One of my male guppies has gone floppy. He is swimming mostly on his side and flopping over. He is flopping all over the tank.

Does anyone know what this is, or if anything can be done? I'm guessing he will be dead by morning but I guess it can't hurt to ask.

Absolutely no idea Melanie but it doesn't sound good. Here's hoping it isn't catching!

I did a google and it sounds like an air bladder thing.

He's still flopping about. I don't know what to do with him.

One of my male guppies has gone floppy. He is swimming mostly on his side and flopping over. He is flopping all over the tank.

Does anyone know what this is, or if anything can be done? I'm guessing he will be dead by morning but I guess it can't hurt to ask.

I am sorry to break the bad news, but the symptoms experienced by your fish are typical of swim bladder disease. When a fish has this, it looses control of its buoyancy. Unfortunately there isn't really a lot you can do to help a fish with this condition.

I have lost one fish in the past who had this condition.

Doing a quite look on the internet I found a couple of possible remedies:

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* Feed your fish a couple of peas. That's right, peas. Just get some frozen peas, thaw them, and feed them to your fish. A professor of fish medicine at N.C. State College of Veterinary Medicine has done this in several cases with very good results. He thinks that the peas somehow encourage destruction of the impaction. No hard scientific data yet, but it's worth a try.

* Fast your fish for a couple of days. Withhold all food for three or four days, and sometimes this alone will break up the impaction and return things to normal. Most fish can go a week to ten days without food and be just fine.

For prevention, heres a couple of tips:

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What can I do to prevent swim bladder disease?

As always, the golden rule of fish disease is WATER QUALITY. If swim bladder disease does have an infectious cause, your fish will be better able to resist this infection (and others) if your water quality is good. Regular water changes and water testing are a must.

Pre-soak your flake or pelleted food. This will allow expansion to occur prior to the fish eating it, and will lessen the chance of impaction.

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Perhaps it might just be worth trying something as mentioned above. I hope you have sucess in your treatment of this fish's ailment.

Kind Regards,

Matthew

P.S. Have a look at this google search I did on swim bladder disease:

http://www.google.co.nz/search?hl=en&q=goldfish+swim+bladder&meta=

If he makes it through another night, I will try to give him peas.

I am working on the water quality issue. My filter was pretty clogged up but seems to be back in commission now.

I really can't isolate him to force him to not eat; I only have two tanks and don't want to endanger the fry tank by putting a sick fish in.

Melanie...how's your fishy doing????

No change. I treated with a pea, but I don't think he is going to make it at this rate; he hasn't shown any improvement.

He's got some of his buoyancy back after two days of pea treatment. I'm still not optimistic, but am continuing the treatment.

He does seem better every day.

However he tires quickly and then starts swimming on his side or back again.

Does anyone know if complete recovery is possible?

Sometimes and sometimes not depending on how much internal damage was done. Time will tell and he will probably be prone to similar problems the rest of his life if he survives.

Well, he is now upright most of the time and back to chasing the females around. He is a bit wobbly but mostly fine.

That's one vote of confidence for the pea treatment, ladies and gentlemen.

Great news Melanie

Don't remember if you posted already :oops: :oops: how many fishies do you have and what kind???

12 adult guppies, 50+ babies.

a cory

two minnows

six tetra

Are these all in the same tank...just wondering about the peas...so far I've only fed them to my goldfish.

The baby guppies are in a separate tank from everything else.

And I didn't put the peas into the bigger tank, I captured the floppy fish in a pitcher of water and let him eat as much as he could before putting him back in with his tankmates.

Oh...he's own private "restaurant" :lol:

So...how did you do this...take him out of tank once a day, give him peas...then put him back in?

let him eat as much as he could

How did you determine that...I thought all fish would pretty much just keep eating and eating... :roll: :-? :roll: :-?

I put him into the pitcher with the squashed up peas in it. He wasn't feeling too well so he didn't eat much and eventually went back to flopping on his side, so I figured that was enough.

He is still not his old self; he occasionally gets tired and tips onto his side. But he is nowhere near as bad off as he was, and is upright most of the time, eating well, and able to swim about the tank.