red oscar in bad shape.HELP!!

[suheil]

hi i got a pair of new red oscars a week back. they are presently in a 60 gallon tank. one of them started eating yesterday-very little. the other one [rose] has not eaten in a week. from day one she has a habit of staying in a oblique position with her head down. when i look at her in the morning she lies flat on her side at the surface. when i switch on the aquarium lights she gets active [but doesnt eat, but just swims around]. when the lights are off she goes oblique again.she some times she even goes completely vertical with her down and stays that ways for 15 seconds or so and then slowly turns around and goes oblique again. her mate is also lethargic. on top of this they have white spots on their body and fins. i have been treating them with methylene blue and formalin for the past three days. the spots have decreased but far from gone. heta do i do? am i doing it right. has my oscar got a swim bladder problem along with ich? what do i do? any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[WILDER]

Sounds like swim bladder or constipation what do you feed the fish, also the whitespot does it look like they have been sprinkled in salt, abit more info please on water stats in ammonia,nitrite,nitrate,and ph, what other types of fish are in the tank and how many.

 

[IMCL85]

Wow ur tank is loaded with disease whitespot + swimbladder. Man oscar r well knowed hardy fish. If wasn't that they r hardy they be long gone now. Try to go to ur LFS and get medicine for ich and swimbladder find brand that might possibly cure both but if not. Find those that can be use alone with other medicine together. Altho its not suggested to use 2 medicine at once but in ur case its a must. Follow their instrustion and good luck to u . Oh dont forget to raise ur temperature to 84+ and add air stone.

 

[Redbled]

When I had problems happen with my oscars, I often found it was best to just do a 50 percent water change and add no medication. I used to use medication, but just found that the extreme water changes, even as much as every 3 or 4 days, usually seemed more effective.

 

[suheil]

well guys i live in a remote place in india so there is no water testing kits available here. but i do 20percent water changes every week and i cycled my tank with 9 cababy carps for a month and later used them as feeders. today i noticed a good change in the white spots on the fins and the oscar is more active and less on staying oblique. but she hasn't eaten anything yet. i will continue treatment for a week and lets see what happens. i hope fish is under duress and not swim bladder disease . thanks guys

 

[black angel]

how big are the fish? if they are nearly full grown then 60 gallons is too small for a pair. they will be stressed from all the moving around and will take a while to settle in. i think doing bigger water changes more often will be more helpfull.