PumaWard
12-23-2003, 5:25 PM
I'm getting a little concerned about my smaller leleupi. He's at the bottom of the food chain (gets picked on the most), he's shimmying (sp?), and I have yet to see him eat. The shimmying is different than I have previously seen in mollies; the leleupi makes quick, jerking movements at random. His gills look very red, but I don't have much to compare to since the other leleupi has a brighter, less see through color.
He's been doing this since yesterday. I've checked my tank water at least 5 times within that period as shimmy is usually caused by poor water conditions. Nothing really to tell, Ammonia= 0, nitrite = 0, pH is ~8.3, gH is 15 degrees. I did a water change this morning just in case, about 35%. I conditioned it with the baking soda and magnesium sulfate to get it at about 16 degrees gH and about 8.2 for pH. I didn't actually measure the amounts, but they must have been close because my perameters are about the same as they were this morning.
I don't know how a dropping gH effects fish, but I have had my gH drop from 18 to 15 over night... but he was doing this before that.
The next thing that I though might be the problem was the temperature. It was at 68F, which I know is low, but the good news is my new heater came in today, so I have slowling increased temperature to 71F, and will continue to raise it until I hit about 78F.
Only two things are left that I can think of: He's shimmying because he's picked on the most. Or he has some sort of internal disease going on.
There are no outward signs of diease. The gills being red caused me to think maybe gill flukes because I don't have ammonia/nitrite in my tank to cause burns.
Some other info,
The other leleupi was shimmying a little this morning, but stopped after the water change. Both J. transcriptus are behaving fine. I am having difficulty getting them all to eat, however, the larger leleupi did eat some krill and a couple baby convicts I fed to them. I put some guppies in the tank last night to try and teach them that the pellets are food.. it worked for a little while. I also put them in there to serve as dithers so that the smaller leleupi wouldn't be picked on as much, which seems to be working.
Does anyone have any idea what might be going on and what I can do to correct it?
He's been doing this since yesterday. I've checked my tank water at least 5 times within that period as shimmy is usually caused by poor water conditions. Nothing really to tell, Ammonia= 0, nitrite = 0, pH is ~8.3, gH is 15 degrees. I did a water change this morning just in case, about 35%. I conditioned it with the baking soda and magnesium sulfate to get it at about 16 degrees gH and about 8.2 for pH. I didn't actually measure the amounts, but they must have been close because my perameters are about the same as they were this morning.
I don't know how a dropping gH effects fish, but I have had my gH drop from 18 to 15 over night... but he was doing this before that.
The next thing that I though might be the problem was the temperature. It was at 68F, which I know is low, but the good news is my new heater came in today, so I have slowling increased temperature to 71F, and will continue to raise it until I hit about 78F.
Only two things are left that I can think of: He's shimmying because he's picked on the most. Or he has some sort of internal disease going on.
There are no outward signs of diease. The gills being red caused me to think maybe gill flukes because I don't have ammonia/nitrite in my tank to cause burns.
Some other info,
The other leleupi was shimmying a little this morning, but stopped after the water change. Both J. transcriptus are behaving fine. I am having difficulty getting them all to eat, however, the larger leleupi did eat some krill and a couple baby convicts I fed to them. I put some guppies in the tank last night to try and teach them that the pellets are food.. it worked for a little while. I also put them in there to serve as dithers so that the smaller leleupi wouldn't be picked on as much, which seems to be working.
Does anyone have any idea what might be going on and what I can do to correct it?