Help me please!

[Babybel10]

Hi all. I’m looking for some help with my sultan Pleco please? ’Vamp’ is extremely bloated and has been for 6 weeks. We have moved him/her (not sure of the sex) to a quarantine tank and been giving him Epsom salt baths twice daily for the past week but no change. There is no evidence to suggest he’s pooing, he has eaten a couple of mini algae wafers but did not eat a cockle. He has bog wood in the tank. He is not floating, does swim and can still cling to his ornaments and bog wood. Our aquatic shop does not know what else to suggest, any ideas? We don’t want to lose Vamp but don’t want him/her to suffer either

[MarcW]

That's doesn't look good, I am guessing that is some sort of fluid build up.

Are you able to post some water test results, temperature, and your water change schedule?

That may help, for now my first course of action would be to perform regular water changes if you aren't already, I would start with around 25% a day. Ensure you are using dechlorinator as needed.

Good luck, hopefully with your water test results someone will have more of an idea how to help.

[Babybel10]

Water is fine, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and less than 40 nitrate. As the hospital tank is small we are changing 50% water weekly but also probably 10% daily. Temperature is around 80 degrees as I have just recently turned it up. He came out of a big tank which houses a golden nugget Pleco and Bristlenose together with various fish so I know it’s not the water as that is perfect in the big tank. The bulge is clear so I agree it is either air or liquid but I don’t know why, he just suddenly blew up. Could it be renal failure?