I have owned my buddy for about 6 months now. He was a very happy fish right from the start. 55 gal tank, weekly partial water changes, all the correct water conditions etc... He was always eating properly, very active and always happy to see me. A couple days ago i was sitting at my computer and i looked over, he was just floating in one spot, pale white and with every gill movement blood would spurt from underneath the head where the gills meet. It shocked me. I lifted the lid and he went up vertical to eat like usual, no more bleeding, and all his color back to normal. I didn't see any kind of open wound. I dropped a couple pellets of food in and he ate them. Not even a half hour later he had just dropped to a corner of the tank and started bleeding again. Eventually that stopped. Now he is not active at all, and just stays in his little corner not moving. There is no more bleeding but he doesn't eat anymore. Its been like this for a few days. Hes not the same fish anymore....Any ideas would be greatly appreciated, i don't want him to dye on me.

Ive got to say im at a loss on this one ive never heard of an oscar bleeding from the gills, is there anything that he could have swallowed in the tank that might have done this? what sort of decor do you have?what substrate do you use?

First thing to do is a water test, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH. Never heard of blood spurting out from the gills. However, fish can develop gill disease. This can mean discoloured gills, and sometimes mucus coming out of the gills.

So the fish isn't eating at all? How is his breathing, is it laboured? I.e. is he opening and closing his mouth a lot?

How often do you do water changes? Do you treat the water before putting it back into the tank, or do you put water treatment in the tank as the water goes then? Either is okay.

Also tell us how you clean your filtration and how often.

I have no idea what this is, however I am going to make a stab in the dark and suggest that it isnt blood that is coming out of your oscar. The amount of blood in an oscar is not that much due do his size. I reckon that if you could see that much blood your oscar would be dead from lack of blood left in him. To give you an example a vet once told me that a drop of blood from a budgie is about the max it could lose without dying from lack of blood. This is just me guessing tho. If it isnt blood I have no idea what it is!

i have a couple fake plants, a little ceramic or whatever half hollow tree and a little skull, there is nothing jagged or broken in the tank, i examined all the pieces. That one day was only time he has bled and hasn't at all since. He just sits in the corner not active, or floats in one spot near the heater. Doesn't acknowledge anything anymore. As for water changes i would change 5 or 6 gallons a week, I have well water (I live in the country more)so there is no chlorine in my water or anything, but i still use a conditioner with every change. Treated before putting into tank. I use a little multi-test strip for testing the water, and according to that strip everything is pretty much what it should be. i change the filters every couple months or so.

Check the date on the strip testers. They dont age well and can sometimes give an incorrect reading (i know this from experience when i used out of date strip testers). The liquid ones are the best. Assuming the tests results are correct then you are doing everything correct. However if you find your nitrates get higher then bigger water changes will be needed. I do 50% once a week

When you say you change your filters every couple months I hope you mean clean them and not change them

Try to tempt him on some different food. Try prawns, maggots, lance fish or worms(oscars love worms)

The ONLY time I've ever seen my Oscar bleed is after I forcibily removed a Fish Louse. The bleeding didn't last long (maybe five minutes) and it didn't seem to slow my Oscar down in the slightest. Fish Lice will certainly attach themselves within a fish's gills. And enough of them could cause enough injury to allow a subsequent infection to set in. Which in turn could cause the symptoms your fish is currently showing. But the chances of you not noticing fich lice in your aquarium prior to all of this is slim. They can get as big as your thumbnail.