I just wanted to say thanks to everyone that posts on these forums. Your advice has helped me keep my Oscar healthy and happy (i hope) for more than 7 years. Sadly he has been sick for a couple weeks and started to have a small hith issue. I came home after traveling for a wedding to find him laying on his side on the bottom. I tested the water and everything is fairly normal for my tank but I did a small change anyway and put the usual chemicals in. My last best guess on how large he is was almost 13" and its amazing to see how big he his while he is still but its awful to watch him struggle. His behavior has really changed a lot over the past year. Besides me fighting a never ending algae battle the nightly splashing parties and escape attempts (one successful ) that ended up requiring bungee cords across the top of the tank have stopped. Until a week or so ago he was still all wiggly and happy to see me walk up to the tank. Everyone that came over was always amazed to see the huge brown and orange fish in my living room. It will be sad to see him go but I hope this doesn't last much longer. I do still hold out hope that he snaps out of it. I've been married for 4 years, and he has been around twice that!

I'm not a professional by any means but I did what I could and you all have been very helpful After this guy I may not be able to do another Oscar for a while, they are not a stupid gold fish or neon but a social, friendly, big happy fish

hey, there.
Imo, 8 years is a big accomplishment allready.
i 'd only suggest to keep up with waterchanges, to provide your o with the best water quality and hope he pulls through.
I'd not give up just yet.
Some changes for the better may take some more time.

btw i see you been a member for allmost 3 years, with only a postcount of 2???
Did you restart your account or have you only been reading and lurking?

I think we forget noddy that the people that use this forum are such a small percentage of the entire amount of people using this site...its a good thing for sure

i'm glad with the data base we allready got for the years the site has been running.
And seeing projects come to life, fish getting healed and getting the space oscars deserve by the info that's provided is definatly worth it.
The goals was to promote happy and healthy fishkeeping and the message is getting across due to the vast database of expieriences.

Before i joined i had no internet, so i photocopied all the articles at work and read them over and over, and i started out wiyh my first o totally prepared, and my Red has allways enjoyed his home from day one.

A satisfied customer, we should have him stuffed

This is a quote from one of my all time favorite sitcoms, anyone guess which one?

wild guess:Fawlty towers?
but again, that's only a guess

You're correct. Wild guess...pull the other one

technut27 wrote:


Why not?

Getting another you get to enjoy the whole process all over again...and this time with all the experience you have gained having a new little one would be cool

Dont give up on your oscar just yet. Keep up the water changes and keep your water as good as possible. It may be a case that he is suffering from old age

when i upgraded tanks my o did the im not eating and swiming thing for a week lol maybe it just one of those times where they lay back and look dead good luck though and i agree this sight has helped me so much its no joke ive nown of this sight for a long time before i joined this forum

technut27 wrote:

7 years is already an accomplishment and i believe you have enjoyed caring your
o.... but 7 years is alo too long for some gadgets to have power leak....
i was told that small amount of power leak could cause HITH with the oscar..
please have the tank water tested for even minor electric current or voltage
this may be the cause.....


i always suggest to start a new one if ever the existing had passed away....
just bear in mind you gave your best and another fish deserved the same
caring..... that line of thinking will make things lighter in case you
lost the one you have right now...

Thanks for the nice replies. It didn't take long, he was still breathing and wiggling around when I went to bed around midnight on Sunday but when I came down for work Monday he was dead. I was beginning to dread the thought of euthanizing him. I had a small vial of clove oil I bought a long time ago when I had two Oscars. They used to get pretty rowdy and I expected one of them to have some horrific injury but one of them ended up dying after getting some crappy feeder fish. I was going to sit and do shots of the Vodka with him if it came to that :o)

Some interesting things did come of it. He was too big for the net I had when I fished him out of the tank, I could only get his head in it. Trust me its a big net for a fish tank, at least i think so. And he was so heavy that it started to rip out. I measured him and he was just shy of 13" long, thick as a book, and I swear weighted 5+ pounds but I can't actually confirm that. There is a metro park behind my house so I buried him next to a group of willow trees and found a big flat rock to put on top so the woodland creatures don't dig him up.

I broke down and scrubbed my tank down last night and tonight. I do plan on setting it back up but where it was has way too much natural light and starting about a year ago I got what can only be described and nuclear power plant, genetically engineered, super algae that I was never able to control. I was getting close to buying a UV filter to help kill it but never got around to it. We are putting a utility sink in the basement when we finally finish it off this fall and I'll set it back up down there. There are things I always wanted to do differently and now I'll have a chance to.

As bummed out as I have been 7 years was a good run and I'm sure I'll do it again.