Help! Big gold ram not doing so hot.

[fishysmell]

Hey everybody. I have a 2-2.5 inch gold ram male (I think) that isn't doing all that great. He pretty much spends his time sitting on the bottom with his tail all folded up. His colors have gone ultra dark but the wierd thing is that the red on his fins is still really bright... brighter than usual. He has been like this for 2-3 days.

Background: I had him in my 60 gallon that I've been treating for the ich (half treatments) that came in on a few fish I bought a couple weeks ago. It isn't too bad and only the new fish have it. The ram does not. Since he was hanging out on the bottom more than usual and didn't look all that great I decided the meds might be stressing him out so I moved him to my newly replanted 10 gallon that has REALLY clean water. Since then, he has shown no improvement.

All my tanks are heavily planted and have nitrates lower than 5ppm and the 10 gallon has none. Can any of you cichlid guys (or anyone else for that matter) give me a hand on this one? Sorry about the long post. Thanks for the help.

 

[wayne]

How old is he? How big was he when you got him, and how were his colours? Is he still eating - if yes/no, what, or what have you tried. HOw warm is your water.
My opinion here won't be too your liking - I think he's suffering from the combined effects of stress and old age. These things don't live too long at the best of times, and the cumulative effect of inbreeding and commonly maintenance in the high 70's, 80's has not helped at all. And that before you get to hormonal treatment to get extra large, colourful rams for sale.
For your fish , top quality water, with frequent small changes, and trying selcon soaked bloodworms to bump up his diet might get him going again, but if he's more than a year and a half old, it might be a struggle

 

[fishysmell]

I'm not sure how old he is, I got him spring this year and he was about the same size. His colors weren't quite as vibrant as they are now, like I said, this is the brightest colors I've ever seen on him. The water is 76-80 degrees, pH 6.5-7 and hardness is almost unmesurable in that tank. No he isn't eating, I having been feeding w/ frozen sea food, flakes, and freeze dried bloodworms, all of which he usually goes nuts over. I do 50% water changes weekly. If its old age, I'm willing to accept it. At least he won't die from something I did, save the possibility of the ich treatment doing a job on him. I'm not very good w/ sick fish, all I've done so far is move him to the tank w/ the best water conditions.

BTW, how big do these things need to be to breed?

Thanks for the help. I really appreciate it.

 

[wayne at home]

Tiny - I've seen them breed at less than an inch, and probably only 5 or so months old. The problem with starting them small is it stunts their growth, especially females