I have a 25cm arowana in 840l tank for about 3 months. She has been growing fast, eating crickets and then fish fillet since she got bigger . She has been in perfect condition since I got her until about 1 week ago...
First I noticed she is more stressed/afraid than usual. Not as likely to eat when someone is around.
Then 3 days ago she had some sort of accident with the only tankmate in that aquarium - a 18 cm stingray. I didn't see exactly what happened, but I heard a loud splash and saw arowana swimming a bit out of control (but not in panic). It looked as if she has hit aquarium with head and was dizzy. At some point I figured she might have been stung by stingray, but there are no wounds on arowana. My best guess is that she got startled when stingray made a trip to the surface for moment. After about 5 minutes arowana had control back. She eats crickets normally next day after this.
But since that "accicent" her condition gets slowly worse. Initially this looked like psychological problem, (arowanas get scared sometimes after all). She would spend a lot of time near corner of the aquarium, forcing the aquarium wall as if she wanted to escape. At that point I failed to interpret that her head is tilted a bit down and tail seems to float up to the surface. It was really small at that point, about 3-5 degrees.
Then she stopped eating (no interest in food) and became more afraid of me and the stringray than any time before. So I started making sure she has a place to hide, feel safe. I re-arranged some decoration, so she could have a place to hide, near the surface where stingray cannot really reach. I turned off most of lights. After one day she liked this new place, still a bit frightened of me, but obviously she preferred to stay there now, instead of escaping aquarium.
Same day in the evening, I noticed that now her tail sometimes gets above water level. She had some trouble stabilizing horizontally. At that point I realized that she is definitely sick. Few sources (including this forum) suggested that these might be symptoms of bacterial infection. However knowing that this could be swim bladder problem due to digestive issues, I started with short 15 minute bath in Epson salt. I looked at her during the entire bath, I noticed 3 bubles comming out her anus (yes, farts I guess). I thought, this is good, problem will be over soon.
To my surprise, when I put her back to main aquarium, she could not stabilize at all any more. She started swimming really fast, because this was the only way to keep straight. Otherwise she would be on one side.
I decided it's time to help her stabilize. I created hospital tank with low water level (10cm), so now she can swim, pressing on the bottom of the tank with floating tail near the surface.
She was in very poor condition after moving her to separate tank, she would spent 50% of time floating on one side. It looked she will not make it through the night. Since I suspect internal bacterial infection I gave her the only anti-septic cures that I had at hand - ZOOSEPT-S (google it, I can't post links yet) and then one dose of Tetracyclin . After 10 hours, now she is in stable-ish condition (not getting worse), swimming with floating tail and belly on the bottom of the tank.
Over the night I found that it's best to use a broad-spectrum antibiotic, since we cannot know really what kind of bacteria this is. But we can speculate that gram negative is most probable. So this kind of infection might be addressed by "Sulfas". In the evening today I plan to start treatment with sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim and continue for at least 5 days, this should help with many gram negative, most aerobic and some anaerobic. If this does not work, I plan to switch to Metronidazol+Neomycin to cover gram positive.
By now I have changed 90% of water in hospital tank with fresh tap water (good quality, same water I used for years in my aquariums) to eliminate environmental problems - in case all this is caused by poor water in the big tank somehow.
My big favor to you is to tell what you think is the best to do here and correct me if I am wrong anywhere above. Especially if you have seen these symptoms before or cured anything like it. This fish has been so strong and healthy since I got her, I really hope to cure her.
First I noticed she is more stressed/afraid than usual. Not as likely to eat when someone is around.
Then 3 days ago she had some sort of accident with the only tankmate in that aquarium - a 18 cm stingray. I didn't see exactly what happened, but I heard a loud splash and saw arowana swimming a bit out of control (but not in panic). It looked as if she has hit aquarium with head and was dizzy. At some point I figured she might have been stung by stingray, but there are no wounds on arowana. My best guess is that she got startled when stingray made a trip to the surface for moment. After about 5 minutes arowana had control back. She eats crickets normally next day after this.
But since that "accicent" her condition gets slowly worse. Initially this looked like psychological problem, (arowanas get scared sometimes after all). She would spend a lot of time near corner of the aquarium, forcing the aquarium wall as if she wanted to escape. At that point I failed to interpret that her head is tilted a bit down and tail seems to float up to the surface. It was really small at that point, about 3-5 degrees.
Then she stopped eating (no interest in food) and became more afraid of me and the stringray than any time before. So I started making sure she has a place to hide, feel safe. I re-arranged some decoration, so she could have a place to hide, near the surface where stingray cannot really reach. I turned off most of lights. After one day she liked this new place, still a bit frightened of me, but obviously she preferred to stay there now, instead of escaping aquarium.
Same day in the evening, I noticed that now her tail sometimes gets above water level. She had some trouble stabilizing horizontally. At that point I realized that she is definitely sick. Few sources (including this forum) suggested that these might be symptoms of bacterial infection. However knowing that this could be swim bladder problem due to digestive issues, I started with short 15 minute bath in Epson salt. I looked at her during the entire bath, I noticed 3 bubles comming out her anus (yes, farts I guess). I thought, this is good, problem will be over soon.
To my surprise, when I put her back to main aquarium, she could not stabilize at all any more. She started swimming really fast, because this was the only way to keep straight. Otherwise she would be on one side.
I decided it's time to help her stabilize. I created hospital tank with low water level (10cm), so now she can swim, pressing on the bottom of the tank with floating tail near the surface.
She was in very poor condition after moving her to separate tank, she would spent 50% of time floating on one side. It looked she will not make it through the night. Since I suspect internal bacterial infection I gave her the only anti-septic cures that I had at hand - ZOOSEPT-S (google it, I can't post links yet) and then one dose of Tetracyclin . After 10 hours, now she is in stable-ish condition (not getting worse), swimming with floating tail and belly on the bottom of the tank.
Over the night I found that it's best to use a broad-spectrum antibiotic, since we cannot know really what kind of bacteria this is. But we can speculate that gram negative is most probable. So this kind of infection might be addressed by "Sulfas". In the evening today I plan to start treatment with sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim and continue for at least 5 days, this should help with many gram negative, most aerobic and some anaerobic. If this does not work, I plan to switch to Metronidazol+Neomycin to cover gram positive.
By now I have changed 90% of water in hospital tank with fresh tap water (good quality, same water I used for years in my aquariums) to eliminate environmental problems - in case all this is caused by poor water in the big tank somehow.
My big favor to you is to tell what you think is the best to do here and correct me if I am wrong anywhere above. Especially if you have seen these symptoms before or cured anything like it. This fish has been so strong and healthy since I got her, I really hope to cure her.
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If possible can you post a pic so members could help analyze what happened to Aro. Imo it sounds like Aro sustained an injury from hitting the aquarium.
