Weird devil behavior

[big train]

I have 12" rd that will be 3 years old this september i have raised him since he was a egg and i think he is dieing. For the last 8 days he has been in the corner standing on his head and doing slow barrell roles or laying on his side with a extreme arch and labored breathing. These are the conditions i have observed from across the room but when u come close to the tank he is his old self bumping the glass flaring the gills normal strong swiming aggro behavior. He normaly eats 6 large hikari gold pellats twice a day now he will eat only 1 once a day and refuses all other types of food and this fish loves nightcrawlers and shrimp but won't touch it now.

I have never seen this type of thing befor ime a fish is healthy and active or sick and dieing. This fish is like playing dead in the corner like suffering then he snaps out of it and bangs the glass i can't figure it out.
All the water paramiters are correct with no visable problems fungus, ick, etc..He is in a 75 gal and i do a 50% wc every week i have changed it twice this week trying fix the problem. He is fed a high protien varied diet with hikari gold as a staple food up til last week he was healthy as a horse and just in great shape. So what do u guys think his problem is have any of u seen this befor?

 

[jordanlewis100]

hi there are only a couple of things that i can think of,it could be something contaminating the water that you are using or maybe you are just changing too much in one go try say 25% a week that should be enough,also has he got anything to occupy him ? RD's are intelligent fish and need to be stimulated in some way you could try putting some more decor in there so that he has to rearrange everything back to what he wants,some people have had success with a ping pong ball although i've never tried it myself ! the best idea i think is to have another tank next to or near him so that he can see it and keep another male cichlid in there to give him some competition trimac,jag or butti should work well, at least they can't actually get at each other just be alot of gill flaring and posturing,hope all works out ok good luck Paul

 

[Mad About Cichlids]

Maybe he's just checking out his reflection on bottom of tank. It's a good sign that he still charges the glass and such though.


I have read about a few cases where the cities added higher than normal doses of chemicals into waters.

 

[big train]

I have been doing 50% wc for his whole life and if there was a water problem it would cause the same problems in the other tanks don't u think i change all the water in all the tanks the same day. There is plenty of gravel in the tank and he normaly moves it around alot and there is a big shell in there he likes to push about so there is no bottom reflection but i may try the floating ball for him to play with. I have recently moved all the fish from the tank next to him but they where just little cichlid growouts that i was using as feeders for him i don't think they would hold his attention like another big cichlid should as jordan suggested. I will put some fish back in the tank next to him just to see what if anything he does i figure if it was a health problem it would have killed him by now with a week gone by and all just hoping for the best but thanks for the feed back keep the ideas coming.