Blind Green Chromis?

[Trever]

What could cause blindness or partial blindness?

I've had the green chromis for ~1.5 years. He's in a 33 gallon cube with 4 other fish (yellow coris wrasse, a clownfish, a firefly, and a diamond back goby.

The fish changed profoundly as it matured. His fins are very fancy these days. He began to hide nearly all the time. Nowadays when feeding and maneuvering around the tank, I'd swear this fish is blind or nearly so. He seems to feel his way around and find the floating frozen food and pellets in a feeding ring as if not by sight.

I can't see any signs of anything on any of the fish in this tank, nor other fish acting unhealthy. No one is flashing.

There was a fish in this tank that may have had flukes, but impossible to say. It was a starki and I think unlikely the fish was contaminated, it came directly out of a rigorous QT (medicated tanks) from an LFS.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

What could cause blindness or partial blindness?

I've had the green chromis for ~1.5 years. He's in a 33 gallon cube with 4 other fish (yellow coris wrasse, a clownfish, a firefly, and a diamond back goby.

The fish changed profoundly as it matured. His fins are very fancy these days. He began to hide nearly all the time. Nowadays when feeding and maneuvering around the tank, I'd swear this fish is blind or nearly so. He seems to feel his way around and find the floating frozen food and pellets in a feeding ring as if not by sight.

I can't see any signs of anything on any of the fish in this tank, nor other fish acting unhealthy. No one is flashing.

There was a fish in this tank that may have had flukes, but impossible to say. It was a starki and I think unlikely the fish was contaminated, it came directly out of a rigorous QT (medicated tanks) from an LFS.

You don’t see any changes to the eyes, cloudiness, swelling?
True blindness in fish is rare, but yours does sound impaired to some extent. There aren’t any treatments that I know of. You can try Googling: Hemdal fish eye health - that should take you to an article I wrote on fish eye disease (I’m on my phone and can’t link to it)
Jay

 

[Trever]

@Jay Hemdal thanks. I have kept a close eye (pun intended) and zero changes to the fish's eyes. They look fine, same as they have always looked.

 

[Trever]

Actually I should say his eyes look very good. They are not swollen, they are sharp, deep black, completely round (nothing interrupting the pupils) etc. The opposite of cloudy. He's a good looking fish.

Maybe I just don't understand Chromis behavior, but for all intents and purposes, he seems to see but not well.

This fish used to be a vacuum cleaner, chasing down all the floating frozen food with accuracy. Now he just kind of gulps, and sometimes gets food, sometimes is lunging and gulping at nothing.

The other day he almost swam into the dark black overflow box (but stopped right when his nose was about to hit it). He swims in corners a lot (not always) and if I go right up to him, he doesn't usually flinch. Etc.

If he's just weird, he sure is weird.

 

[Sheila Hebert]

Same thing happen to one I had for 3 years. Just went blind. Was very odd. I babied it for awhile but it eventually died.

 

[blaxsun]

 

[Trever]

@Sheila Hebert thanks for the comment.

Yeah, so far we are working it out- he goes into a corner I can drop pellets that swirl around (it's right near the return). where he points his nose up and just blindly gobbles them up. I expected him to be dead long before now, but this seems to be working so far. I'm not sure blindness is the root cause here.

Eh, the problematic part of the hobby. We're trying to playing fish vet and we aren't that.

 

[rmorris_14]

@Sheila Hebert thanks for the comment.

Yeah, so far we are working it out- he goes into a corner I can drop pellets that swirl around (it's right near the return). where he points his nose up and just blindly gobbles them up. I expected him to be dead long before now, but this seems to be working so far. I'm not sure blindness is the root cause here.

Eh, the problematic part of the hobby. We're trying to playing fish vet and we aren't that.

Hey! Hows the fish doing today?

I've got an older banggai cardinal that I suspect to be blind despite the eyes looking perfectly normal. She was in the DT tank for 18 month + living her best life, to now is barely eating with no known exposure to disease or symptoms of anything. It started over a month ago and I recently had to move her out of my DT (due to her tank mates starting to pick on her) I have been babying her in a separate for almost a week.
If I can get her to eat, it seems like luck rather than intent. She doesn't respond much to my hand or things being in the tank. Curious, if you fish ended up passing or if you have development any special technics for feeding?

 

[Trever]

Actually, I chose to euthanize this fish finally two days ago. @rmorris_14 weird to get a question like this now- what timing.

I have been able to feed him per the above for several months, but I began to notice that the fish was eating less and more spastic about it. That is, he'd blindly gulp, but (hard to explain) just wasn't eating like before. It's as if he was losing control of his mouth (i.e. losing the ability to eat ). He did eventually learn to stay in the one corner where I could feed him (the pellets swirl there), and not go to the other corners.

Even once he figured out where to hang out during the day, he continued to very slowly go downhill. This after already being largely moribund.

I felt and everyone I talked to (fish store, other reefers) that it was time to put the fish down.

This was a very easy process since the fish just stayed mouth up at the surface during the day (he'd sleep on the bottom at night). I scooped him into a bag along with tank water, the fish gave no fight and didn't move much at all. No trauma or drama. I put the bag in the freezer.

RIP my little friend. Wonderful fish but overall, they don't seem to do the greatest in captivity. Doubt I would get one again after my experience and all that I've since learned and heard.

FYI he never showed any of the usual signs of disease, and no other fish in the tank have been effected to date.

 

[rmorris_14]

Actually, I chose to euthanize this fish finally two days ago. Weird to get a question like this now- what timing.

I have been able to feed him per the above for several months, but I began to notice that the fish was eating less and more spastic about it. That is, he'd blindly gulp, but (hard to explain) just wasn't eating like before. It's as if he was losing control of the ability to eat (mouth, etc.). He did eventually learn to stay in the one corner where I could feed him (the pellets swirl there), and not go to the other corners.

Even once he figured out where to hang out during the day, he continued to very slowly go downhill. This after already being largely moribund.

I felt and everyone I talked to (fish store, other reefers) that it was time to put the fish down.

This was a very easy process since the fish just stayed mouth up at the surface during the day (he'd sleep on the bottom at night). I scooped him into a bag along with tank water, the fish gave no fight and didn't move much at all. No trauma or drama. I put the bag in the freezer.

RIP my little friend. Wonderful fish but overall, they don't seem to do the greatest in captivity. Doubt I would get one again after my experience and all that I've since learned and heard.

Hey Trever,

Thanks so much for the update! Sorry about the outcome . Sadly, I have little hope for improvement at this point as well. I am going to keep trying for a little longer but it is really time consuming to try feeding multiple times per day before and after work in the hopes of getting a small amount of food in her. If I am lucky, she gets one piece of food in her mouth. Other feedings, the food can literally bounce of her head and she goes on swimming like nothing is there. I've tried holding the food in front of her with tweezers (which she lets me do as though I am not even there) but wont strike at it. I've tried soaking in garlic to give the food a stronger smell. I've even tried clicking the tweezers together each feeding to give her a sound to let her know food is going in the tank to give her some sort of alert system. I'm going to try to raise some brine shrimp (just ordered today) as my next effort to see if I get anymore of a response from her with live food. However, with each day that goes by, I am less confident that she will ever be able to return back to the DT. .

Anyways........ thanks again for the update. Sounds like you did the right thing in the end .