Female seahorse swims upside

[bolling]

Female seahorse swims upside down all of a sudden. She is eating well but can't control her swimming. Help please!!!!!!!!!

 

[rayjay]

Sounds like gas bubble disease due to internal chemistry out of wack. Normally this is associated with deteriorating water conditions.
Treatment is in a heavily aerated 10g hospital tank with Diamox that you have to get from a vet.
She may also stop eating and have to be tube fed.
Tank size? tank mates? temperature? how long have you had her? How long since newest additions to the tank? Have you used any treatments so far?
How often do you do what size of water changes, and do you vacuum the tank of trapped detritus and leftover food from around rock and decor?
If you use a filter, how often do you clean out the mechanical filter pads?

 

[bolling]

Tank size is 30 gallon rimless. Tank mates are on tiny gobe with tiny pistol shrimp. 10 hermit crabs. I small mandarin and another female seahorse. Temp 75, nitrate 10, PH 8.2, KH 11, Salinity 1.26. Change filters every day, clean shimmer every day. 10 gallon water change every two weeks. We recently added the mandarin. I am also adding Vodka every day but have not reached the point the point where nitrates are reducing. I also have a mixture of charcoal and phosgard that I change once a month. I am trying hard to reduce nitrates but am fighting it all the time. I am thinking of going to 5 gallons every week to see if it helps. There is also a lot of live rock with mushrooms and a couple of small leathers and three gorgonians.

 

[rayjay]

IMO, it's pointless to be checking for nitrates because a seahorse tank needs large frequent water changes to maintain water quality and this should handle the nitrates sufficiently.
I've not checked for nitrates in any of my reef tanks or seahorse tanks in probably 19 yrs.
Water quality, that affects internal chemistry balance leading to this problem, can't be tested for by hobbyists as we only have certain basic test kits and it would be cost prohibitive to pay for lab testing even if we knew exactly what to test for.
IMO, you should be changing a MINIMUM of 10g a week for that tank, making sure to dislodge any detritus and uneaten food from places it can be trapped so it can be siphoned out before replacing the new water.
I hope your mandarin is trained to eat frozen foods as normally a 30g tank would be too small for it.

 

[bolling]

The mandarin actually eats pellets, it does not even seem interested in the mysis shrimp at all. The only reason I purchased the mandarin because lfs showed me how it loves pellets. It is an ORA mandarin. I will start doing 10 gallon a week changes and see how things go. Thank for the advice.

 

[rayjay]

Have you located a vet to get the Diamox yet?
I doubt that the condition will heal itself and it won't take too much time to go too far downhill to fix.
Put her in a hospital tank and lower the temperature to 68° to start with and then add the Diamox as soon as you can.

 

[bolling]

I think we found out that Gracy is a he. We were looking and could see swelling in the abdomen and we tried the procedure for a male and got a lot of air out. We bought it as a female and have had her for quite a while. I am doing a large water change today and will keep a close eye on her, him. I hope we have solved the problem.

 

[rayjay]

That's a break!!
It wouldn't hurt to source out a place to get Diamox for when you might need it. Time is of essence when needing Diamox and if you have a ready source for when it might be needed it could mean the difference between success and failure.
Diamox is ALSO used for pouch emphysema which this now appears to be, if after repeated occurrences and flushes with new salt water (matching tank water specs), it still happens, then a Diamox flush can be used.

 

[bolling]

I will definately talk to my local fish store and see if he knows and if not I will find out elsewhere. I have a six gallon cube sitting empty in the basement which hopefully could suffice for a hospital tank. I have a chiller set on 75 on the seahorse tank, do you think I should lower the temp? Thanks for all the help.

 

[rayjay]

Stores don't have Diamox as it can only be obtained with a prescription.
Best to find a vet that will provide it as soon as you need it, or perhaps even a small quantity to have on hand just for emergency use.
People have a range of temps that they keep seahorses at but most now I think are a touch cooler. I have mine at 68° because that's what I keep my home at.
A very good piece to read is by pledoscophy in post #5 in THIS THREAD.
While cooler temperatures may not have helped this problem, it WILL help the bacteria problems that are ALSO associated with the water conditions that may have caused this pouch emphysema.