View Full Version : Convict with food stuck in it's mouth???
Jayhawk
04-24-2003, 7:45 PM
I have a bizarre situation I've never seen in 20+ years of fishkeeping...
My female convict stuffed a large hunk of shrimp pellet in her mouth. She swiped it from right in front of the male, but it's too big for her to chew or swallow. While I'm proud of her initiative and gusto, I'm not sure if I should try to help her or just let it disolve with time. It looks like she's pouting because the food is inside her lips which pushes them out and forward. It's been there over an hour now.
What do you all think? :confused: Anyone else ever seen anything like this?
Thanks,
Eric
Ide give her another hour or two then after that if its still there I would try catching her and try pulling some of it out. You dont want the food to rot in her mouth that would be bad news.
ScottoMacD
04-24-2003, 9:06 PM
Leave it.
She will get through it fine. It would take a couple of days before the food started to rot.
What would be more troublesome is that if you try to remove the food and dislocate her jaw.
If that happens and she can't put it back into place she's dead.
I have had a couple of fish die because of dislocations. It isn't pretty.
The food will soften on it's own and she will spit it out. As long as she can breath it won't be a problem.
Jayhawk
04-24-2003, 9:14 PM
She's not having any problems, she's acting totally normal, but she looks stupid and appears irked she can't graze for food like she is use to.
I think I'll wait because I don't want to hurt her jaw, but I'll probably only wait until tomorrow night.
Thanks all!
was it a dry pellet or frozen cube???
Jayhawk
04-24-2003, 10:21 PM
It was a dry pellet, and I'm hoping it will soften up by tomorrow. We're up to hour 4 now, the pellet has not swollen up and gotten larger (which was one worry), and it may be slightly smaller...but again I could just be being hopeful.
Since she is able to breath and all, I know fish can survive a week or two with no food easily, so I'm not worried about starvation. I'm just hoping her jaw isn't damaged already.
K_S_W_I_S_S
04-25-2003, 12:41 AM
i think she will be ok... once my oscar ate a crawdad and had it stuck in his mouth for a while, but he got it down... if it looks like she is gasping she is probably grinding it down with the "teethlike" things in her gills.. (dont all fish have those?)
Jayhawk
04-25-2003, 6:18 AM
Shoot, I didn't see you rmessage until this morning. Last night she was flaring her gills, and I interpreted this to be a problem. I netted her, and was able to pick apart the piece of food with a toothpick until it was small enough that she ate the rest. It took several tries, but I never touched her jaws and she looks OK this morning (not that she wants me to see her - she remembers the mean man who took her out of the water and picked in her mouth).
Anyway, alls well. I'm going to go feed them flake food this morning to make sure her jaw not only looks OK but that it works, too.