My Flowerhorn’s Impossible Recovery from Swim Bladder Disorder

Pollock’s swim bladder disorder happened suddenly. About a week after, he stopped eating. Secondary symptoms were more holes in the head and nose area, and an open sore. B/c he was floating at the top of water all the time, his hump that was exposed to the air started to rot. It smelled like old rotting fish. Another week passed, and I tried the “Clear.” This entire time, I researched all that I could, phoned so many vets in the area and fish stores to find a fish vet, but I could not find any. I didn’t know what to do b/c he had swim bladder, holes in the head, and an open sore. I’ve never encountered something like this before.
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I’ve seen videos where a needle was inserted into the fish to release the air for the swim bladder disorder. I’ve never done this before, and I wasn’t confident at all that I could do this successfully. So I decided to tackle the hole in the head and the open sore first. I used “Clear.” I didn’t film most of this and the procedure b/c I wanted 100% of my attention on him. Sorry. But if you search “Flowerhorn Clear Medicine” on youtube, you can find lots of videos where people force feed flowerhorns with this medicine.
The instruction was to feed 5 consecutive times in 5 days with around 30 to 50% water change each day. Well, after the first dose, he regurgitated all of the medicine into the water. The next day, he became nearly completely white, and didn’t move from one spot. I decided not to give him the next dose b/c I thought it would make things worse. Day by day, he got worse than before using the medicine. He didn’t move from one spot for nearly a week. I contemplated on the needle procedure to release the air from his swim bladder, but he was in a very weak state and I thought it would make things worse.
Days went by, and each day he would freak out and thrash around here and there, and float up to the top of the water completely limp. Some days he would barely breathe. He would make an eye contact with me, and I couldn’t look at him anymore.
So, a flowerhorn with swim bladder disorder, rotting head, holes in the head and nose area, an open sore, completely pale and weak and barely breathing, freaking out daily trying to sink…was there a chance of recovery? I thought to myself.
I thought about many different ways to give him peace. I thought about quick violent ways to do it, too. But I couldn’t get myself to do this. Maybe one tetra with no name that I barely noticed in a group of 10 or more that was in a similar situation… I couldn’t do this to Pollock.
Clove oil and vodka method:
The day the clove oil arrived was the day Pollock sank. I didn’t open the package until late at night. I actually didn’t want to do it that day. After I opened the package, and a few hours later, I heard a huge splash and I saw that he had sank. I was ecstatic. It gave me hope. I fed him but he didn’t take the food. However, he took around 2 pellets the next day, and more and more thereafter.
It was around the third day after he started eating pellets that the “burn” on his hump started to heal. And then, it kept on healing very fast. It was like magic.
Final thoughts:
I think he wasn’t completely healed from the hole in the head and it caused the swim bladder disorder. B/c he couldn’t swim down and was stressed out, his condition worsened and he got secondary infections. Of course not eating made things much worse.
I’m not sure using “Clear” helped the ordeal. Just one dose made him go completely pale and made him much more lethargic. I can’t say it didn’t help, either. Maybe it took a long time for the medicine to work. When the clove oil had arrived, it was around 2 weeks after the first and only dose of “Clear.”
I don’t know what’s in “Clear.” From my reading, it’s a cocktail of 3 different medicines. Many flowerhorn owners used it for hole in the head and it helped.
If you’re interested, here’s the link: amzn.to/33J2mIM
In the end, his swim bladder is back to normal, his head burn healed completely, open sore is gone, and there are scars where the holes in the head were.
This was the craziest recovery of any fish that I’ve ever kept. I’m so glad that he got better. He’s like a pet dog to me. I’m planning on getting him a bigger tank. Thank you so much for all the concerns past few months. You don’t know how much your kind words mean to me.
Music:
Gymnopédie No. 1 - Erik Satie (Acoustic Guitar)
Played by Shawn Hertel
• Gymnopédie No. 1 - Eri...