

[fish-o-fish]

One of my neons is lying sideways on a bunch of plants and I just noticed he is missing an eye!!!!
There's a red hole where it's eye should be, and it's just lying there sideways.. I've never had this happen before.. I'm assuming there's no hope for this little guy but I'm wondering how the hell it could have happened? I have no aggressive fish in my tank

 

[karin]

I have had neon's live for a long time with only one eye but they were not sideways. That does not bode well if he is sideways. Keep your water pristine to see if that helps. Who are the other inhabitants in the tank because someone poked his eye out.

 

[Kelly-Jo]

In my experience, whenever a fish is severely ill and laying on the bottom/sideways, the other fish seem to think that it's already dead and will pick at it. For example, when I had a very ill bronze cory, my rosy barb removed both of its eyes but it was too weak to swim away. Sadly, this can usually be the end of an ill fish as it is obviously increadibly painful and stressful. However, if your neon still has one eye and is swimming around and eating then theres a good chance he'll be okay.

Watch your tank for a while if you can to see if you can pinpoint who the agressive fish is and go from there.

 

[fish-o-fish]

Well it is now the next day and he seems to be doing a lot better. I couldn't find him this morning and was freaking out thinking he had died/been eaten, but once all my neons re-schooled for the day I spotted him swimming around normally with the others as if nothing was wrong.. so hopefully he will be okay now

 

[karin]

The key here is to keep your water pristine. Good luck.