cdklos
New Member
Hello All! I received a large shipment of new fish for my new tank from @Dr. Reef. I think Dr. Reef does a great job and we had no issues, except the Blue Hippo Tang was swimming upside down in the bag. (The only reason I mention Dr. Reef is because the fish was QT'd for 30 days at his facility and I'm quite positive this is a shipping issue. Either swallowing air or plane ride decompression issues. To be clear, I do not think this was a problem due to Dr. Reef, and they have been great in assuring me that if this fish doesn't pull through that they will honor the DOA guarantee.) I immediately got the tang in an acclimation bucket and watched her for a few minutes. Ammonia did not show up on the badge. Shipment was received on 5/25/23 at 11:30am.
See Video #1 attached.
Video #1 Hippo Tang upside down after shipment
I acclimated the tang normally; air stone, ammonia badge, drip acclimation over a period of 45 minutes. Her swimming seemed to improve a bit, but clearly swimming head down, tail up, and fighting to stay down.
I put her in the main DT until I could get a QT set up and then moved her to QT. The only time I have actually observed her swimming upside down was immediately after receiving her after shipment. In QT she will eat nori just fine, I have not observed her eating any pellet food I have fed. I have given her a MB dip for 30 minutes, 2x a day at 10 am and 10 pm. I also added epsom salt at a rate of 1tbsp / 5 gallons of water. She is in a 20 gallon QT tank. I'm not convinced the epsom salt will actually do anything at this low level, but I'm not sure of the repercussions of increasing the dosage. She is bloated on both sides, seemingly lower portion of her body, although its quite difficult to say. See Video #2 attached.
Video #2 Hippo Tang in QT with swim bladder complications
On the evening of 5/26/23 I decided to force feed her some peas ( I had fed them, but she wouldn't take them) on the recommendation of my local aquarium shop owner. While feeding her the peas ( I had her in the water, help up against the wall ) she had a bowl movement. It was very small, but it happened none the less. Afterwards I moved her back to QT and she started swimming like a normal fish again, up and down, in a manner that seemed like she had full control of her buoyancy again. The next morning, she was back to erratic swimming with no control over buoyancy, expending a high amount of energy to stay down in the water column, it seems. She is still eating nori, I have tried medicated pellets, but have not observed her eat any of them. I have also not observed her have any bowl movements except the one that I'm afraid I may have caused. Other than swimming head down tail up most the time, and not being able to control side to side action, she is breathing normally, and eating. This last video is from today 5/29/23. She is a bit angry, I just did a large water change; she did not like that. See Video #3 attached.
Video #3 Hippo Tang with swim bladder complications
Can anyone give me some guidance on a direction to go from here? I am not afraid to try to vent the swim bladder, but I don't want to do that if there is a possibility that is not the problem. I understand venting a swim bladder has a very low chance of actually fixing the problem. Is it possibly just an air ingestion problem from shipping that may resolve itself in due time, or constipation? I have Kanaplex on order to help with a possible bowl movement, but won't be here until Friday. Should I continue to force feed peas, or stick with nori, or possibly not feed for a few days?
See Video #1 attached.
Video #1 Hippo Tang upside down after shipment
I acclimated the tang normally; air stone, ammonia badge, drip acclimation over a period of 45 minutes. Her swimming seemed to improve a bit, but clearly swimming head down, tail up, and fighting to stay down.
I put her in the main DT until I could get a QT set up and then moved her to QT. The only time I have actually observed her swimming upside down was immediately after receiving her after shipment. In QT she will eat nori just fine, I have not observed her eating any pellet food I have fed. I have given her a MB dip for 30 minutes, 2x a day at 10 am and 10 pm. I also added epsom salt at a rate of 1tbsp / 5 gallons of water. She is in a 20 gallon QT tank. I'm not convinced the epsom salt will actually do anything at this low level, but I'm not sure of the repercussions of increasing the dosage. She is bloated on both sides, seemingly lower portion of her body, although its quite difficult to say. See Video #2 attached.
Video #2 Hippo Tang in QT with swim bladder complications
On the evening of 5/26/23 I decided to force feed her some peas ( I had fed them, but she wouldn't take them) on the recommendation of my local aquarium shop owner. While feeding her the peas ( I had her in the water, help up against the wall ) she had a bowl movement. It was very small, but it happened none the less. Afterwards I moved her back to QT and she started swimming like a normal fish again, up and down, in a manner that seemed like she had full control of her buoyancy again. The next morning, she was back to erratic swimming with no control over buoyancy, expending a high amount of energy to stay down in the water column, it seems. She is still eating nori, I have tried medicated pellets, but have not observed her eat any of them. I have also not observed her have any bowl movements except the one that I'm afraid I may have caused. Other than swimming head down tail up most the time, and not being able to control side to side action, she is breathing normally, and eating. This last video is from today 5/29/23. She is a bit angry, I just did a large water change; she did not like that. See Video #3 attached.
Video #3 Hippo Tang with swim bladder complications
Can anyone give me some guidance on a direction to go from here? I am not afraid to try to vent the swim bladder, but I don't want to do that if there is a possibility that is not the problem. I understand venting a swim bladder has a very low chance of actually fixing the problem. Is it possibly just an air ingestion problem from shipping that may resolve itself in due time, or constipation? I have Kanaplex on order to help with a possible bowl movement, but won't be here until Friday. Should I continue to force feed peas, or stick with nori, or possibly not feed for a few days?
