clown knife aggressively surfacing

[onetouch2many]

so my 18" clown knife has always done this, he charges the surface of the water, grabs a breathe of air and charges back down.
he used to only do it about twice a day, but today he is doing it every 5 min or so.
He is also doing it more aggressively. Louder splash and often bashing into the tank bottom upon his return...

Im assuming it is a parameter issue, but I tested and nitrates and nitrites are at zero.
additionally, none of his tank mates are acting different than normal, other than my 16" TSN, but I think he just ate too much lol

which leaves me to another point..

I asked my gf to feed my fish while I was out of town for a day. She did, but fed them far more than I ever do. All of the food was eaten, but like I said, it was, like, triple the amount I feed. I usually feed every 2nd day.

 

[C L O W N K N I F E]

Clown knives, like all knife fish, have huge appetites...overfeeding one day will not hurt it...they will eat until their full. My guess is you don't have enough aeration

 

[onetouch2many]

i do have areation. I have a huge air pump. My setup hasn't changed at all for the last few months and this is a brand new problem.

 

[tjfish]

My first guess would be lack of aeration as well. other than that im not really sure. You could try a partial water change and see if it changes anything and if he stops doin that you can be sure its probably a parameter issue. Thats what i would try anyway.

 

[C L O W N K N I F E]

i do have areation. I have a huge air pump. My setup hasn't changed at all for the last few months and this is a brand new problem.

What size pump(s)? What size tank? ... I still think it has to do with not enough aeration ... If you don't change the filters on your air pump(s), it can cause your air pump to not reach optimum performance. Ruptured diaphragm(s) within the pump will also cause your pump to not reach optimum performance. I had a whisper 100 air pump on my 75g for the longest time and when I finally brought it in to my local pet store after wondering what was causing my air pump to not work as good as it did, I found out the filter was bad and the rubber diaphragm had torn, thus making my air pump more like a whisper 10.

 

[onetouch2many]

now that i think of it, recently I have noticed that the airpump was getting noisier... maybe its just time for a new one. I lowered my water level so the fx5 output was above the water line and he has since stopped charging the surface

 

[fwprawn]

Well, the fish would have grown (We hope!) and so use more oxygen than before. Sounds like you need a good cleaning, too.

 

[C L O W N K N I F E]

now that i think of it, recently I have noticed that the airpump was getting noisier... maybe its just time for a new one. I lowered my water level so the fx5 output was above the water line and he has since stopped charging the surface

Good to hear & ya, get that pump checked out or upgrade pumps