Yes, fish are very VERY resilient and can recover from things we'd never imagine. Agree, don't jump the gunAs it is I don't think he will be able to eat. If it swells down he may live no problem. I mean that you have the ability to reserve your decision. If you starved this fish for a month he would not die, so you have time to see if he can recover. I only euthenize fish when I am confident that there quality of life has hit the ****ter. Fish live happily with a missing eye, a missing fin and can regenerate better than any terrestrial creature I know of. If the fish continue to have the droopy mouth and can't eat for a week, this thread becomes highly relevant.
Try adding stress coat and 1 Tablespoon of tablesalt per 5 gallons of water, it will help him be more comfortable in the meantime, relieve stress, promote healing, fight infection, bacteria, etc.well right now it looks like he's trying to eat but i can't tell how successful it is. he does swim around a lot. lip is turning darker reddish, almost like a bruise. doesn't look like he's moving around in pain so i guess the big thing to watch for is eating/starvation
he's swimming around still, tries digging in the sand every once in a while, sticking his nose/lips/now i guess its like a trunk. can't tell if he's looking for food. no sunken stomach at this point but no change in the lip. i've been sticking to my normal 30% every other day water changes and add aquarium salt with the water changes.Yes, fish are very VERY resilient and can recover from things we'd never imagine. Agree, don't jump the gun
Try adding stress coat and 1 Tablespoon of tablesalt per 5 gallons of water, it will help him be more comfortable in the meantime, relieve stress, promote healing, fight infection, bacteria, etc.
good advice.....i'll have to hold on to this one for myselfIf you are concerned as to it eating you can always force feed. I dealt with a fish with 'duck lips' and it could not eat so I went to a local pharmacy and got a baby medicine syringe and attached a small piece of silicone airline tubing to it. I would make a mix of foo/medicine and force feed it. Brought it back from the brink. Anyway here is what it looks like.
An option to consider is to sedate the fish and manually pop the jaw back in place. Some people use a light dose of clove oil to put a fish to sleep and operate but thats not a great way since clove oil basically stops the breathing process altogether. You could get MS-22 or Tricaine Methanesulfonate which puts the fish to sleep but it still is breathing and then try the pop the mouth in place. just an idea.