pop eye

I have a Black Tetra with pop eye. I removed the carbon and tried a
seven day treatment with Melafix without any results. It's been a
month, would further treatment help or should I consider sending him to
fish heaven? Behavior and eating is normal but it sure looks like it's
painfull.

wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a Black Tetra with pop eye. I removed the carbon and tried a
seven day treatment with Melafix without any results. It's been a
month, would further treatment help or should I consider sending him to
fish heaven? Behavior and eating is normal but it sure looks like it's
painfull.


I'm no expert but pop-eye is generally caused by mechanical stress (banged)
or a bacterial infection behind the eye. I don't think Mela-Fix would have
any effect. I don't recall the proper treatment, or how effective they are.

As for being painful, I doubt it. Their nervous systems are quite different
from mammals. If the infection continues, the eye may pop out and the fish
will quite possibly continue living a normal life. You might be amazed at
how unaffected they can be by the loss of a single eye. They sense motion
along the lateral line on both sides of their body, so the fish is not
really 'blind' on that side. If this happens, give him a proper pirate
name. Black tetras play this part well...."argh laddie" ;~).
--
www.NetMax.tk

Bottom posted.
NetMax wrote:
wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a Black Tetra with pop eye. I removed the carbon and tried a
seven day treatment with Melafix without any results. It's been a
month, would further treatment help or should I consider sending him
to fish heaven? Behavior and eating is normal but it sure looks like
it's painfull.


I'm no expert but pop-eye is generally caused by mechanical stress
(banged) or a bacterial infection behind the eye. I don't think
Mela-Fix would have any effect. I don't recall the proper treatment,
or how effective they are.

As for being painful, I doubt it. Their nervous systems are quite
different from mammals. If the infection continues, the eye may pop
out and the fish will quite possibly continue living a normal life.
You might be amazed at how unaffected they can be by the loss of a
single eye. They sense motion along the lateral line on both sides
of their body, so the fish is not really 'blind' on that side. If
this happens, give him a proper pirate name. Black tetras play this
part well...."argh laddie" ;~).

Pop-eyes: Dr. Ross F Nigrelli says the commonest cause of pop-eyes or
exophthalmus in fishes is hemorrhage produced by gas in the capillaries in
the eye socket. Place fish in later-described progressive salt treatment
over a period of 36 hours. Keep fish in full strength 24 hours, then swab
eye with 5% argyrol, silver-sol or similar drug. Repeat if necessary while
slowly substituting fresh for salt water.

The above paragraph is a quote from the exotic aquarium fishes book I have
had for what seems like forever. Good luck and later! By the way - do a
search on the newgroups (through google groups for example) for the
progressive salt treatment information. later!