My discus has not eaten for 5 weeks

[biggy1688]

Hi everyone,

I have a wild brown discus, he has not eaten for 5 weeks. I am very worried about him. At first, i thought he had worms because he has been pooing jelly shit. So i have treated him with levamisole, prazi, metro. But no luck at all. I have done 50% water change everyday since and have been feeding him with both live and dry food , he's still not eating and pooing jelly. Appearance wise, he still looks ok but getting skinner. Tonight, i start noticing some redness (like blood vessels) below the fins.

Any suggestion or idea how can i get him back on track.

Thanks heaps

Biggy :(

[ILLUSN]

5 weeks is a long time.

is he in a bare bottom tank?, if not get him in there and keep offering live food as often as you can.

if he's still pooing jelly he still has hex, he needs a metro treatmenr.

bring the ph of the hlding tank down gradually to 5.0. add salt to the water at 2 tsp/40L start the metro treatment, you'll need alot of tablets doise at 25mg/L (250mg/10L) for 48 hours (lights off) then give a massive change and repeat, you might need to repeat the metro treatment in a week if he hasn't picked up.

if you can load up some brine shrimp on spirolina powder and get him to eat that, the extravitamins in the spirolina will go a long way to helping him recover.

[biggy1688]

G'day ILLUSN,

Thanks for the prompt reply. He is in the hospital tank which is bare bottom. I think i might try force feeding him with the metro in the food. I just when out and brought liquid fry food which i am going to put the metro in with some spiralina. Has anyone out there tried force feeding? any tips would be great!! :) Will do all the rest you said Illusn, thanks mate.

Cheers

[ILLUSN]

I personally dont think force feeding a discus is possible, but if you have sucess write up how you did it, will save alot of people ALOT of grief.

[samir]

syringe attached to tube, go about an inch inside then squirt otherwise it will come out the gills. use a small amount, just metro will be fine.
you have to be quick, if it closes its mouth then its very hard.

[ILLUSN]

Legand Samir!!!!!

where were you a few years back??? :wink:

[dntx5b9]

syringe attached to tube, go about an inch inside then squirt otherwise it will come out the gills. use a small amount, just metro will be fine.
you have to be quick, if it closes its mouth then its very hard.

:shock: :shock: Does this actually work? Does this actually get not eating discus to start eating?

[samir]

depends on what's wrong with it, if its really bad, i usually stuff a quarter of a tablet of metro down its throat with a matchstick, but I wouldn't recommend you do it.