Large 6yr Lightning Maroon laying on side after cold temperature stress

Radu · May 28, 2023

My large female Lightning Maroon has been at my parents house while I have been traveling.

My mom told me today she realized the heater was off for a while and that the fish is laying on its side and will struggle to swim upright for a bit. She said she still tries to eat.

It appears like her vent is swollen or inflamed.

I am thinking the cold slowed her metabolism down and now she is constipated and its effecting swim bladder. I also think my mom has been over feeding because she always tries to over feed me.

I told her to stop feeding the pellets and to feed her 1 green pea tonight that is cut up into 4 small pieces.

I really love this fish so if anybody has any ideas I would be very thankful.

vetteguy53081 · May 28, 2023

Radu said:
My large female Lightning Maroon has been at my parents house while I have been traveling.

My mom told me today she realized the heater was off for a while and that the fish is laying on its side and will struggle to swim upright for a bit. She said she still tries to eat.

It appears like her vent is swollen or inflamed.

I am thinking the cold slowed her metabolism down and now she is constipated and its effecting swim bladder. I also think my mom has been over feeding because she always tries to over feed me.

I told her to stop feeding the pellets and to feed her 1 green pea tonight that is cut up into 4 small pieces.

I really love this fish so if anybody has any ideas I would be very thankful.

Cold water may have indeed played a role and in addition to metabolism, may have caused shock to the fish depending how cold the water temperature reached.
If any food, brine shrimp will be easy to ingest. as for the frozen pea- its an old remedy for goldfish and rarely if at all works in a marine setting.
Warming the water temp gradually may increase the stamina of fish before it reaches point of moribund.

Radu · May 30, 2023

vetteguy53081 said:
Cold water may have indeed played a role and in addition to metabolism, may have caused shock to the fish depending how cold the water temperature reached.
If any food, brine shrimp will be easy to ingest. as for the frozen pea- its an old remedy for goldfish and rarely if at all works in a marine setting.
Warming the water temp gradually may increase the stamina of fish before it reaches point of moribund.

Thank you for the tips.
I had my parents go to the LFS and buy live brine shrimp, air pumps, and an Eheim heater.
They said they saw her eat or try to eat them, but with great difficultly swimming in a squirming fashion with bursts of heavy flapping in attempt to orient herself upright.
The heater raised the temp 1 degree in the past 12 hours to 79F.
My plan is to raise it to 83F slowly like this 1 degree every 12 hours.
Should I raise it higher?
I see an improvement from the first day that they showed me that there was a problem, she can sometimes lean more upright than laying completely flat like in the picture from first post.
I also see improvement in her breathing rate, it has slowed down from the previous panting. I think the additional water surface agitation added by the air pumps has helped with the breathing and will help oxygen levels as the temp increases.

vetteguy53081 · May 30, 2023

Radu said:
Thank you for the tips.
I had my parents go to the LFS and buy live brine shrimp, air pumps, and an Eheim heater.
They said they saw her eat or try to eat them, but with great difficultly swimming in a squirming fashion with bursts of heavy flapping in attempt to orient herself upright.
The heater raised the temp 1 degree in the past 12 hours to 79F.
My plan is to raise it to 83F slowly like this 1 degree every 12 hours.
Should I raise it higher?
I see an improvement from the first day that they showed me that there was a problem, she can sometimes lean more upright than laying completely flat like in the picture from first post.
I also see improvement in her breathing rate, it has slowed down from the previous panting. I think the additional water surface agitation added by the air pumps has helped with the breathing and will help oxygen levels as the temp increases.

Do not raise above 80 as higher temperature will reduce dissolved oxygen levels

FurrierTransform · May 30, 2023

I was careless one time and let the water temperature go wa-a-a-y down (forgot to reset the chiller when I used it for something else really cold), duration was probably overnight. My maroon clownfish was unhappy but then perked back up when I saw the error of my ways and warmed things back up. So here's hoping yours will recover too.

(I was chilling some steamer clams prior to cooking them, then when I rerouted the chiller back to the tank, I forgot to reset it from 40 F to 78 F; I do not recall what temperature the tank got down to overnight, but it wasn't as cold as 40, but it may have been in the low 60s. And, those clams were great!)