Please help- adult angel swimming at angle and refusing food

1. What is the size of your tank?

55 Gallon Standard

2. What are your water parameters? State the brand of test kit used.

NitrIte-0 Amonia-0 NitrAte-40 Ph-7.6 API Master Test Kit

3. Is your aquarium set up freshwater or brackish water?

Freshwater

4. How long the aquarium has been set up?

Since July 4, 2009

5. What fish do you have? How many are in your tank? How big are they? How long have you had them?

Adult mated pair Half-black velitail Angels (bought as adults)- size of palm of hand- aquired July 2009

5 Bolivian Rams- ~ 2 inches aquired ~ October 2009

6 Flame Tetras- 2 inches- aquired end of July 2009

6 Panda Corydoras- 1.5 inches- aquired ~September 2009

8 Cardinal Tetras- 2 inches- aquired ~ August 2009

4 otto catfish- ~ 1 inch- aquired February 2010

1 Albino Bristlenose Pleco ~ 3 inches- aquired ~ August 2009

a few hitchiker snails






6. Were the fish placed under quarantine period (minus the first batch from the point wherein the tank is ready to accommodate the inhabitants)?

Quarantined at LFS

7. What temperature is the tank water currently?

79F (raised from normal 76F)

8. Are there live plants in the aquarium?

yes

9. What filter are you using? State brand, maintenance routine and power capacity.

Tetra Whisper EX 90- see maint routine below

10. Any other equipment used (aside from heater and filter which are two very important components of the tank)?

No

11. Does your aquarium receive natural sunlight at any given part of the day? What is your lighting schedule (assuming you do not rely on sunlight for our viewing pleasure)?

Slight sunlight during the day, very little algae in tank. Lights on around 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Live plants keep algae down (along with otto catfish & snails)

12. When did you perform your last water change and how much water was changed? How often do you change your water? Do you vacuum the substrate?

Last waterchange Sat night- only ~10 percent so not to stress ill fish. Normally 20 percent wc is done, waterchanges every 3-4 weeks to keep nitrates at good range, change filter media monthly, only change one filter at a time, vacuum gravel during waterchange, scrub down filter every few months- do not use chlorinated water to rinse


13. What foods do you provide your fish? What is the feeding schedule?

feed 1-2 times daily, skip 1 day week. feed NLS, occasional frozen bloodworms & bbs, assorted flake food from O.S.I, algae wafers

14. What unusual signs have you observed in your fish?

Swimming diagonally (mouth upward), hanging out either by filtertop or on bottom near plant, rubbing belly only on plant, similar to spawning behavior, only swims around when lights are out, refusal to eat, abdomen possibly large? Does not stay next to female which is VERY unusual, occasionally goes to surface but not really gasping for air- appears normal as far as no visible wounds, color is same, eye color same, no visible fin damage or clamped fins
15. Have you treated your fish ahead of diagnosis? If so, what treatments did you use? State your reasons for planning ahead of proper diagnosis.

Raised temp slowly from 76F to 79F- I read this aids in many diseases as well as constipation, which I have considered


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My usual LFS is closed, I called another- they recommended quarantining and treating with clout. I hate to treat with clout without a good quess that this is something it will treat. I would really hate to lose this fish he is a beauty and the pair is very strongly bonded. He is quite large and so pretty IMO. I'll attach a pic of him normally, I don't have a pic of him since he started swimming at the odd angle.

I can't really get a pic now. Now he just lies there on his side propped up against a plant

Star_Rider said:

Hi

how long has the angel not been eating?
have you noticed it passing feces?
if so how does that look?

unfortuanatley Angels are often prone to a few parasitic infestations.. some which appear at later stages in their lives.

these range from protozoa to worms.

more common ailments are flagellated protozoa which infect the gut.
these are easily treated with metro/prazi.

If there is swelling you can look to also bacterial infection..which seem to have similar Sx to parasites.

common parasites, BTW, are camallanus and capillaria.
camallanus are sometimes visible.. I see them more often at night they may show up as thin threadlike (red) protusions..they are often related to the stomach bloating. but they are also not always visible.
if this is the case skip clout as it is largely ineffective for these.
capllaria is a tiny worm.. I have never seen bloating as a Sx with these but would not rule that out.

did you notice, prior to not eating.. if the fish ate and spat out the food? finally not eating at all?

Click to expand...

I haven't seen him pass any feces, but he could have without me seeing it.

The not eating begain Saturday night- there was no eary warning, no spitting, nothing- very out of the blue.

At times it seemed like he would try to swim up to the food but couldn't see it almost. Kind of like vertigo or something.

Could he have something neurological or something going on? He acts like a stroke patient (not being sarcastic here).

Okay. He was doing better yesterday & today. Still not eating, but swimming around again. As soon as I turned the lights on though he swam to the bottom. Leading me to believe he is stressed and trying to hide. I will buy a quarantine tank and transfer him. They gave me an herbal treatment type thing (can't remember the name) and have dosed twice (I removed the carbon), maybe that is helping?

Thanks a lot guys! I think I am going to get a divider tomorrow instead of stressing him by transferring him. Last night he tried to eat but when the other fish would come around he would go lay on the bottom so I guess he's trying to avoid being picked on. He didn't get any food.

I'm going to try the peas & garlic thing to get him eating. His little buddy is still chasing the fish away from him, but she has her work cut out for her!

I was least concerned about him not eating, I know fish can go for a while without it, what was freaking me out was the laying down on the bottom. I came thisclose to euthanizing him because I thought it was so cruel to let him lay there like that. Glad I didn't.