HELP! I think my fish is sick.?

Question

My Gold fish is alive and flapping his fins, but is floating with his tummy up on top of the water. He's moving but keeps floating up to the top, why is he doing this?!? Is there anything that i can do?

Answer 1

He's displaying Swim Bladder Disorder, there are medication to treat it, it should be available in most aquarium.

A home remedy you can try is to feed him frozen peas. When you do is to defroze the peas, peel out the outer skin and cut up the inner part into small pieces which your goldfish can eat. Sometimes, it will help. The peas act something like a balast of a ship, keeping the fish up right.

This is an analysis I wrote and posted on another website. See if it helps.

"Swim bladder problem. There is two different issues when we see a floating or sinking goldfish, first it's the cause and second it's the effect. I have often hear people relate to floating goldfish as suffering from SBD ( Swim Bladder Disease ) that is not always true.

A fish regulate it's buoyancy by inflating it's swim bladder ( an air sac in the abdomen responsible for maintaining buoyancy ) if the fish needs to be more buoyant and deflates if the fish needs to be less buoyant.

The reason a goldfish floats or sink all the time is because it's swim bladder got blocks or constricted which makes regulation of gases within the air bubble difficult or impossible. This could be cause by food impactions, taking in too much air, virus or bacteria infection which can inflame the lining of the bladder making it difficult for gases to diffuse across to the through the digestive tract. For the latter the effect of the infection could be permanent, which means that when the disease is cured, the bladder itself might be deform permanently and cannot regulate gases no more.

Before treatment can be administered, you have to identify what is the cause. Fasting is recommended for the side effect of food impaction. Pre-soaking and non-floating pellets might solve the effect of consumming air when eating. Anti-bacterial medication can be use for bacterial caused infection ( usually refered to as SBD ). For some virus or bacterial cause after-effect, there is nothing that can be done ( as far as I know ) for the fish, but hope that it can out grow it.

For floating goldfish, you could try feeding it some green peas as it does help at times. I am not sure how green peas chemically solve the problem (occasionally). But my best guess is that the peas kinda act like the water balast of the ship and aid to keep the fish sinking and up-right."

Answer 2

Swim bladder disease

Answer 3

your house is actually upside down.