# Please help my plecos stomach is sunken in and I don’t know what to do :(



## 21niko (Oct 9, 2020)

Hey, In my 29 gallon tank I noticed today my common pleco had a sunken in belly! I just fixed the nitrates on this tank that were through the roof and brought them back down to 10 ppm. I’ve had some of my corydoras in this tank and guppies die, I thought because of the nitrates but I’m now starting to suspect like a parasite or bacterial infections going on in my tank. I don’t know what is going on in my tank guys any ideas? I’m going to test my water tonight and I’ll post the numbers, but if anyone could help I would extremely appreciate it. Thanks👍


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## WaterChange (Feb 8, 2021)

It can be a number of things from starvation, bacteria infection or parasites. If your Pleco is a herbivore it relies on something called "gut flora" to process food. If this gut flora dies off the fish can no longer process it's food. An omnivore is more likely to recover if it's been starved than a herbivore.


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## 21niko (Oct 9, 2020)

WaterChange said:


> It can be a number of things from starvation, bacteria infection or parasites. If your Pleco is a herbivore it relies on something called "gut flora" to process food. If this gut flora dies off the fish can no longer process it's food. An omnivore is more likely to recover if it's been starved than a herbivore.


Hmm ok, I don’t think I’ve been starving them, is it ok to feed about a half of a hikari algae wafer for the pleco he’s about 7 inches long? I treated yesterday with e.erythromycin and am gonna do it again today ,I also bought some fritz para cleanse if it’s a parasite, I’m feeding the plecos zucchini today so we’ll see.


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## WaterChange (Feb 8, 2021)

21niko said:


> Hmm ok, I don’t think I’ve been starving them, is it ok to feed about a half of a hikari algae wafer for the pleco he’s about 7 inches long? I treated yesterday with e.erythromycin and am gonna do it again today ,I also bought some fritz para cleanse if it’s a parasite, I’m feeding the plecos zucchini today so we’ll see.


It may well be an infection of some kind, so worth medicating if you're concerned. 
You seem to keep him well fed with Hikari wafers and zucchini so I'm assuming he's eating well.
I think a common pleco needs about 4 square inches of veggies a week or a little less with some other foods such as your wafers.


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## 21niko (Oct 9, 2020)

WaterChange said:


> It may well be an infection of some kind, so worth medicating if you're concerned.
> You seem to keep him well fed with Hikari wafers and zucchini so I'm assuming he's eating well.
> I think a common pleco needs about 4 square inches of veggies a week or a little less with some other foods such as your wafers.


Ok will feed the big guy/girl more throughout the week lol thanks I’ll keep you posted on how this goes.👍


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## 21niko (Oct 9, 2020)

WaterChange said:


> It may well be an infection of some kind, so worth medicating if you're concerned.
> You seem to keep him well fed with Hikari wafers and zucchini so I'm assuming he's eating well.
> I think a common pleco needs about 4 square inches of veggies a week or a little less with some other foods such as your wafers.


He’s made a good recovery and the Fritz Paracleanse treatment I used worked really well thanks for the help👍


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