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  • Results 1 to 5 of 5

    Thread: Deflated Swim Bladder

    1. #1
      WLcreations is offline Senior Member
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      Deflated Swim Bladder

      Hi, does anybody know how to help a fish with a deflated swim bladder? I recently adopted a fish with a very inflated swim bladder, it kept floating to the surface so I tried to extract air out (using a syringe) but I made the mistake of taking out too much air and now it sinks sideways to the bottom. I placed it in a quarantine tank and have been hand feeding it. It seems alert and willing to eat but it's been a couple of weeks and I'm wondering if there's anything else I can do. Is it possible to add air back in using a syringe? I'm worried that, with the swim bladder deflated, it is a much smaller and thinner target in terms of knowing how deep the needle should go. For ex. if the walls of the swim bladder on both sides are touching then how do I get the needle to just pierce one side and not the other to inject air in? Is there anything else I can do to help it heal or care for it? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
      Last edited by WLcreations; 12-11-2019 at 01:25 PM.

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    2. #2
      richtoybox's Avatar
      richtoybox is offline Administrator
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      If it had a "very inflated swim bladder" then I would fully expect it to reinflate. The swim bladder is designed to be self regulating, and if it over inflated, it was due to some form of infection or something causing it to not regulate itself, but to allow air in and not back out. Give it time is the only thing that I can suggest.
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    3. #3
      abuchi123's Avatar
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      I vaguely remember some people have tried injecting antibiotic into the swim bladder. The idea is to target the infection (if that's the root cause).

    4. #4
      WLcreations is offline Senior Member
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      RichToyBox and abuchi123, thank you both for your help. Given this, I think I'll give it more time, keeping good water conditions, and continue hand feeding it. I was searching the web and saw a suggestion to keep it in shallow water so the fish can come up. Does anybody know if fish intake air into their swim bladder through their mouths? Would it help if I carried it to the surface every once in a while?

    5. #5
      richtoybox's Avatar
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      I am not sure, but it wouldn't hurt to try. I suspect that the fish could be coming to the surface to gulp some air to inflate or give off air to deflate the air bladder as needed.
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      Richard

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