Anyone with advice on Malawi Bloat

[hssea]

Hasn't been a good couple of days. My mbuna tank that has been doing so well...took a horrible turn. Lost 2 male mbamba's on back to back days, following that noticed females had swollen bellies and won't come out to swim. Couple of labs have hair like poop. SColofi's look unaffected. Looked up these symptoms and sounds like MalawI Bloat. Started on Metronidazole today. Stopped feeding for now. Removed carbon. Spent a lot of money ordering these fish and done everything by the book. Very distressing.

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated. Going to bed....i'm exhausted. Will ck back in the morning.

 

[Cichlidnut]

What are you feeding them?

 

[RandomZoid]

Just continue what you're doing and quarantine them if you can. Continue to treat with Metronidazol, don't feed them at all and hopefully they will be fine.

 

[hssea]

What are you feeding them?

I was feeding them three times a day, what they could eat in 30 seconds.
Foods API tropical greens (33% protein), Cobalt cichlid flakes (44% protein), spirulina flakes and zuchinnie every four days.

 

[AlexAlex]

Three times a day!!!!???? Wow! I have 24 Mbunas and I only feed mine once a day and that's enough for them. I even fast mine every Friday (once a week). I truly think that you're overfeeding them.

I'd seriously consider cutting down on the amount of times you feed them.

 

[hssea]

Three times a day!!!!???? Wow! I have 24 Mbunas and I only feed mine once a day and that's enough for them. I even fast mine every Friday (once a week). I truly think that you're overfeeding them.

I'd seriously consider cutting down on the amount of times you feed them.

I think your right. Everything else--water quality, environment is correct. During my research prior to getting them I read about several small feedings in decrease aggression....that's how I came up with the x3 per day. My community fish get feed twice a day. I do fast everyone on Sunday.

Also I don't think now that I was feeding enough fresh greens.

Very disheartening ....I did so much research on the mbuna's but didn't really get the diet requirments in regarding how much.

 

[AlexAlex]

Sorry to hear about a few of your Mbunas passing. I do love 'em... My favorites of all fishes (along with some Catfishes and Sharks).

The aggression is going to happen. I overcrowd my 75 Gallon with the Mbunas for that reason as most others experienced with them will note that as well. That way the aggression is towards more than one rather than the aggressor targeting just one or two and bullying them to death.

Hopefully that makes sense.

 

[Cichlidnut]

The only fish I feed that often are my breeders. That's a lot

 

[hssea]

Sorry to hear about a few of your Mbunas passing. I do love 'em... My favorites of all fishes (along with some Catfishes and Sharks).

The aggression is going to happen. I overcrowd my 75 Gallon with the Mbunas for that reason as most others experienced with them will note that as well. That way the aggression is towards more than one rather than the aggressor targeting just one or two and bullying them to death.


Yes , I stocked the tank (55 gal) with 16 mbuna ( yellow lab, scolofI and mbamba). Hardly any aggression. The first thing I noticed was 1 of the 2 male mbamba acting weird , even though I didn't witness aggression I thought for sure it was due to the other male. Then the other male mbamba started acting weird. By the time I realized it wasn't aggression related both of them were really bad and some of the others had bloat symptoms. It spread very quickly i'm talking about couple of days !!! I did about 1 week earlier feed some Tetra Cichlid Pellet that a friend had given me....I WISH i'd never done that for several reason.....1. it's a cheap quality product 2. don't know the expiration on it and it was a very large can 3. I didn't soak it !! Now i'm wondering if it was those pellets. Anyway I spent $250.00 dollars on on-line fish....so I really can't afford to replace them after this bloat is all over. According to what i'm reading the others that are showing advanced symptoms probably won't make it either. I'm currently on day #2 of treatment with metrodazalo (sp ???).

It's going to get extremely cold here soon ...in single digits for our lows. So probably won't order till spring. Isn't that a problem also to add stock to a existing mbuna tank ????? What a mess !!!

 

[RandomZoid]

I added juvies to my tank with full grown Mbuna, including some Melanachromis. I never saw a problem with it.

The way I figure the bigger fish don't consider the small ones a threat and the only reason Mbuna are aggressive is for territory and mating. So why attack a smaller fish that is not a threat against either of those 2 things. The smaller fish usually ate a lot and grew very fast. Way faster than my juvies all did when they grew up as the only fish in the tank. I figure it's to compensate and be able to compete with the larger fish in the tank.