Please I hope someone can give me advice on how to weave my nearly 2 foot arapaima! :(

[Landonious]

he is just swimming very slow, near the top. Before when he transferred to this new tank months ago, he jumped out of the tank. Very active and alert. Hangs out with my platinum alligator gar. Now he just swims very slowly, I can even touch him and he won't dart away. Won't eat for 5 days now. Water nitrate is okay, temperature was 85 but he's been fine on that for months. He eats exclusively silversides and now he won't eat it, if someone can help me that would be super. here is a video of the poor guy. Reaching out to all the arapaima guys and gals out there, pls help!

 

[Deadliestviper7]

Have you tried feeding live foods? Sometimes sick fish will only eat live

 

[TwoHedWlf]

Is he covered in white fungussy spots or is that bubbles in the water?

 

[Landonious]

Yeah that is like this oily risidue from all the silversides i feed them. its interesting that whole fishes have all this fatty stuff on them, and fillets are more clean. i haven't tried live food yet cause....


my wife woke me up this morning and the poor guy was floating on the water, he RIP. In 5 month he went from 5" to almost 2 feet. He was the runt of the litter. I had another arapaima that had better genetics, he was the boss and ate more, he grew to 2 and half feet before he jumped out the tank to his death

I don't know what killed him, no disease at all. thats the strange part. i checked the pH, its at 6.0 so maybe too acidic? its the only reason i can give as I constantly watch nitrate lvls and do water changes per week at greater than 50%. Tank is 450 gallons with 2 Fx6 filters

 

[TwoHedWlf]

I don't know what killed him, no disease at all. thats the strange part.

That's probably not true. It's safe to say that, with the exception of injury, fish don't just die without having some kind of disease. They're susceptible to basically the same kind of things that kill humans, strokes, heart attacks, organ failure etc we just don't usually have the tools and knowledge available to identify the cause if there aren't any really blatant signs.

You could do a necropsy on him(Which I'd encourage), that would be interesting, but without a good idea of what normal looks it's unlikely you'd find even obvious issues.

 

[Deadliestviper7]

Some fish just aren't healthy,like some humans.
Sorry for your loss.

 

[Landonious]

Thanks man. Yeah I'm just getting into this amazing aquarium hobby and we live and learn. As long as my 2 lil boys are healthy and safe, thats all that matters. Luckily, arapaimas are amazing fast growing fishes, so getting another one or two to 2 feet won't be hard. Live for the journey and learn from the mistakes

 

[Deadliestviper7]

Thanks man. Yeah I'm just getting into this amazing aquarium hobby and we live and learn. As long as my 2 lil boys are healthy and safe, thats all that matters. Luckily, arapaimas are amazing fast growing fishes, so getting another one or two to 2 feet won't be hard. Live for the journey and learn from the mistakes

So are you building a bigger pond yet?

 

[Landonious]

I will have a 7500 gallon tank with 15,000 gph flow that is above ground with large arcrylic windows soon, in 4 weeks. everything is go go!

 

[TwoHedWlf]

Thanks man. Yeah I'm just getting into this amazing aquarium hobby

I will have a 7500 gallon tank with 15,000 gph flow that is above ground with large arcrylic windows soon, in 4 weeks. everything is go go!

Well, usually I'd suggest maybe you should get the hang of a moderate sized tank. But sounds like you went straight to swimming pool...