So far so good

The Octozin course finished last week, after two days the fish were looking good – everyone was busy and seemed hungry. I tentatively tried a small amount of food and to my delight, everybody ate! It seems therefore that the treatment was successful so I have not repeated it. A few days on all the fish still seem healthy.

To recap, I after a death identified as bloat, I noticed a number of fish not eating. Initially I intended to treat only the affected fish in a hospital tank but it rapidly became apparent that I would not be able to contain all the afflicted fish in the 2ft tank I had available. I ceased feeding entirely and treated the main tank immediately, first doing a 60% water change then embarking on a 3 day course of Octozin at 4x dose. At the end of the Octozin course I did a 80% water change. After a further two days of observation I resumed feeding.

I will be changing the way I look after my fish in future: I will only feed in the evenings now when I can observe closely for an extended period. I will only feed pure spirulina flake sourced from Germany and I will keep enough medication on hand to be able to attack bloat as soon as I see it.

Octozin Day 3

Yesterday was the end of the Octozin course so I did a very large water change, approximately 60%. Still no more loses and all fish are perky and active.

Looking good so far, will be monitoring closely for the next 2 days before deciding whether to do another course of treatment or not….

Approaching adulthood

One of my juvenile Melanochromis dialeptos is changing from the juvenile colours seen here to his adult male colouration (which is midnight blue). He’s not quite there yet, and is currently a rather unattractive shade of brown:

Octozin Day 2

So far so good, no new losses incurred. The demasoni are still looking very sorry for themselves but the labidochromis freibergi is perking up and is now swimming around the tank rather than resting at the bottom. Promising signs, but by no means out of the woods yet. Final does of this treatment of octozin is now in the tank…

Octozin Day 1

Am just about to put in the Day 2 dose of octazin, so far there have been no deaths but all fish seem a little bit subdued. The labidochromis freibergi seems to be deteriorating quite badly and is sitting on the sand motionless. Quite a shame as he seemed better this morning and was swimming around. Tomorrow will see the final dose go in, fingers crossed it works but currently it seems I will incur further losses…

The survivors

Here is a pic of the Metriaclima pyrsonotos girls that are left. Fortunately I will be getting another 2/3 males and 4 more females to go with them – should make a nice breeding group!

Pyrsonotos Update

I have been asking around forums, looking for input on what may have killed my Metriaclima pyrsonotos. Unfortunately it seems likely that it was ‘bloat’ rather than bullying. Bloat is a catch all term for a issue in the digestive tract, the first symptoms are a lack or absence of appetite – the balloon like swelling doesn’t occur until much later on when its too late. There are number of potential causes but stress and an overly protein rich diet are the main ones.  Once a fish has succumbed to bloat, it can spread rapidly to other fish so I will have to be on the lookout. I have also got some Octozin to use if I need it! Fingers crossed I don’t….

Special thanks to Colin @  Natural World and Mike Whitaker for their help and advice.

Labidochromis freibergi

I recently set up a 3ft tank for my Pseudotropheus minutus as they were looking a bit sheepish in the big tank with the big fish. I also got a pair of Labidochromis freibergi. These are cute litte fish, the males are blue with diamond barring and the females are similar in silver. 

Unfortunately the male is in rather a hurry to have babies and was really giving the Mrs a hard time so hes back in the big tank for now. When the female is looking plump and ready I will repatriate him for a brief liason.

A sad day…

On Saturday morning I woke up to find my Metriaclima pyrsonotos male struggling at the surface. He seemed to be unable to swim properly and was biting at the air. More worrying still he was so immobile that I was able to catch him with my bare hands! I quickly looked over him and their appeared to be some darkening round the underside of his belly which was also a little swollen and he had a very inflamed anus. I put him in a bucket with an air stone straight away but within 30 minutes he deteriorated very badly, lost the ability to stay upright and died.

I’m not usually too bothered about loosing a fish, its part and parcel of the hobby, but this was different. It seemed such a shame for this fish from come all the way from Malawi just to keel over in my tank. He was just starting to settle into the tank, and was beginning to show excellent colour too. Unfortunately I never managed to get a decent photo of him. Here he is in a coloured down state:

And this is what he looked like when coloured up (this is pic of a wild one taken by Ad Konigs):

I think now its obvious why I was so sad to loose this fish!

It was important to work out what happened to the fish, so I examined the body….

WARNING SOME AQUARISTS MAY FIND THE FOLLOWING PICTURES DISTURBING

Melanochromis dialeptos

I have what I think is a trio of these neat little fish. They closely resememble Melanochromis auratus but very much smaller and dont have the attitude problem.

I say I think I have a trio as the dominant male is starting to take on his adult colours and is fighting with the larger of the two female looking fish. Its possible that the fish he is fighting with is also a subdominant male. Next time I drain the tank I guess I will have to take it out and vent to know for sure.

Here is a picture of a juvenile taken a few weeks ago: