convict tang suddenly..

[tailoftwogobies]

hi y’all. our convict tang is suddenly hanging out in an area of the tank it’s never in & is extremely sluggish and strange acting. the pictures i’m attaching show what it’s been doing for over an hour now. it’s never acted like this, normally one of the most active fish in our tank. a water change was done a few hours ago & all other fish are acting normal.. it has plenty to eat in the tank and is showing no signs of being bullied or hurt. has anyone every experienced this with a tang before? really feel bad seeing it act this way & just curious if there are any ways to help or diagnose an issue here.. or if this is normal sometimes.

 

[ZoWhat]

Convicts are a bad choice bc they are hyper, require a lot of food and are super sensitive to tank changes

But you know all this bc you did the thorough research before buying it

 

[DrZoidburg]

Could be something internal going on he looks a little skinny. How old is it?

 

[LaloJ]

It looks like a pretty thin fish, I'm not sure if I see a white spot above the eye, how well has it fed?

 

[tailoftwogobies]

Could be something internal going on he looks a little skinny. How old is it?

it’s done an amazing job at cleaning algae in the tank and eats heartily during feeding time. we’ve had it for over a month now and it has never acted this way. this morning it seems to be back to normal, but i’m still curious what could have caused this behavior to prevent again.

 

[tailoftwogobies]

n

It looks like a pretty thin fish, I'm not sure if I see a white spot above the eye, how well has it fed?

no spots we can see of at all, it does look a little thin.. but this morning the behavior is almost back to normal completely. but i was curious if there is anything that causes this so when it happens again we have an idea of how to help or prevent.

 

[tailoftwogobies]

Convicts are a bad choice bc they are hyper, require a lot of food and are super sensitive to tank changes

But you know all this bc you did the thorough research before buying it

never heard anyone say they are a bad choice before.. nor have i heard anyone say they aren’t good at one of their purposes which is eating algae.

 

[blaxsun]

Glad to hear he’s doing better. Hopefully this was a one-off in terms of behaviour.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Convicts are Not a bad choice and the extremely blue lighting in the pictures not helpful. Retake under white light
Look for dots of any sort and also rapid breathing, injury or signs of aggression from other tank mates

 

[tailoftwogobies]

Convicts are Not a bad choice and the extremely blue lighting in the pictures not helpful. Retake under white light
Look for dots of any sort and also rapid breathing, injury or signs of aggression from other tank mates

no signs of any bullying at all, it did most definitely seemed stressed out last night for sure.. and was in a weird place in the tank, a place where it never ventured to before. just glad to see it back to normal this morning, is there anything anyone can imagine caused this?

 

[tailoftwogobies]

Glad to hear he’s doing better. Hopefully this was a one-off in terms of behaviour.

me too

 

[vetteguy53081]

no signs of any bullying at all, it did most definitely seemed stressed out last night for sure.. and was in a weird place in the tank, a place where it never ventured to before. just glad to see it back to normal this morning, is there anything anyone can imagine caused this?

Change in PH, temperature, startled or spooked

 

[LaloJ]

It's good to know the convict returning to normal but you should definitely make that fish fat, offer a variety of foods and feed several times a day.

 

[DrZoidburg]

I was thinking along the lines of internal bacteria, or worms. Pretty common in these fish a lot of them are wild caught. They do eat, but tend to lose weight over time because of this. It could be another fish harassing it even though you might not see it, or maybe it doesn't like your food.

 

[QuarantinedCorals]

Hi! So I might not be able to provide info as to what's going on with your convict, however, I got one about 2 months ago and I've made posts about him having a few issues. I got him pretty fat, he got thin quickly although I feed A LOT, he now eats 1-2 sheets of nori daily, my tank also gets 4-6 cubes of frozen food + NLS pellets daily, he still wasn't putting on weight so what I'm doing now is feeding medicated food for internal issues which is what I suspect he is having. Mine is actually really hardy, my Achilles tang attempted to murder him for a month but my convict tang refuses to die (which I'm thankful for), now that he has found his place amongst the other inhabitants he actually holds his own quite well. I agree with everyone saying they're high energy, he is always swimming and grazing. Mine also has a preference to food, he loves brine shrimp and is picky when it comes to mysis. Good Luck!