# Am I overfeeding my baby fish or is this a disease of some sort?



## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

I've had a few fish get this fat and then they died. :/ 

I feed them only 3-4 times a day on average since they are babies I thought they were supposed to be fed often.

Only happened to mollies so far that I've noticed.

About 35% of my babies go up to the top to eat while the rest wait for it to fall down due to the filter. I think most of the mollies and some of the larger platies feed on the top, while the smaller platies wait on the bottom for the food. So I think the ones on the top end up eating more... and I put in enough for all of them, but these guys get more than the smaller ones.

I feed them crushed flake food (seemed like it worked just as good as brine shrimp but was easier... didn't notice explosive growth with brine shrimp like it's supposed to. Haven't fed them brine shrimp since I moved to the 44g). 

If this is caused by overfeeding/constipation or something, is there anything I could feed them to help it? Should I stop feeding so much? Or could this be dropsy or something?

Attached a picture of one of the dead fish (Rebecca (the fish)'s baby!!!  ) . Haven't had this happen for a week or two. 

Note these are balloon molly fry.


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

Can you post water params for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and pH? 
I am noticing clamped fins in the photo... is this the same with all of the fry? How many total fish are in this tank? What size tank?

The more details you can offer the faster we can help you.

Also, can you post a photo of the entire tank?


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## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

Hey, it's fins are not clamped it's just because I took it out of the water (the dead body) and that's what happened. It mostly just looks extra fat compared to the other fish.

I'm busy atm but I'll post water parameters later on.


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## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

Ok here's the parameters.

My test kit doesn't have nitrates (but I clean that tank about 50% once a week).

Also I could test for GH/KH if you want, don't know the exact numbers, but I didn't think it would be important but if it is I'll go test. I know my water is very hard. 

So here we go:

Temperature: 79.5 F
Nitrite: <0.3 mg/L (lowest it can go on the chart, so I'm guessing 0)
Ammonia: 0 mg/L
PH - 8.0 (Hard to tell, it seemed almost between 8.0 - 8.5 if I had to guess which color it was closest too I'd say about 8.2 PH)

(Btw it's a liquid test kit by Tetra)

Hope this helps determine the problem.  I bet it's just me overfeeding though. 

Oh and the tank is 44g, it's in my aquarium log. If you need me to post a pic here I will just tell me.

Thanks for the help.


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

Really need to know the nitrate level... and yes, could you please post a photo of the tank here?

Could you also include a pic of "live fry" in the tank and not out of the water?


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## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

Oh, sorry I was going to post pics in the 44g tank in my aquarium log since I noticed they weren't there and I forgot (each photo is around 2.4 MB and max in aquarium log is 2 MB so im too lazy to get any resized XD)... And sorry I don't got a nitrate reading. 


















Also forgot to say I bet theres about 50 babies in there.


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## fryup (Jan 12, 2010)

that first pick of fry , it looked really deformed.....or are they balloon mollies


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## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

It is a balloon molly. But I don't think they have the balloon shape that early on. It looks more deformed in the picture because it's fins are clamped because its out of water. It really didn't look deformed when it was alive. The only thing is that it's belly got huge and it died.


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

I'm noticing debris on the bottom of the tank... is this left over food?

I'm doing my best here, but without a nitrate reading there is only so much I can offer... Typically the first place to find clues to over feeding is in nitrate readings. I am going to strongly suggest you get yourself a nitrate test kit. Nitrate is just as important as ammonia, nitrite, and pH.


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## Austin (Feb 1, 2010)

The stuff on the bottom is some of the rock i couldn't get out when I cleaned the entire tank out before. And the white pieces are some sand that hijacks from my saltwater tank in the gravel vacuum. Probably some debris too but not all of it. I'll try to get a nitrate test kit eventually. If you can't figure it out for now w/o it, it's ok. It was only a few that this happened to and it doesn't seem to be an outbreak. Thanks for the help!


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