Swim bladder problem in red cap oranda.

[milocat2012]

I have oranda gold fish with swim bladder problems. I got 11 baby orandas last summer for my 3200 gallon koi pond from 11 very small babies 6 of them survived and now they're pretty big: probably 4'' and some even bigger they're a probably a year and a half or 2 years old now. 4 of them survived thru the winter just fine in the pond along with the koi but 2 of them didn't do too well at the end of January and i had to bring them inside. They did very well for couple of months since i took them inside. I don't have an aquarium, so i kept them in 8-9 gallon plastic container with the heater and air pump. No filter but changing 75% of water every day: (always monitored the water temperature so only changed water with the same temperature as in the holding container) and full water change weekly. The problem is that one of them still doing very well at this point but the other developed swim bladder problem and had been swimming upside down: belly up for about a month now. I've tried some steps: withhold the food for 3 days and then started to feed them defrosted peas with no skin for over a week already. Still no change in the ability to hold himself in normal swim position. I feel bad for poor fish: he's very active and absolutely doesn't look like he's dying or even sick: i actually have been hand feeding him peas because i don't think he can get food on his own as he has trouble swimming to the bottom. He's very exited every time i come to feed them and gladly takes peas out my hands. Just not sure if that swim bladder problem could be cured. Is anything else i can do for this guy? The other fish is doing great and i actually released them both back to the pond as the temperature of the water is warmer: always above 60 (around 70 (20C) in the day time and little less about 63-65 (17-18C) at night. I made small inclosure with plastic net as i don't want this poor guy to be wondering upside down in big pond with no ability to swim normally. Also i have ability to hand feed him in this inclosure. Should i stop feeding them peas and just give that medicated food instead? I attached the picture of both of the fish i kept inside in the pond now. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[Faebinder]

So i had this experience with three of my fancy goldfish (two of which were orandas). I researched it on various forums and with my knowledge of medicines here is what I concluded (again I'm not a fish doctor):

Some goldfish just dont do well in cold temperature and start having problems with their swim bladder during the winter. This is probably genetics and varies for each fancy goldfish (only a minority of my fancy goldfish got this problem in the pond).

All 3 of the sick fancies (2 orandas and 1 ryukin) got better with medicated food. I treated them with medicated food for 2 weeks. I made the mistake of releasing one back to the pond too fast and it got sick again and this time came home and died after a month in quarantine. I didn't do that mistake with the other 2 and they stayed till the temperature was over 50.

What I should have done however for the one that died is inject it with antibiotics, but I didn't have the materials at that time. Now I do.

So what I would advise in this situation is that you may be dealing with bacterial infection and not a swim bladder issue, especially since they didnt have swim bladder before the winter. If it was my fish, I would feed it medicated food for 2 weeks and if it doesn't start eating it within 3 days I would inject it with a broad spectrum antibiotic.

Oh and dont expose the rest of the fish to the sick fish you have in the picture. Isolate it. A 20 gallon tank is $20 from petco. Should be easy to use as a hospital tank.

That's my two cents.

 

[milocat2012]

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately it's no changes it poor fish. I continue to hand feed him peas. i've had bacterial infection in fish before and this one doesn't look like it's the case: it looks like he just has trouble to swim down to the bottom as well as hold himself upright. He only can float at the top belly up. I've tried to put him in shallow bucket and it didn't make any difference: he still only could float at the top. He's really not look sick at all: has great appetite and eats about everything he can get a hold on (that's for sure a sign that fish is not sick). Very unfortunate, but will try to give him what he needs to keep him alive. Unfortunately i can not take him permanently inside: don't have an aquarium and not have any room to set it up inside for one fish. So he'll have to stay in the pond and hope for the best with summer approaching. I actually had one oranda lived in my pond all year around in about 14-15 years. It grow up huge: i think it was around 10-12'' at the time it finally died after 15 years. I moved it to 2 different pond locations as i took my fish with me when moved to different house. The only thing i learn is not to mix is regular gold fish with slow swimmers orandas, as the fast swimming gold fish actually can kill slow orandas at the time of spawning. And since i really like orandas i got rid of all regular gold fish and shubunkins in my pond. koi only bothers with they own kind when spawning, and never bother orandas or any gold fish at all in all 17 years since i had ponds never any koi-oranda problem. So they get along just fine. I live in zone 7a, so our winters are not super cold plus i do heat up my pond, so the water never freezes and temperature never gets below 40F. Most of orandas I ever had did just fine in the winter. Those 2 were the first ones i had to take inside this winter. And the other one is doing just fine now back in the pond. Not sure what made this one to develop swim bladder problem which he actually has developed after about 6-7 weeks being inside. they're very fragile when they're very small but once they get bigger they're getting much stronger. out 6 surviving babies 5 are still doing great as of now and they growing huge: from about 1.5'' babies about a year ago the biggest one is probably about 5-6'' now. The 2 that were inside for the winter are now smallest ones out of 6. unfortunately the way it looks like that only some kind of miracle had to happen for poor guy to turn around his swimming problem. Doesn't look good but i'm hoping for the best. Meanwhile will try to give him what he needs to keep him alive. I always monitor water conditions weekly. I have very good filters (about triple amount of filtration to required gallons) and run all filtration during winter months, so usually don't have any ammonia or nitrate problems.I can try and give him an antibiotic injections but i actually doubt that it'll help, as it definitely looks like swimming bladder problem rather then any bacterial infection. He's been like this for over a month now.

 

[milocat2012]

I fixed up frozen/defrosted peas with metro and other antibacterial food coating and feeding him for a few days. Also gave him 4 Baytril injections by now (last 5th one is scheduled for Wednesday): not even slight change. Unfortunately I don't hold much hope, because he doesn't look like he has any type of bacterial infection, but just the swim bladder problem, as he can't really swim or go to the bottom at all. He just floats belly up like a balloon. from what i read that in most cases swim bladder problem especially long term/chronic can't be fixed. I don't know what i should do with this poor guy as i imagine the quality of his life can's be very good. He still has good appetite so i hand feed him medicated peas i fixed up.

 

[Sue Ellen Anderson]

You have to feed them skinless peas? How do you peel them? Just mash them up and spoon up the inside and put in pond? I'll try that. Maybe my organda is not eating the peas because of skins.

 

[Sue Ellen Anderson]

My oranda doesn't seem as affected as the others in the pictures She's not upside down. Her head is low and her back is humped out of the water. She can swim a little. I've not seen her go to the bottom of the pond, but she does go down a little when I put the peas in.

 

[Sue Ellen Anderson]

She's looking okay today maybe a little better. Back still out of water and pinkish though. Glad she's not upside down.