What's Wrong With My Guppy?!

[Ivana331]

Ok, so I have two guppies, a male red neon guppy, and a yellow female guppy(as well as four of their offspring). I have had them since about December. My female has had about three batches of babies, and she still has a gravid spot and is fat, so I figure more on the way. Anyways, today I noticed she was acting strange. I thought she was dead; she was just kinda bobbing along at the bottom of the tank, and the male kept swimming past her nudging into her, usually she'll swim away from him, but this time she just didn't move, which is why I thought she was dead. Upon closer examination I saw her gills moving as well as her tiny fins.
Anyways, I had to go to class and when I came back she was stuck by the tail to the filter, so once again I thought she died and just got sucked up, because she would have swam away. Upon closer examination, I once again noticed her tiny fins moving and her gills moving. So I unplugged the filter, and she floated to the bottom. I looked in at her and her gills are moving, and so are her fins, but she kinda looks top heavy, the way she is floating. There are air bubbles on her body(none of the other fish have air bubbles on them) and I have also noticed that there are two reddish spots on her face, near her gills on either side.
I have no idea what is wrong, all the other fish and the frog that I have in there are doing just fine, swimming around and everything, but she is just floating there....I can take a picture and post it if you need to see. I don't want her to die. Do any of you have any idea what might be wrong?

 

[Ivana331]

here are a few pictures I took, sorry about the bad quality, I only have the camera on my phone.

She's right above the blue rock

it's easier to see her in this pic

this is what I mean when I say she looks "top-heavy"

this is a front view of her, she looks really fat, though it is nearly impossible to see that in this pic.

 

[Jozlyn]

I'm no expert but I'd say she's on the way out

I had a fish die last weekend (totally different breed) but it did the exact same thing during the Saturday and must've died during the night as I found it's little body the next morning.

The fact that the area around/near her gills is red may indicate an infection of some kind.

 

[BiffMalawi]

My daughter has lost several guppies recently.

They also had one or two red spots on thier bodies and red gills, they also have lost thier tails. Does yours have any fin damage?

I did a 50% water change with lots of gravel vaccuming, rinsed the filter media in the tank water and added 1 tblsp of salt for each 5 gallons.

I don't keep guppies myself and have no experience with them. My daughter's maintenance schedule is not what it should be. I think this had led to a weakening of the fish's immune system allowing it to get infected. How are your water parameters?

 

[Ivana331]

well, she died, I found her dead body at the bottom of the tank this morning.
I live in dormitories, so I can't really clean the water very often. I have an algae eater to help me with that.
I cleaned the water this past saturday,(for the 2nd time since December) I also had another female and she died right after I cleaned out the filter!!
I think the ladies were used to their own gunk or something!! just kidding, but that is odd that they died after I cleaned the tank. The male and the four fry are doing just fine.
I moved them to my home for my spring break(last week, that is when I cleaned out the tank), and then I moved them out of their tank to clean it, then back into the tank, then they had to endure the trip back to my dorm. Do you think maybe this stressed her out since she was clearly pregnant? Would stress have killed her??

My daughter has lost several guppies recently.

They also had one or two red spots on thier bodies and red gills, they also have lost thier tails. Does yours have any fin damage?

I did a 50% water change with lots of gravel vaccuming, rinsed the filter media in the tank water and added 1 tblsp of salt for each 5 gallons.

I don't keep guppies myself and have no experience with them. My daughter's maintenance schedule is not what it should be. I think this had led to a weakening of the fish's immune system allowing it to get infected. How are your water parameters?

her fins were intact and just fine. I examined her body and the only thing I found odd was that it looked as if her anus(do fish have those?) it looked torn. So maybe she did have an infection, but i don't know why. The water has been the same since I first got them!

 

[kpintheshed]

sorry we couldn't come in time to help you

 

[BiffMalawi]

I am so sorry to hear she has died. I always find it hard when that happens.

I think your observation about the timing of the deaths was interesting. Sometimes the shock of going from dirty water to clean water can cause significant stress. Stress can weaken fish and make it difficult to fight off disease.

I don't know what kind of algae eater you have but they often add more waste than they clean. Ideally you should be changing 30-50% of tank water every week at least every two. Once a month you should rinse the fliter sponge in the bucket of tank water.

Not changing the water allows for significant waste buildup that can be deadly to fish, if the fish are able to adapt to the poor water quality then the occasional large water change and clean up can shock them. Rinsing the filter under the tap will risk the chlorine in the water killing the good bacteria that is consuming the bad chemicals.

A good maintenance schedule can significantly reduce fish losses. I have 7 tanks going and since I improved my maintenance habits (I change over 100 gallons of water a week) I have luckily not lost a fish(outside of aggression issues) in over a year.

I hope your other fish stay well.

 

[scorphonic]

From my knowledge, an algae eater is not going to keep the levels of Nitrate down...only water changes will do that. From what I have read high levels of nitrate can cause inflammation of the gills over time and eventually become so toxic that the fish die.

Have you checked your water for Ammonia, Nitrites and Nitrates recently?