While I’ve taken care of Oscars for over 10 years, but it wasn’t until last week that I realized that I have been doing a horrible job and honestly feel like I’ve been mistreating my Oscars. (I started out with a setup from walmart – needless to say their education was not correct). I started out with 2 small Oscars in a 10 gallon tank. They lived for 4 years with no noticeable health problems (they died when we lost power from an ice storm and froze to death overnight). They were only fed tropical fish flakes.
After they died and power was restored, I purchased 2 more Oscars. They lived together peacefully for 4 years until one decided to kill the other (their size differed by a few millimeters). I didn’t try to replace the tank mate since he seemed quite content by himself. He’s now 6 years old. A few months ago he started slamming himself against the walls of the tank. He lost large chunks of flesh to his head and lost many areas of scales along his side. I had been neglecting his water changes (I wasn’t in town as much due to college) so I increased them and the behavior stopped. The flesh and scales grew back except for a round spot/hole on the top of his head. The tips of his fins were also white and didn’t return to their normal color. I assumed this was permanent damage and since the behavior has stopped, the rest of the wounds had healed, he was still active and eating I didn’t think much about the hole and fin discoloration.
Last week he starting swimming with a slight tilt and acting a bit lethargic (spending more time near the bottom), but was still eating normally. I finally decided to talk to some people about Oscar care and do some research. I discovered that the 10 gallon tank is much too small, he has hole in the head and fin rot, and his attack of the tank walls was an attempt to escape. He’s 6 years old and about 6-7 inches (although he’s difficult to measure since he doesn’t like to stay still). From what I read it sounds like if he has been properly taken care of he should be much bigger.
I found a former Oscar owner on craigslist that was selling the tank his 2 oscars has outgrown. It’s a 55 gallon tank with a cascade filter (I believe it’s the 700 model – he said it was meant to cycle 75 gallons), a heater (it came with 2, but one was glass and broke on the trip home), with lids, lights, gravel/sand, decorations and food (my Oscar has been eating tropical fish flakes with an occasional bug his entire life – his new food are varying size pellots for chilids, frozen bloodworms, krill, beef heart etc….). The tank has been set up since Sunday night (3 days). Today I added some feeder fish to the tank to help it cycle. While I have read that ideally I should cycle the tank for 5-6 weeks, the person I bought the tank from said that 2 weeks should be sufficient (perhaps 1 week with feeder fish). Regardless, I plan on testing the water before adding my Oscar.
I bought a water testing kit today and tested both tanks (I know it’s too soon for the 55 gallon, but I was curious).
10 gallon tank:
23 degrees celcius
GH – 120 (normall)
KH – 0 (bad – should be 120)
pH – 6.0 (bad – ideal is 7.0, 6.5 okay)
nitrite – 0 (normal)
nitrate – 160 (bad – should be under 40)
55 gallon tank (I tested it just to compare, I know it’s too early to move him yet)
23 degrees celcius
GH – 0(low – should be 120)
KH –0(low – should be 120)
pH – 6.5 (normal, although ideal is 7.0)
nitrite – 0(normal)
nitrate – 0 (normal)
When I bought the feeder fish for the bigger tank, I put them in the smaller tank until the bigger tank had cycled for a few days. My Oscar absolutely loved it and over the past few days has eaten many of them. I moved the feeder fish over to the new tank today and after a few hours tried feeding my Oscar a pellet (he’s never had pellets before). He gulped it, then spit it back out. So I tried two other kinds (the CL lot that I bought had about 4 kinds). He did the same thing each time, gulped the pellet, but then spit t back out.
Since I found out that he had head rot, I’ve been treating him daily with Melafix (made by aquarium pharmaceuticals). According to the instructions I’m supposed to treat him daily for 1 week, continuing if necessary. So here’s my list of questions:
1) Obviously the test results on the current tank are poor. Should I try to correct these values? (I would have to go out and buy the necessary products – I don’t have anything on hand to correct them). Or should I not worry about it since he’ll be moving to a new tank as soon as it’s finished cycling?
2) Why won’t my Oscar eat the pellets? Is he just full from the feeder fish (even though he is gulping the pellets, but spiting them back out)? Or is he so accustomed to the tropical flakes that he doesn’t like the change?
3) How do I go about feeding the frozen beef hearts, krill, etc….? Do you feed chop them up into pieces and feed them frozen, thaw them out and let him eat the whole square,etc….?
4) I’m treating my Oscar for HITH and fin rot. He will have finished with his 7 day treatment tomorrow evening. I haven’t noticed an improvement in the hole yet. If he’s “contagious” I don’t want to move him to the new tank and risk contaminating the water with the bacteria affecting his head. How long should I wait to move him?
5)There’s one decoration in the old tank that I’d like to have in the new tank. However I don’t want to transmit any of the bacteria that’s causing the fin rot and HITH to the new tank. How do I properly clean/sterilize it so it’s safe to go in the new tank?
6) I’m afraid that I’ve permanently stunted his growth. He’s only about 6-7 inches and is 6 years old. I’m told that once he’s moved to bigger tank with better water conditions that he should continue to grow. I realize that he’ll probably never get as big as he would have if I had taken proper care of him from day 1. How much bigger will he get? (I don’t really have the room for anything bigger than a 55 gallon tank).
fin rot
HITH
general pic
