What happened to my Platy?

[magictorch1976]

Hi all

Had a bit of a trauma the other night and I don't know what happened.

I check my tank everyday before I leave for work and when I come home, just to make sure things are how they should be.

When I got home the other night, one of my orange platy's, (I had 4,) was bobbing around the tank like he was on drugs. He would shoot up from the bottom, across the tank and then just float down to the bottom nose-first, then just turn upside down.........then do it again. Then lie on the bottom, then float in the water and allow the filter output to push him around.

I was in a panic, trying to read the Interpet Fish Health Guide that comes with their medicines here in the UK and filling a bucket of fresh water in which to move him to.

I decided it was swimbladder, although I am not sure - the diagnostics table in the guide said it was a "possible symptom" but I had to do something. I managed to get him out the tank but in the 3 second transfer to the bucket, to which I had added swimbladder medicine, he passed away

I left him for 24 hours in the bucket with a spare heater just to be sure he was really not with us and have buried him this morning

It all just happened to fast. He was fine that morning. His fins and tail etc. were perfect. Perhaps a slightly swollen stomach but I wasn't sure if it was or whether he normally looked like that! It's hard sometimes to try and remember what's "normal" and you start looking for things that maybe aren't there.

The other fish seem fine - a gourami, a number of tetra's and the other platy's but for future reference - had I diagnosed correctly?

Thanks very much.

J

 

[Lupin]

Hi J,

I would have looked into the water parameters first as the likeliest culprit. Every fish has a different tolerance level to substances that are found in the water so just because one fish is acting abnormally while the rest are fine, it does not mean water parameters are unlikely the cause at all. What test kit do you use? Please post your water parameters.

What do you normally feed this fish?
Are the others still behaving normally?
What is the temperature?
When was the last fish introduced? Was it quarantined at all? If so, how long?

What species is your gourami? What about your tetras? There are several species of gouramis that also have bullying tendencies. Have you observed any outward aggression at all by any of these tankmates towards each other?

I wouldn't necessarily diagnose it as "swim bladder disorder". The symptoms you observed are quite fast paced enough to be SBD and almost always signs of near death, something that you cannot link correctly to SBD. No medicine can treat SBD unless you figured out the exact cause.

You didn't indicate whether you used an airpump when you separated the platy. High temperature will greatly deplete its oxygen supply so suffocation may also contribute to its death assuming you did not aerate the water at all.