I'm stumped!

[veegal]

My one angelfish, which has been in the tank for about 2-3 months now, has suddenly stopped eating and is isolating himself from the others in the tank. All other angelfish sharing the tank are healthy, eating and carrying on as normal. No new fish have been added recently nor has new plants been added. All the Angelfish in the tank have been together for almost 2 months now and I haven't noticed any recent fighting going on.

I religiously carry out partial water changes once a week and get the new water to around the same temp as that of the tank. All tests taken on the water have come up as being within normal ranges. I carried out a 30% water change yesterday hoping that would help, but it hasn't. I feed a very varied diet so I doubt it could be that. I'm really stumped :wondering:

I can see no visible signs of illness at all - no rapid breathing, no marks or swollen gills - nothing! :dontknow: He has been acting like this for about 3 days now. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what the problem could be?

[Henk Hugo]

Check its vent where it poops out of, any sign of worms?

[veegal]

Just went to double check - nope no signs of worms or parasite on the body. He LOOKS healthy. I tried to get a photo of him but he's hiding away and all the other angels seem to think that I want to take a photo of them :)

[veegal]

Okay, I managed to get a photo of him (not a very good one though). What I notice on the photo (probably because I can enlarge it and because of the angle he is at) but not when I look at him is that his side seems to be a little swollen - I don't think this is food, because as I said, I haven't seen him eating.....any suggestions???

[Dirk Bellstedt]

Where he is swollen is where I his swimbladder is. As a result his swimbladder may be infected. Does he have any problems in keeping himself off the gravel because of an underinflated swimabladder or is he trying to swim down because of an over inflated swimbladder?

The cause of swimbladder problems in angels and discus can be as a result of flagellate organisms. You do not need to introduce new fishes to have this problem as almost all angels carry these organisms. The flagellates only become a problem when the diet they consume is not high enough in vitamin C or when their immune system is put under pressure.

This can be treated very well with metranidazole of which you can find the treatment and dosage on the web. You also need to adjust your diet to increase vitamin C content.

Kind regards,

Dirk

[veegal]

Thanks Prof. I'll check out the dosage now :)