My dearly-loved lungfish passed away unexpectedly yesterday after an acute illness. She was 28" and about 9-10 years old. I got her as a 8" baby noodle, managed to keep her through moving six different times into different rental units in a difficult housing market (including moving her and her 100 gallon tank in with a friend 3 hrs away to fishysit her for a couple of months when I was in a temporary room), nursed her through lateral line disease and a few power failures that made her biofilter crash, and nearly lost end of my ring finger when I wasn't being careful cleaning her tank that one time. I got a lot of help throughout the years with her from this forum, and I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who has contributed to this knowledge base, been a supportive part of this community, and put up with my stupid questions. I miss her and I figured you folks would understand that better than the normal people in my life.
I don't know exactly what happened. She had been slowing down for a few months, and the tank did have a nitrate spike (80ppm) but she'd definitely survived worse during power outages, and the zillions of fancy guppies in the tank are all fine. I'm going to finish out the antimicrobial/antifungal treatment course on the tank just in case (kanaplex, furan-2, metroplex). I was trying those as a hail Mary, but she went from fine, to gasping, to ramming the sides and lid of the tank until she injured herself within the space of a couple of hours, and died shortly after exhausting herself completely. She had previously attempted to jump out of the tank a few times in the past, when nitrates got too high or there was a high level of ammonia after a biofilter crash, but this behavior was much more agitated and it was like she couldn't stop. She was acting like a 5lb weatherloach, and did not stop after water changes and the addition of Prime. The other parameters were trace ammonia, 0 nitrite, and pH 6.6, and her tank had two of the largest-size Eheim Classic canister filters running. It happened a couple of days after I did one of her regular (every 2-ish weeks) 50% water changes. No recent changes in feeding (rotation of sinking carnivore and algae pellets, like hikari cichlid, massivore, and NLS). I did add 3 guppies from a trusted source a week prior. She did have a few lesions like bruises or possibly septicemia, a missing scale that may have had fungus, and a red swollen vent. All of these appeared very acutely. I followed the dosing protocol for columnaris/septicemia (nitrofuran and kanamycin) because of the lesions, but she died very soon after. I did not perform a gross necropsy. If anyone has any ideas, I'm open to hearing them.
I don't know exactly what happened. She had been slowing down for a few months, and the tank did have a nitrate spike (80ppm) but she'd definitely survived worse during power outages, and the zillions of fancy guppies in the tank are all fine. I'm going to finish out the antimicrobial/antifungal treatment course on the tank just in case (kanaplex, furan-2, metroplex). I was trying those as a hail Mary, but she went from fine, to gasping, to ramming the sides and lid of the tank until she injured herself within the space of a couple of hours, and died shortly after exhausting herself completely. She had previously attempted to jump out of the tank a few times in the past, when nitrates got too high or there was a high level of ammonia after a biofilter crash, but this behavior was much more agitated and it was like she couldn't stop. She was acting like a 5lb weatherloach, and did not stop after water changes and the addition of Prime. The other parameters were trace ammonia, 0 nitrite, and pH 6.6, and her tank had two of the largest-size Eheim Classic canister filters running. It happened a couple of days after I did one of her regular (every 2-ish weeks) 50% water changes. No recent changes in feeding (rotation of sinking carnivore and algae pellets, like hikari cichlid, massivore, and NLS). I did add 3 guppies from a trusted source a week prior. She did have a few lesions like bruises or possibly septicemia, a missing scale that may have had fungus, and a red swollen vent. All of these appeared very acutely. I followed the dosing protocol for columnaris/septicemia (nitrofuran and kanamycin) because of the lesions, but she died very soon after. I did not perform a gross necropsy. If anyone has any ideas, I'm open to hearing them.
