BN swollen belly - HELP QUICK

[ccole]

Can you guys please help

My bn in my community tank has suddenly got a HUGE belly -
I mean HUGE - his scales are fine and so is everything else.

His eating lots of different veg, flake, pellets etc and tank peramitors are all fine.

help? dont want him to go bang!:cry:

 

[bigbird]

Hi,

Place in a quarantine tank or net and try not to feed for a day or two and then only vegies. Could be a blockage . Do you have a photo ? cheers jk :thumbup:

 

[ccole]

photo

Hi,

Place in a quarantine tank or net and try not to feed for a day or two and then only vegies. Could be a blockage . Do you have a photo ? cheers jk :thumbup:

thanks bigbird - will do straight away. I read that de-sheled pea's are good - is that right? Hope the pic helps!! ive had him such a long time
cole

 

[Rey]

My albino bn had a serious bout with this bloat issue after having ich. It can be bacterial infection or diet related. I was able to get the belly to go down. Your fish will need anti bacterial infection meds and/or shelled peas. I also used fresh garlic minced up and soaked the food in it. I also used a small amount of epsom salt added to the tank at 5ml per 40l. twuce a day 20-40% water changes .
I was told you can also do an epsom salt bath as a last resort. You should look up bristlenoseworld.com the member there gacve me great advice on how to treat this issue common to bn plecs. Inmy case almost as bad as your fish I don't think the fish ate the med food so I purried peas and soaked them in with seachem garlic guard(not sure if available in UK) its just garlic extract with vitamin c however. I dont know if that is what helped my fish recover or if it was fasting and the heavy amount of garlic(as noticed from my tank smelling like an Italian restaurant) I put in the tank with some small amount of epsom salt. peas arae a laxative as is epsom salt and I think water changes really help too. I'm a beginner but from what I understand these cases are hard to cure but it's worth a try.

 

[bigbird]

wow that is some sort of blockage alright. Shelled peas and some meds. good luck. cheers jk :thumbup:

 

[ccole]

f***- Poo and blah. Ok i'm on it. Thanks guys for your help and for the luck.

 

[D-MAC]

Try Interpet No9 Anti internal as well as the peas. It may help.

 

[ccole]

am glad you said that - i just added EXTERNAL bacteria med's, ill by some tomorrow and leaving it 24hours. thank you lots.

 

[Joby]

If you can get esha2000 its very good for internal problems like that, its been known to cure a fish when its got to the point of scales sticking out :fr:

 

[ccole]

Im soaking peas in some water and choped up garlic, will give to him in some days-i hope he makes it

 

[roydon]

Hi Buddy going throught the same problem as we speak one yesterday and now one today of my albino longfin bristle nose i was just about to seek advice changed food to a new brand of algae discs not good thrown them in bin not happy

 

[ccole]

New food

Hi buddy back to you, sorry to hear your little ones are not wel l to.totally crap . Funny you said about changing your food. . .i did the same thing to plec taps by aquairious. . Or something like that. I'm fasting all my fish that were in the tank just in case. The bo y in the photo is not eating, hop efully he knows what his doing. Anyone know if potato could cause this if he ate to much? Good luck, fingers crossed for you and yours

 

[Rey]

from what I am hearing at bristlenoseworld.com that bn and other plecs can be fed too much of a high protein diet and all the algae wafers designed for herbivores are mostly high protein and meaty they mostly have main ingredients like fishmeal or shrimp so overtime this can lead to bloat, For bn's It is better to feed mostly veggies, and maybe %10 of their diet on algae wafers depending on the individual pleco or species of plec. bn tend to be huge eaters so this happen where they can overeat(even on veggies like sweet potato). when it gets real bad meds can be needed that are safe or in proper dosage for a pleco sometimes you have to half the dose . I recently lost a snowball pleco to herbal medicine "ich attack" which is supposed to be very safe for scaleless fish.
my longfin abn had serious bloat case and had to fast her and just put in the pea/garlic mixture (don't know if she ate too much of it).And I think the small dose of epsom salt helped(not sure) and daily water changes still unsure if the diet was wrong or more than likely related to the ich my fish had just got thru. in this case look for some internal bacteria meds since it is serious. cheers and good luck!

here's the link to my post on bristlenoseworld
http://www.bristlenoseworld.com/t2618-abn-got-rid-of-ich-now-bloat

and a very informative topic on bloat disease

http://www.bristlenoseworld.com/t1592-bloat-desease

 

[Jimmy]

Rey is correct:clap: bloat in BN's is usually brought in by feeding a diet that is to high in protein. Plec tablets/wafers are ofen used as food but most are to high in protein for BN's better it's feeding Algae wafers or Spirulina wafers plus veg like, cucumber, zucchini, sweet potato and countless others.

Food that is higher in protein, like plec tabs, can be fed once a week but should never be the main part of the diet.

Peas act as a laxative and are very effective when the bloat is caught early enough. Simply cook the peas, fresh or frozen, for a couple of minutes and the when cool enough remove the outer shell and drop the inner part into the effected fish.

 

[Lornek8]

A little clarification here. It is not simply protein that is the problem, but rather animal-based protein. Many veggies are high in proteins & safe for plecs. Spirulina, in fact, is approximately 60% protein. Don't be fooled by the "veggie wafer" labeling of some foods. Read the labels & study the ingredients. If the top 5 or so ingredients are animal based than chances are the food could cause problems.

 

[ccole]

thanks for all the help, information and advice.
He is still alive and is just ending day one of his fasting. His hiding in a cave so i cant see if his belly has gone down. Have been checking out the links and they have been helpful. I will certainly study the labels from now lorne.
cheers all

 

[D-MAC]

Have you added the Interpet No9 yet?

 

[Irene0100]

sometimes a diet of peas alone will cure bloat. i only use meds of not improvement after a couple of days.
I had some l134 with bloat, i also learnt the hard way that too much algae wafer is not good. now they only get it as occasional treat, and peas are regular food most of the time. also I use spirinula mix with agar agar.

 

[Doodles]

In a previous post it said shelled peas, just to clarify that, you should only feed de-shelled peas, the shell itself could be a possible cause for bloat in plecs. You should also try and give your plecs and any other fish that eat them peas once a week. For fish that don't like peas, brine shrimp has the same effects( from what ive read) but not to be fed to veggie diet fish.
Have you seen any poop at all?

 

[ccole]

day two of fasting - he is still alive and hiding . I have de-shelled the peas and am soaking them in some shopped up garlic.

I was feeding them on cucumber,zuckeani (the better veion of a cucumber, can remember twhat its called!) carrot, potato on a rotation basis . Plec tablets once a day and flakes once a day.

Ive started him on internal bacteria med's because i want to throw as much as possible at him as he seemed so far gone. As a rule I dont normally use meds, only as a last result.

How long would you guys fast him for? I still cant get to him to see his belly... should i disturb him to look?

Thanks to all of you for helping him though this.
cole