Severe Swimbladder; Advice Needed

[Richie Hell]

our glass catfish fester has been swimming off centre for a while but recently he started swimming directly upright and then doing corkscrews crashing into things. He's also floating to the surface and sometimes lying on the floor.

We decided it must be swimbladder. We have fasted our fish for several days and then fed them peas, but poor old Fester doesnt seem to be getting any food and doesnt seem to be improving

Today he got worse and began crashing into things more, became trapped under the snail trap (which we have removed for now until he gets better) and when we came upstairs a few minutes ago he'd got himself stuck nose down in one of the plants we have in there (silk plants but we dont want a lecture on those as its not what we're trying to find out)

We have recently (two days ago) treated our tank for whitespot. The tank has had 3 doses, 4 days in between, and one more dose is needed to complete the treatment. And then we have to wait another week or so before we can do any other treatments.

Because of this, we cant use a swimbladder treatment, but fester is getting very ill.

Is there anything we can do for him? Does swimbladder clear up on its own? Any home made treatments that wont clash with our white spot treatment?

All our water stats are good (0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5.0ppm nitrate, ph is 7), and all of the fish get along. 20 gallon tank. The white spot treatment we are using is Interpet Anti Whitespot plus

Please help!

 

[WILDER]

I would end his misery he's in bad shape, sorry not nice but he's suffering.

 

[Tolak]

It's a stretch, but you could try some epsom salt in the water. You can use this with most any med I can think of. The fish should be in a seperate tank & treated with an antibiotic. Even then it's iffy if the fish is this far gone.

 

[Richie Hell]

Can't bear to kill him, we'd rather give him the best fighting chance right to the end. He's survived a remarkable time and loads of getting stuck.

Have now got a hospital tank and popped him along with some epsom salt and some swim bladder treatment. Fingers crossed.

 

[WILDER]

Ok fingers crossed and good luck.

 

[puppyduck]

Hurrah!

We are very very happy!

We popped our Fester into the hospital tank Wednesday and today he has much improved.

Not sure whether it was the salts or the swimbladder treatment but he is far far better than before.

Thanks for the advice. Glad we couldnt bear to kill him because he's really perked up. Am chuffed to bits that my little glassy is on the mend!

 

[WILDER]

Could of been constipation then.
Well done.