Disease or just a bad swimmer?

[SheepdogLover]

The sole surviving Longfin Serpae Tetra in my tank has been swimming almost vertically for the past few weeks. His head points directly upward with his back-end down...just straight up. None of them were that good of swimmers in the first place, but I feel so bad for him...the only time he stops swimming like that is when it's dinnertime. Really, it isn't swimming. He just stays vertical in one spot almost all day long. Is he just a bad swimmer or is this some sort of disease??

 

[Slacker]

Thats a bad sign. Usually made by stress but can be a number of factors. Check water paremeters!

 

[SheepdogLover]

Water parameters? What is that?

None of my other fish are swimming like that, btw.

 

[lizwinz]

Originally posted by SheepdogLover
Water parameters? What is that?

ph, ammonia, nitrite and nitrAte just to name a few

if you dont already have test kits to check these you should consider getting them

how long ago did you get these fish? how did the others die?

--liz

 

[dana307]

I got a new Gold Severum that was doing the same thing. I netted her, gave her a lot of extra food and made sure the net was in a high current spot. The lfs said that was all I could do and she bounced back and is just fine. Good luck. Hope your fish improves.

 

[wayne at home]

Might be diesease, might be behaviour, often it means poor water quality, esp. build up of nitrates

 

[SheepdogLover]

Oh! I just tested the water the other day and everything's fine. I've had this batch of fish for about a month now. Er...hehe. This is a bit embarrassing, but I killed the others because we shocked them on accident. We were putting them in a different tank and we put them in without floating them in a bag and they all died.

I haven't tested nitrates yet. What do I do if they're too high?

 

[lizwinz]

only one thing to do...a water change

the biggest reason for doing water changes is to keep the nitrAtes down so if theyre getting to high between your regular water changes you could add an extra water change per week

plants also help to keep nitrAtes down (you should still do regular water changes) if you dont feel like planting just throw some floating plants in...if you already have live plants, add some more

--liz