Penelope .R
Fish Fanatic
My 60 gallon has had a few deaths recently.
It started with a dwarf gourami. His belly swelled up and he sat on the bottom. I separated him immediately and he lived for a few days in quarantine before passing. I assumed it was bloat because of the swollen abdomen and sitting on the bottom.
A week-ish later, a molly started swimming at the surface and breathing heavily, had stringy poop, and eventually died as well.
Since then I have also lost a cory catfish, but didn't notice any symptoms in him, so unfortunately he died in the tank.
Now my blue dwarf gourami is swimming by the filter output most of the time, no swelling, some stringy poop, will swim but not much.
I am mostly concerned about my seven year old silver dollars, my kissing gourami Adonis, and my kuhli loaches. None of them are showing symptoms, but they are definitely the most important fish I have.
Water parameters are good, I do weekly water changes and ph stays around neutral. Until now I haven't lost a fish since January of this year. The tank is overstocked for sure (13 Rosy barbs someone rescued and *gifted* me, currently setting up a dedicated Rosy tank to move them into), I try to compensate by doing large water changes but the filter does a really good job at keeping ammonia at 0.
I haven't added any new fish or plants in a year, and all of my tanks have their own equipment and supplies, I'm very careful about cross contamination.
I've read some posts here on stringy poo and swelling and I'm thinking this is an intestinal parasite. I've never dealt with it before, so I'm not sure what to do.
I've done some reading on treatment but I'm concerned about hurting the kuhli loaches and the snails. I also have some questions about the filter, it's well established and I don't want to remove the media and kill the bacteria but I also don't want to render any medication useless.
Sorry if some of this doesn't make sense, I just got off a 14 hour shift and will probably pass out as soon as I post this.
I can get a picture of the gourami tomorrow, he's starting to look less stunning.
Also, every fish that has died so far are Petsmart fish, I'm honestly surprised they've lived as long as they have.
I'm mostly concerned about medication because of the kuhli loaches. I like my snails and can separate them if need be, but the kuhlis are very important to me.
Anyway, advice is deeply appreciated. I have some different medications on hand but I don't think any of them treat internal parasites, if that's even what this is.
It started with a dwarf gourami. His belly swelled up and he sat on the bottom. I separated him immediately and he lived for a few days in quarantine before passing. I assumed it was bloat because of the swollen abdomen and sitting on the bottom.
A week-ish later, a molly started swimming at the surface and breathing heavily, had stringy poop, and eventually died as well.
Since then I have also lost a cory catfish, but didn't notice any symptoms in him, so unfortunately he died in the tank.
Now my blue dwarf gourami is swimming by the filter output most of the time, no swelling, some stringy poop, will swim but not much.
I am mostly concerned about my seven year old silver dollars, my kissing gourami Adonis, and my kuhli loaches. None of them are showing symptoms, but they are definitely the most important fish I have.
Water parameters are good, I do weekly water changes and ph stays around neutral. Until now I haven't lost a fish since January of this year. The tank is overstocked for sure (13 Rosy barbs someone rescued and *gifted* me, currently setting up a dedicated Rosy tank to move them into), I try to compensate by doing large water changes but the filter does a really good job at keeping ammonia at 0.
I haven't added any new fish or plants in a year, and all of my tanks have their own equipment and supplies, I'm very careful about cross contamination.
I've read some posts here on stringy poo and swelling and I'm thinking this is an intestinal parasite. I've never dealt with it before, so I'm not sure what to do.
I've done some reading on treatment but I'm concerned about hurting the kuhli loaches and the snails. I also have some questions about the filter, it's well established and I don't want to remove the media and kill the bacteria but I also don't want to render any medication useless.
Sorry if some of this doesn't make sense, I just got off a 14 hour shift and will probably pass out as soon as I post this.
I can get a picture of the gourami tomorrow, he's starting to look less stunning.
Also, every fish that has died so far are Petsmart fish, I'm honestly surprised they've lived as long as they have.
I'm mostly concerned about medication because of the kuhli loaches. I like my snails and can separate them if need be, but the kuhlis are very important to me.
Anyway, advice is deeply appreciated. I have some different medications on hand but I don't think any of them treat internal parasites, if that's even what this is.