Need Some Advice, Not Sure What To Do

[TMDragon]

So just last Thursday night, around midnight, I noticed my 10'' oscar pretty stressed out and leaning against its favorite rock. This is its normal spot, between a large rock and the back of the tank, but it normally hovers right above the gravel. Now it's leaning against the rock and sitting on the floor. I also noticed that a few of its scales were missing, like it rubbed up against the rock, so I figured it got carried away playing and accidentally hurt itself again, it's not the first time my oscar has decided to move and bash a rock so I didn't think much of it till the next morning.

My oscar is normally the first one to the front of the tank, begging for food, but that morning, only my arowana swam up to the front. So I looked through the side of the tank to find it still laying in the same spot. What was more odd was that when I got closer to check on it, it suddenly flared its gills and tried to attack me 2 or 3 times through the glass before laying back down. Since I've gotten it, it has never flared or charged like that before. Anyway, I turned on the lights and went ahead and fed the tank. That's when I knew something was seriously wrong, the oscar didn't eat. Right after I turned on the lights though, it suddenly swam up to the top of the tank and started to attack the back glass panel so I'm assuming it saw it's reflection so I turned off the lights and the oscar went back down and just continued to lay there.

2 possible causes immediately came to my mind, my water parameters and aggression with my silver arowana. So I tested my water with my API liquid test kit and the readings were normal. Ammonia:0 Nitrite:0 Nitrate:15. I ruled out the possibility that there was something wrong with my water because arowanas are much more sensitive to water conditions than oscars yet my arowana is fine. It's appetite and activity is the same. I also ruled out the possibility that there was aggression between the arowana and the oscar because my arowana is a big chicken, it gets startled by the smallest things, and I know for a fact that it is afraid of the oscar. Normally if the oscar is swimming, the arowana would get out of it's way as quickly as it could. The arowana would be the one losing the fight, not the oscar. Not to mention, the fins on both fish are perfect, no rips or tears. They eat together and get along great, but know how to stay out of each other's way.

I decided to give it a day and see how things turned out before I intervened. The oscar didn't get any better so this morning, I decided to do a large water change just in case that my water might have been the cause despite my parameters. When I removed the rocks, the oscar started to freak out and started spinning around in a tight circle, like it was trying to bite it's own tail. When I looked closer though, I noticed it opens and snaps its mouth on the glass at the back of the tank as well as whipping it with its tail as it spun. It dawned on me that this is what it must have been doing when it hurt itself. It was probably attacking its reflection. Its favorite rock is about 5 inches away from the glass and my oscar is very large so it probably scratched itself on the rock as it was spinning. I was right, when I put his rock back it randomly started attacking its reflection by spinning and kept smacking the rock unintentionally with the side of its body towards the tail. So I decided to remove the rock to prevent the oscar from hurting itself any further.

I should also probably mention that the fish are currently in a 90 gallon tank with no other tankmates and though my arowana will be going in a 8' x 2.5' x 2' tank next month, this 90 will be my oscars permanent home. I've also had the oscar for a little over a year, but I didn't put it in the 90 until late December or early January. I think it's strange that my oscar has been in the tank, decor unchanged, for about 8 months yet it just noticed its refelction...

It's still extremely stressed (turns a very light gray when stressed) and is currently sitting on the gravel, right next to the back wall of the tank. I don't know how I'm going to prevent it from seeing its reflection without removing the black background altogether. So anyone have any ideas on how I should approach this?

Also, attacking it's reflection is what I believe it's doing, but I'm not sure if there's an underlying problem beneath this so if there are any other possible diagnoses I would like to hear them.

Sorry for the super long post, but I didn't want to leave out any details. Thanks in advance.

 

[jm1212]

keep up with the water changes. very clean water will help him recover.

there is a chance that he hurt himself on the rock, any other decor, or any equipment in the tank. shying away from you and lashing out when you get close is what alot of animals do if they are hurt...they tend to be more aggressive so other fish will not see their weakness.

 

[TMDragon]

keep up with the water changes. very clean water will help him recover.

there is a chance that he hurt himself on the rock, any other decor, or any equipment in the tank. shying away from you and lashing out when you get close is what alot of animals do if they are hurt...they tend to be more aggressive so other fish will not see their weakness.

