Swim Bladder Issue

[riftwater]

I came home last night to two dead Red Bishops, the remaining adults all clearly having issues swimming. I had done my usual 50 percent water change the day before and the two males really went at it hard afterwards. This morning there was another dead and a 4th dashed herself against the glass so hard she died. Other than a water change is there anything that can be done? My 2 groups of fry and catfish all seem fine, but all of the adults are struggling.

[pseuro]

oh man... sorry for your loss! Sounds strange why only the adults are having problems. Is this a really old colony? Are you sure nothing got into the water? Is the tank covered?

[riftwater]

I've had the colony for about 6 months, I would estimate them at 2-3 years old given their size. Tank is covered and well maintained, I'm at a loss. The only thing I can think of is the Detroit city water had an issue when I filled it on Sunday. But even if so, the fry are maybe an inch long and catfish are all tiny, they would have had issues first (I think).

[phish]

Red bishop are super mean n aggressive especially during breeding I compare them to Petros.
I have colony of 12 always raise with dithering colony of 20 adults yellow labs plus 20 adults red rainbow.
Took them 6 months plus to breed successfully. First batch had 5 and second had 8 frys. Males get so aggressive females swollow eggs or release them. I have been growing the frys out really carefully just introduced 2 frys at 1.75" don't want to risk that's why letting them grow bigger before introduce just so hard to breed them. The others are about 1.25-1.5" will introduce soon. Getting a 210g ready for them n some dubs got from Andrew. Thanks buddy!

[riftwater]

Yes, my big male was a complete brute for sure.

4 more adults dead and 2 babies. There were 9 fry instead of 8 so 7 left, and a female clearly spit out 3 tiny fry today. I'm hopeful the 10 fry survive, Drew was able to figure out what was going on and I'm treating, we shall see.

[...]

Sucks so bad mate...so sad 😢
C'mon lol fellas, you can overcome this and rebuild a great group for John!

[jkdjedi]

Oct 3, 2017 7:19:25 GMT -5 riftwater said:

I came home last night to two dead Red Bishops, the remaining adults all clearly having issues swimming. I had done my usual 50 percent water change the day before and the two males really went at it hard afterwards. This morning there was another dead and a 4th dashed herself against the glass so hard she died. Other than a water change is there anything that can be done? My 2 groups of fry and catfish all seem fine, but all of the adults are struggling.

Had a similar problem with a buffalo head species, lack of iodine seemed to be the culprit. Try Cichlid Trace Elements and see if that helps.

[riftwater]

They actually had Pop Eye, Drew figured out out pretty quickly. I lost 9 of 10 adults but was able to save 12 of the 14 fry. Lesson learned, keep the rocks to a minimum and cleaned under them weekly.

[jkdjedi]

Oct 12, 2017 20:20:57 GMT -5 riftwater said:

They actually had Pop Eye, Drew figured out out pretty quickly. I lost 9 of 10 adults but was able to save 12 of the 14 fry. Lesson learned, keep the rocks to a minimum and cleaned under them weekly.

Had the similar thing a few months back from missing water changes. Think it was dropsy, didn't lose as much as you did though...ouch..9! hope your tank recovers.

[phish]

Glad you have it under control. Could you share what you did. Thanks.