Loaches Online Forum

My loach has been having serious trouble now for weeks. I have been so busy that, I am ashamed to admit, I have not had the time to research the issue.

It is quite immobile and I can't tell if it's eating or not. Water is clean and the other fish are healthy.

Any clue where I should start?

Thanks.

I would approach it like Dropsy.
Put the fish in a hospital tank with some Epsom salt in the water.

Dropsy is a condition where the systems the fish usually uses to get rid of excess water no longer functions, perhaps because of disease.
Often the disease is bacterial, but not always. If it is bacterial you can try antibiotics. That is a lot of 'If', but (here is another one) if it is something else there may not be any treatment at all.

Unfortunately, if this is Dropsy, then by the time the fish is in this condition there is too much internal damage to heal, and the fish may not recover.

Other things:
Usually the swelling is more localized with other issues.
Tumor or some other sort of growth. (Might be anywhere, but is localized, not an overall swelling)
Eggs (female fish, abdominal swelling, may be lumpy like you can tell the eggs through the skin)

After a very exhaustive several months, including buying a hospital tank, a full course of two antibiotics, a full course of parasite treatment, epsom salt treatments, tons of water changes, lots of worrying, lots of praying for the little guy, it finally passed away. It's been so painful to watch that I was actually relieved. That fish was seriously the toughest little animal with a will to live. It set the benchmark for tough animals in my book.

Thanks for the response. It was helpful. I think after I extensively clean the hospital tank, I'm going to put a couple of new loaches in and move them to my big tank if I need the small one for isolation in the future.