Thanks for the reply. I will be doing frequent water changes, but I'm not so much as worried about its recovery as I am about finding the cause of all of this. I removed all rocks and there are only plastic plants left to make sure it can't hurt himself until I can figure out what to do. I might have to remove the background if it continues, but I would like to avoid it as my tank is in the corner of the room with a lot of stuff hanging on the wall above it so it's a pain to put the background picture back on.

 

[JasonR]

Is your black background matte or shiny? If its shiny, you could try a piece of construction paper or black presentation board from a craft store to cut down on the reflection.

Also, could you move the rock out a bit and put a big plant right by the glass?

 

[TMDragon]

Is your black background matte or shiny? If its shiny, you could try a piece of construction paper or black presentation board from a craft store to cut down on the reflection.

Also, could you move the rock out a bit and put a big plant right by the glass?

It's pretty glossy, I was also thinking about replacing the background with something, but I wasn't sure what. The presentation board sounds like a great idea though because if I'm not mistaken they have ones that are made out of foam in between and that would be great as it wouldn't soak up water. Thanks for the suggestion.

I'm also going to try putting my plants up against the glass, I don't have too many, but hopefully its enough to cover the space it swims around.

I've been keeping an eye on the oscar and when all the lights in the room went out, it started to come up towards the middle of the tank and swim around, hopefully this continues tomorrow when the sun comes up to light the room.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[aquarob]

Melafix works really well for minor skin damage or torn fins. As far as toning down his aggression, well, there isn't much you can do if he is attacking his own reflection. Frankly, I had a betta that did that and ended up beating his own skull in on the glass. Darwinism at it's finest. Stupid fish. :grinyes:

 

[TMDragon]

Melafix works really well for minor skin damage or torn fins. As far as toning down his aggression, well, there isn't much you can do if he is attacking his own reflection. Frankly, I had a betta that did that and ended up beating his own skull in on the glass. Darwinism at it's finest. Stupid fish. :grinyes:

Lol, the oscar has done some serious damage to itself over the last year or so. One time it, decided to follow the arowana for the day, and they ended up sort of racing, but when it turned around to do another lap it sped into a rock and split its forehead open. Its a tough fish, right afterwords it continued like nothing happend and the cut went away on its own after a 2 weeks or so. Unfortunately, this time I have to try and figure something out as the Oscar no longer swims around during the day. It even refuses to eat so if I don't do something soon, I'm afraid it will stress itself to death. I would hate to lose this fish, especially to something so rediculous. I've had it since it was a 2 inch pup.

 

[Rbishop]

Weird. Can't think of anything else for you to do. I have an Oscar that likes to float on its side at the surface. Go figure.

 

[TMDragon]

So I was laying in bed, with the Oscar still on my mind, hoping that this problem will be resolved soon when I remembered that I have a packet of 15 white matte posterboards somewhere in my garage. So I went searching and found them.

My background picture for the tank is taped completely across the top to the plastic trimming of the of tank to prevent water from dripping in between it and the tank. The bottom is taped in a few places to the bottom trimming of the tank and the sides are untaped leaving about an eighth of an inch gap between the picture and the actual glass (This may have very well been the cause of the reflection..though there was no problem before).

So I cut the posterboard to fit the back glass panel and slid it in between my tank and the background picture. It covers about 70% of the tank and the oscars side of the tank is completely white now with no possible reflection from the background picture. I immediately noticed that my oscar darkened up a bit, though it is still not completely back to his normal coloring.

Hopefully this will help give me some solid answers and confirm my suspicion that the oscar was stressed out by its reflection. It's still dark in my house as its only 6 am so I can't be too sure till later in the day when its brighter. If all goes well I can simply buy some black posterboard for a few cents and slide it in between the background picture and the tank like I did with the white one. Quick easy fix and I wouldn't have to move or change anything. Wish me luck.

 

[excuzzzeme]

When my O gets bored he occasionally attacks his reflection in the back glass also. I have been thinking about adding more tankmates to aid in distraction. Yes, mine too gets stressed easily.