Popeye

@MariaS I also agree with you and I know by looking at your tanks that you keep it at a very high level. My personal opinion on it, I think the substrate caused it in your case and maybe Jwh's case as well if he's not running bare bottom. When I took apart my planted tank you wouldn't believe how dirty the substrate was. Filthy. And I kept the water pristine on that tank.

Two of my discus got and eye infection and three got a skin disease. Lucky it was sorted out quickly. The eyes was swollen and so white that you couldn't see the iris anymore. I didn't look good.

I could be wrong though. Just my logical approach to this problem as I had no issues with the bare bottom and they healed up within two weeks.

 

Hmmm...in a tank with 30+ fish running for a number of years, I have one case of pop eye, which healed perfectly....due to the substrate....rather tenuous link don't you think?

 

Yes could be. Trying to figure it out. Could have come in on our hands too. I go fishing often and are man handeling wild fish. Some quite parasite ridden. Will have to keep tabs on that. My fish got sick in the fishing season and only went fishing once few weeks ago and worked on my tanks before I went out because we were going to come home late.

 

Or maybe your husbundry is on such a good level that it took a long time for a build up of waste. The disease is mostly seen in people starting out in the hobby, same with hole in the head.

 

I think these are more opportunistic infections that could affect any fish at any given time. By keeping water & tanks clean you limit possible events, but if a fish's condition is below par for whatever reason the probability for infections increase, even with good husbandry.
I also very seldom use (or need to use) medications, I believe there is such an overuse in fish meds on farms and in the pet trade that resistance to these med's render them pretty much useless.
Antibiotics have value, but unless you are clear what organism cause the infection, and know what antibiotic the bacteria are sensitive to, you may cause more harm than good

 

Agree fully. I actually saw this fisrt hand. When I visited my brother we got fish for his daughter. They brought ich with them. He wanted to try ich medication first so we did and it did absolutely nothing, they just got worse so I told him I'm going to try my method and do waterchanges every day. It worked much better than the meds and the ich cleared up. Most of the shops tanks was blue with the meds to start off with.

I guess we will never be 100% sure. I think you nailed it with the opportunistic infection. If the immune system of a fish goes down for any reason there's problems so giving them the best care is crucial. You can't be 100% sure nothing will go wrong but at least you know very few things can go wrong and chances of recovery is pretty good like both our cases.

 

Ummmm.. substrate causing my problem... no way.
Reasons, I dont have a fully planted tank, substrate is only about 2cm. I only have anubias and fern on the wood
This substrate gets moved around by both the oscars and my little school of geos
Oscars just move it totaly to patience testing point
Geos, if you have never kept any, probably move that substrate around 3 times a day. They suck it into their mouth for any food and spit t out again
On top of this, the tank gets gravel vaced at every water change...
How can it be the substrate accumulating anything under these circumstances?

 

Yes couldn't be that then. Just trying to get to the cause and not trying to accuse anybody of anything. Don't want it to happen again that's all. So it seems that it's just down to luck then. I think it's good to debate these things as there could be answers in there somewhere. It feels that if I ask sensitive questions people think I'm pointing fingers, I'm really not.

According to your detailed post it could be a lot of things and narrowing it down would have been the next step in pinpointing the problem.

So I'm going to rule out the substate. The next thing to look at is the filter system. Is there any possibility for uneaten food to be trapped in it or is there some kind of pre filter?

eddited after some pondering: There's no water quality issues in your cases because the fish healed so it must have been a self inflicted injury. I'm putting down mine as substrate because my fish didn't heal in that tank and the substrate was miff. After moving them they healed pretty fast and I used the same filter so not that either.

 

Hey hey before the gloves come flying i agree with al that has posted. But the common issues that more than likely causes popeye is listed.

When i started many moons ago i had one kribensis that went all bonkers and had a nice pair of goggles but after that none.

Now my son had a molly with popeye and must say it qas a new addition to the tank. Went back to lfs and seen that that tank where i got it from was place under quarintine and most fish had started with fungus.

I treated the molly with some condish crystals kept it in a filtered iso tank. And he is all jolly now happy i did not flush him.

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Guys; most often people will confuse Pop Eye with Dropsy. Pop Eye can be cured, however Dropsy is an incurable disease and it's always advisable to put these fishes down sooner rather than later as they will not survive, no matter what you do!! The symptoms can appear to be similar, just check if the fish has raised scales, if so it has Dropsy. Dropsy has nothing to do with water parameters, it's just a freak fish disease which we must deal with.

 

Dropsy is caused by bad diet, bacterial or parasitic. So yes a real freak disease as you don't know what you are actually dealing with. Epson salt will help if its just a blockage but most likely be fatal if its the other causes. If dropsy causes the eyes to go its tickets.

One of my gold fish had it when n was a laaitie and died soon afterwards. It was bad diet in my case. PnP flakes day in day out nothing you can do but get the toilet ready or start digging haha.

 

I disagree, Dropsy is not from a bad diet, but comes from a type of bacteria which is present in all fishes, but only comes to bear in certain cases, it is a very mysterious disease. BTW, how do you guys put your babies down? You flush them???

 

Boelderbeestie I hardly ever feed my fish flakes. Hate the stuff I try to feed them as much different foods I can. Bloodworms, Tuberfixworms, mosquito larvae, shrimp, egg yolk, spirulina, cucumber, zucchini bread and I never scrape clean the lower back panel fom aglea growing.

 

Ocean Nutrition flakes are wonderful and I swear by them!

 

@Ladysphinx this was more than 25 years ago, that's all we had back then where I lived. Now my fish eat better than me haha.

@TrevorR I think I'm thinking of bloat not dropsy. Yes there's some excellent flakes out there.

 

@TrevorR fortunately haven't had a death in years. But I'll have to get the shovel out if that happens. Putting down, I don't think I'll have the cahoonas to do so I'll try to save them to the bitter end. If it's a broken back or something like that I'll ask a friend to put it in the freezer. I'm not very good at killing even if it's for the best.

 

@TrevorR I did some recap. It was dropsy I was think about here's the link.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fish_dropsy

 

@BoelderBeestie thanks for the link! Yes, the freezer is the answer! If you discover a fish with Dropsy, rather just put the fish in a small bucket with water from the tank and pop it into the freezer, where they will fall asleep from the cold and then pass gently away. Flushing is definitely not the humane thing to do! Flush it once it's passed, no problem!

 

@TrevorR shot. You made me study up on diseases again was starting to question myself haha. I would try epson first if it's just swollen, just incase it's a blockage.

Let me ruin dropsy for everyone muhahaha. When you see it again imagine the scales that stick up are ticks and when you stroke over it with your hand it pulls back and hisses a bit. Gril inducing isn't it hahaha.

 

It's a very nasty issue! Dropsy and Hole in the Head are my worst fears for my babies! BTW Your link does not tell the whole story.