Psycho Gourami

[mike the zealot]

Ok so last night I decided it was time to do my gravel vaccuuming of my month old 20gallon high. I "planted" some new plastic plants, and I'm pretty proud of my almost natural looking plastic planted tank.

This morning my opaline gourami, about 2.75 - 3", is shooting around the tank like a raped ape, with a bunch of scrapes on him. Hes been doing it at least 8 hours now (maybe all night I dunno) and when he stops to rest, he pushes back and forth in the water with his pectorals. I just finiished treating the tank a week ago for some ick I seen on my baby pleco, so I dunno why he would be skidding off the driftwood / rocks like he is. It's almost like he wants out or something the way he swim back and forth...

So I took a water sample into my LFS and they said my water quality is "excellent" , and that sometimes no matter what you do, fish will freak out sometimes.

Hes pretty banged up, he's the biggest / most dominant in the tank, and his color is starting to pale to the point that I'm starting to worry if hes going to make it.

The only other thing I can think of is that the water temp got up to 80 when I did my water change. I've got a heater thats preset to 78F but the thermometer always shows 76F

Here's my stats:

20gallon high
30lbs natural colored large grain gravel
15w flourescent bulb
Under Gravel Filter
7 good sized plastic plants
large piece of driftwood, a couple rocks
1 Opaline Gourami ~3"
1 moonlight Gourami ~2.5"
1 Red Tailed Black Shark 1.75"
1 Bristlenose Pleco 2"
6 Red Eye Tetras 1 - 1.25"

Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 0

someone help, he was my favorite fish, now I'm wondering if I should just put him out of his misery...  

 

[colesea]

If he's scraping off of things, that's usually an indication of a skin parasite or some other skin disease. Or the moonlight could be going after him. You might want to get an antibacterial medication, like Melafix, just in case.
~~Colesea

 

[rummynose]

I had a similar problem with a blue gourami once.  He started wacking out and finnally jammed himself into one of those corny fake caves.  I managed to get him out of the cave but he was scrapped up pretty bad.  The fish was very agressive towards all my other fish so I ended up taking him back.  The cave's long gone now too.

 

[mike the zealot]

Just got back from weekend at in laws... my red tail shark is clamped and sitting on the driftwood gilling pretty hard, the gourami is all fungused over from scabbing and clamped. everyone else is hunky dory.  :

Im so confused... if I knew what it was I'd treat it...

and Im positive the moonlight is not chasing, the opaline is the largest and definitely most dominant.

 

[snowplankton]

  How long have you had them? I`ve had some fish I bought die from some weird dieseases while the other tankmates were fine. I had some Corys die within a week of the time I bought them of the same thing, and nothing else seemed affected.  

 

[mike the zealot]

Just over a month, he and the moonlight were the first ones in the tank. Last night he looked pretty bad and the moonlight was starting to chew on him so I put him down. I don't have the stomach to watch something die slowly. The shark seems a little better anyway...

 

[colesea]

Wow, I'd do a quick 4 gallon water change and start some antibiotics/antifungals right away.

Strange enough, I had something happen to my tank that was odd although it caused no harm to my fish because I caught it in time. That was anaerobic decompostion in my gravel. I noticed it because I put my hand in the tank to put the bottom pellets in their cup, and when I removed my hand, my sterling silver ring had been tarnished. This is from sulfur dioxide formation, the same stuff that makes salt marshes stink. I quickly stirred up the gravel and did a six gallon water change. Luckily none of my fish seemed harmed by this, and I cleaned my ring with toothpaste.

All sorts of strange chemical reactions can happen in your fish tank, even if your ammonia/nitrites/nitrates are fine.
~~Colesea

 

[mike the zealot]

Well went and bought me a new opaline gourami today, and talked some with the LFS guy, he said my fish had "Rocking Gourami" desease... and that it's pretty much incurable unless u hit it really early... so I don't feel so bad having executed the poor thing.