# Firemouth "Spasm" Issue...Please Help!



## rupe (Jan 31, 2010)

I've been keeping fish since 1980 and I've never seen this before. My female sub-adult firemouth went spastic for about a second, rushed rapidly to the top of the tank, and "died". I took her from the tank...fins were stiff, mouth was stretched wide open. As I looked in disbelief, I noticed she started slowly moving her gills. I put her in my hospital tank were she sunk upside down to the bottom, but began breathing rapidly. Fast forward 10 minutes and she looked fine, as if nothing happened. The only thing that I could think of is a stray electric current in the tank but I couldn't detect anything.

About two hours later, she does the same thing in the hospital tank, only this time she sinks to the bottom, loses all color, but never quits breathing...recovers again in about ten minutes (this was about 1/2 hour ago).

Back to the "community" sub-adult cichlid tank (55 w/pair of firemouths, pair of convicts, elec blue jd, yoyo loach, red tailed shark). The red tailed shark does the same thing...finally darting to to the top and smacking the lid, completely loses color, and dies instantly. All other fish are fine, water tests out well (ammonia/nitrites are "0", 5ppm nitrates, .5ppm phosphates), and all fish appeared perfectly healthy just hours before.

Any insights would be greatly appreciated...thanks!


----------



## rupe (Jan 31, 2010)

The firemouth just did it again. Went to the bottom and looked dead. I went to net her out and she started breathing again. Laid upside down for about 5 minutes, then took off like a shot around the tank and then began swimming normally. I don't get it???


----------



## LSBoost (Jan 21, 2010)

Upside down and unable to stay floating unless she use energy? Swim bladder problem.


----------



## jeaninel (Nov 1, 2009)

I've had a cory do that before. It eventually did die. But it would do the same as what you're describing...almost as if it was fainting. It would dart around swimming all weird, upside down and sideways, then go belly up and sink to the substrate. Then would come back to life and be normal. Never did figure out what it was. What's really weird in your case is that another fish in the tank did the same thing. That's rather disconcerting. Sorry I'm not much help. Just wanted to let you know I've had something similar happen and I know how frustrating it can be.


----------



## rupe (Jan 31, 2010)

LSBoost said:


> Upside down and unable to stay floating unless she use energy? Swim bladder problem.


No...perfectly fine several minutes after the "seizures". Clearly not a swim bladder issue.
She looked normal this morning, although a bit nervous, before I left for work.


----------

