Fin Damage

[Matto]

One of my female fighters jumped into the other divider in my tank and has ripped my males fins off quite badly is there anything I can do for him to help the healing process or will he die ?

[pink_fish]

Luckily fighters are pretty resilient fish – he should be okay given time. Put in some 'Stress Coat' and some 'Tonic' (mostly contains methylene blue, so anything containing a bit of this will do) - follow the directions on the bottles. Keep him alone in a quiet (not too much water flow) tank. And keep us posted on how he does!

[Adrienne]

Make sure you keep the tank clean. You can medicate although I tend to avoid it unless it is necessary. They will grow back and he's probably going to be fine as long as she didn't attack his body itself too badly. They may not grow back to be as beautiful as they once were or the same colour but hopefully in a couple of months you won't know it happened. You will notice the fins repairing slowly, they will come through a translucent white colour to start with but should colour back up eventually depending on the amount of damage done.

[Jaide]

. They will grow back and he's probably going to be fine as long as she didn't attack his body itself too badly. They may not grow back to be as beautiful as they once were or the same colour but hopefully in a couple of months you won't know it happened. You will notice the fins repairing slowly, they will come through a translucent white colour to start with but should colour back up eventually depending on the amount of damage done.

How long does this take? My VT boy developed fin and tail rot and his fin/tail are still stumpy yet he's perfectly healthy now - this was at the end of October.

[Adrienne]

I would think that if they haven't started to repair by now then they are not going to.

[Jaide]

So he'll now have short fins and tail? Oh no!

[Adrienne]

have they not grown at all then?

[Jaide]

a little bit, but not the lovely long flowing tail of before - it's about half the length it was.