Nigelfish
09-19-2007, 2:52 PM
Hi - can anyone help me please? I have a 6 inch Sarasa Comet who lives in my 60 gallon patio pond along with 3 of his buddies plus some goldfish and orfes. Recently he has moped about and not been feeding but now he is blowing up like a balloon; he is so fat that his scales have separated and stick out at a 45 degree angle from his body.
What is causing this and how can I treat it?
Thanks
Nigelfish
jtburf
09-19-2007, 4:51 PM
can you get a pic and water conditions, it sounds like dropsy which is a quick disease and has very many causes.
wataugachicken
09-20-2007, 11:56 AM
it sounds exactly like dropsy (pinecone scales). causes are bad water, bacterial infection, stunting, genetic predisposition, or old age. dropsy (edema) is caused by kidney failure, which means that the fish's body stops filtering and removing excess fluid from the body, so the fish swells up from all the fluid trapped inside of it. usually when the disease has gone on this far it is very difficult to treat, especially since there is a variety of causes. you may want to try mixing a few tablespoons of epsom salts into a bucket of the pond water, and putting the fish in there for 20-30 minutes at a time. it may help to pull fluid from the body. i am not sure of the exact doage though, you could ask that in the general freshwater section.