Seriously considering euthanizing my Flowerhorn

[TheBee]

Our FH is sick. He had signs of hex maybe 5 months back (not eating and white stringy poop) so I gave him metro. It seemed to work because he started eating again and his head grew. That was short lived because for the last few months he has been losing weight and we have been trying different means to help him. It feels like a losing battle.

Here's where we're at: He is interested in food but after some chewing will spit out the pellets. Flake food comes out his gills. He stares at the surface of the water or sits uninterested at the bottom most of the time. We have tried to gently force feed him with a small dropper (metro & food paste) but I swear he has a blockage because we cannot get it into his stomach. We tried several different times... you can hear the dropper hitting something but no matter the angle, it won't go in. Don't know what the water ph etc levels are currently but were normal last time we checked. Water changes are regular. Water temp was 84 but I think we need a bigger heater because the NEW 55 gal one is only maintaining about 81 degrees. I was trying to bump it up to 88. We introduced algae wafers and different flakes with more veggie/less protein per the suggestion of a FH fish store... he's not all that interested. Added aquarium salt 2 days ago (per some other "qualified" persons suggestion) - 1 rounded Tbp per 5 Gal, and his tank is 55 gal. Maybe he doesn't like it, because today he isn't even interested in eating and his head looks even more sunk in, which is hard to imagine. I feel so sorry for him and wish I could help him but don't know what to give him.

Assuming I can figure out what he even has, how can I treat him with medicine if he's not eating and I can't administer with a dropper? At what point do I just euthanize?

Here's some pics.. sorry they're a little fuzzy. There aren't holes in his head, he just has NO hump left and so there are indentions now.

 

[TheBee]

One thing I forgot to mention: whether wrong or right, we have fed him guppies. He loves them, well.. right at this moment he doesn't, but he did love them. Do you think it's possible he has got a bone stuck somewhere and now food just won't go down? He sometimes does this weird chewing-type motion when he's not eating.. I always wondered if maybe he was trying to dislodge something stuck. I just don't know. Maybe he got some internal parasite from the guppies?

 

[Dr_Shakalu]

Wow, that's one really sick flowerhorn. I don't know if that is wasting disease. I think General Cure is used to treat wasting disease but your fish looks too far gone to recover. I've never seen a kok so deflated and look so bad. I'm surprised that it's still alive. Also, did you quarantine the guppies for at least 3 weeks before feeding him? If one of my flowerhorns get that sick and is still alive, I would put him out of his misery. The way I put down a fish is to put it in a plastic bag, grab the tail from outside of the bag and smack his head real hard on the sidewalk or something hard. Fish dies right away with no sufferring or even a twitch of its body. Other people have different ways but I'm just letting you know how I do it. Keep us updated on whether your fish recovers or that you put it out of its misery. Good luck, Ed.

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[Aquanero]

Is the fish alone in the tank? What size is the tank? Do you have any water perameters at all? The numbers are important in recomending a medication. Ok haveing said this the fish may not make it, I wish you would have asked sooner about this. If you can psot perameters I'll sugest somthing to try but you need to understand it may not survive the treatment and may need to be euthanize this fish.

 

[Spicoli]

That is a sad lookin fish,I'd put it down if it were mine.

 

[Dr_Shakalu]

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