Picked up a 8-9 inch red tiger oscar from my mates brother who claimed it was a "pussy" who got picked on by his other fish eg, Large Jack Dempsey and two other 12 inch O's. he wanted to get rid of it, and i'm not sure what he meant by that, but it wasn't finding it a new home. i rised to the challenge and took the battered and bruised oscar home and decided to rejuvenate him and try to get him healthy again.

in his old home he sat on the bottom on his side mostly, resting his cuts and bruises from the other big fish. he barely swam, never came to the top for food just accepted the scraps from the others when they had finished and had no red/orange coloration left on him except for his little O on his tail. I took him home and i've got him in my spare 55gal in my new house. with his two buddies Sabre and blaze (pushing 6 inches each now!) in my new 120g.

Charlie is his name! and he's slowly getting back his orange markings after just two days!

i've attached a link that i'm pretty sure i've messed if someone can fix it. its a picture of charlie now, he still is a little battered but alot better than when i got him. hes starting to get a little of his orange markings back, and you can see his original markings if u look hard!

i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd289/timmo900/OFLpicCharlie.jpg

any ideas to help this guy on his way to good health would be great. please give your advice.

Cheers!
Timmo

Hooray for Charlie!
That was a good thing you rescued him. If you want, you can try adding some melafix to the tank since many people say it's good. I would expect him to recover on his own though, most important thing is that the stress from being bullied is gone, and provided the water is clean, he should heal up just fine.
Good luck with your new addition!

wattya guys think about that color enhancing food?

going to the LFS tomorrow to grab some more melafix and food for my little devils

worth grabbing the red enhancer for charlie?

Haven't tried it ever so can't tell about the processed colour enhancing foods. There are quite some things though you can feed him, reddish looking food e.g. shrimps are said to be good for colour.
Delboy and some others mentioned a variety of suitable foods for Oscars in this thread recently.

Good for Charlie, nice job saving him

Good for you!!

IMO you don't need to feed the color enhancing food just provide Charlie with a good balanced diet, use melafix, and keep the water as pristine as possible and before you know it Charlie will be a healthy happy O.

his cuts are slowly healing up,

added some melafix this morning and hope that helps him out a bit.

he comes to the top for food now and is not afraid of my hand.

hasn't gained any more orange markings since the last pic posted.

i will keep you guys posted on his progress with pics attached

yey he looks fine now just needs his colour back to normal
gotta admire you for saving the lovely fish
brownie points awarded
keep up the good work and keep us updated on his progress will turn out a butifull fish for many years of happy life

thats the plan anyway drew.

he eats like a machine! and i thought my little oscars were garbage disposals! this guy is the king!

Timmo.

Great rescue.

followers of this post will be pleased to know that Charlie is healing very quickly thanks to the little addition of melafix.

his gashes and cuts have closed over and there are no more fleshy wounds! damn these fish can take a beating! and regenerate so fast! amazing animals

heres the latest pic of Charlie

i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd289/timmo9...healedOFLCharlie.jpg

A job well done!