Will my catfish get dizzy

Sasquatch · Post by **Sasquatch** » 18 Feb 2007, 16:06

I have a question about my bumblebee catfish. He's in a 10g tank, planted with Hygrophila, has two decorative caves and there's also a piece of slate leaned against the glass in one corner of the tank. He shares it with 5 platies.

He seems to spend a lot of time up against the front glass of the aquarium swimming in circles. He loops around in a spiral, always staying in contact with the glass, works his way to one side of the aquarium, swims back to the other side and starts over again.

He can do this for hours. We thought he was looking for food, but when we added food he ignores it or only takes passing interest.

Is he just exploring or is this really abnormal?

Thanks for any help.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 20 Feb 2007, 09:58

Bumblebee catfish are largely nocturnal fish, and this kind of behavior leads me to think that either he is stressed because the water is not to his liking, or he is suffering from malnutrition.

By answering these questions we may get a better idea of the problem.....

Water parameters e.g. temp, pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate?

How long have you had him and have you seen him eat?

What do you feed him on?

Is he or ?

I hope this helps

Sasquatch · Post by **Sasquatch** » 20 Feb 2007, 13:24

It's a Microglanis iheringi and he's been in the tank for about a week and a half now. He still swims in circles, though it's less pronounced lately.

I know it's a nocturnal fish, which is why I'm concerned, he spends a large of the day outside the various caves/hidey holes.

Water Parameters:
Temp: 25C
Ammonia/Nitrites:0
Nitrates: 10ppm
pH: 8.0

We feed him once a day, after lights out, alternating between beef heart, pieces of fish and brine shrimp. We also feed him Hikari sinking wafers and Shrimp Pellets, but he doesn't find these as palatable. He also eats the occasional platy fry.

When we feed him, we make sure he eats, despite competition from the platies.

We might not feed him enough though. It's usually 3-4 thin slices of beef/fish cut into strips about 1.5mm x 5mmm or a little chunck of frozen brine shrimp. He does have a rather round belly though.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 20 Feb 2007, 13:47

Well your water sounds OK. The pH is a little high, but I doubt that is the problem.

I would stop feeding the beefheart. Its not a food that he would encounter in the wild, and the mammal flesh may not be good for him.

Stick to frozen aquatic invertebrate food such as bloodworm, mysis, whiteworm, blackworm and brineshrimp etc as well as the wafers/pellets.

As to why he is acting strange, I don't really have any more ideas. External contaminants like fumes perhaps or maybe a disease?

Sasquatch · Post by **Sasquatch** » 20 Feb 2007, 14:57

I know my pH isn't the greatest, but we got a bad batch of gravel with limestone in it and there isn't much we can do about it. I'd rather have a stable pH at 8.0 than one that is lower but always fluctuating.

I'll lay off the beef heart and see if it changes things. But I haven't fed him any in three days and he was doing circles this morning so....

I'm hoping he's just getting used to the new tank and it'll calm down as he gets used to his new home.

Thanks for the help.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 20 Feb 2007, 15:22

I'd rather have a stable pH at 8.0 than one that is lower but always fluctuating.

Is your tapwater really soft then? Tapwater of "average" hardness is usually pretty stable.

I'll lay off the beef heart and see if it changes things.

I don't think the beefheart would cause the problem, it was just some general advice.

Beefheart is regarded now as a pretty bad fish food as the saturated animal fats are worse for fish that they are for humans.

Sasquatch · Post by **Sasquatch** » 20 Feb 2007, 15:35

Our tapwater pH is around 7.5 and it's fairly soft (20mg/L alkalinity). I was talking about adding "pH down" to reduce the pH. But since it's just going to go back up again, I'd rather it stay stable at 8.0 than constantly swinging back and forth.

As for the beef heart, I thought is was good because there it's high protein with little fat? Mine has no visible fat on it at least, which is usually the saturated fats.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 20 Feb 2007, 16:29

Now I think I understand.

I think perhaps now that the bumblebee was kept in soft water with a low pH at the LFS, and is struggling to acclimate to the hard alkaline water in your tank.

This is just a guess, but is all I can think of really.

You may now wish to decide to lower the hardness and pH of your tank to see if this helps.

What I would do is remove the gravel and replace with inert gravel/sand.

As you say, your tapwater has a very low buffering capacity, so I would increase this (with a product such as "Kent pH Stable" or similar) to about 60mg/l.

This should give you a stable pH of between 7.0-7.5. You can fine adjust the quantity to give you the pH you want.

Make sure you keep water changes with this new water small (less than 10%). This way the fish will adjust slowly.

Also, do you put anything like salt into the tank?

Sasquatch · Post by **Sasquatch** » 21 Feb 2007, 00:00

Thanks for the advice and information.

I think we'll let him acclimate to the conditions in the tank though. We just finished getting things stable after a near disaster in December, so we're not looking to do large changes in the aquarium right now.

As for salt, nope, none in the tank.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 21 Feb 2007, 08:33

I hope he settles down OK. Its odd. I would have thought he would be used to the water in week.

I'd like to hear some ideas from other people?

Well let us know how he gets on.......