Garra flavatra dying

[Hanuman]

Hey there @Hanuman. Michelle here from the states. I came across your post, as my panda garra suddenly seems to be going downhill quick. I was unaware, but I dosed my tank 2 days in a row with potassium. I guess it could be potassium poisoning, but tetra's, and otos seem to be fine. I have had him for roughly a year, happens to be my favorite little guy in the tank (fully planted rainbow tank, with one tetra and a couple otos and the panda) my plants were not growing so great, so my local fish store told me to dose potassium for 2 days. I'm just wondering if you have any idea what happened to yours? Sorry to hear about the loss of your other ones. Never a good feeling. Thanks for any input, Michelle.

I'll be honest but I think potassium has nothing to do with what you are experiencing unless you severely overdosed and by severely I mean you dumped the whole botte and some. Many people and me included dosed EI levels of K. That is 20-30ppm of K.
In my case I was never able to find what the reason was. Only one survived for some reason and he is doing just fine. He never exhibited any of the symptoms other did. All other fish in my tank are doing just fine. Only thing I can think of at this stage was that they died of some disease or genetic disorder or whatnot because I can't find any other explanation.

 

[mibelle85]

@Hanuman thank you very much for your response. No, it definitely wasn't that much. It was just the recommended dose, but 2 days in a row. It's so odd. He's been completely fine for quite some time, then out of no where he's declining. He's swimming erratically and just being weird. We have him contained to one side of the tank by himself. He's eating just fine, and we actually just added some medicated blood worms for internal parasites just to be safe (the tank had some type of internal parasite from the rainbow fish over a year ago from the fish store, which of course we had to medicate all of them.. and none have shown any parasites at all, until today.. when we happened to notice one of the rainbow fish has a white stringy poop.. so I thought maybe it's possible he's had some kind of parasite we weren't aware of) anyway, he's keeping himself upright, but when he goes to swim he is basically spiraling. He'll land back on the ground, and sometimes he'll land on his side or back, but he'll flip himself back over. As long as he doesn't try to swim he seems to be fine. Lastly, he does try to suck onto the glass but it's like he can't. Sorry for being long winded, but kind of at a loss here. Thank you again for your response and help!!

 

[Hanuman]

Yes I feel you. Is the fish doing like in the video I posted earlier in the thread? Don't want to discourage you, but in my case, when they started doing that it was a matter of time before they died.

 

[mibelle85]

@sparkyweasel thank you very much! Sorry I am new here and did not see this response. I did do some fairly large water changes just in case it was the potassium. I will do as you suggested as soon as I can.

 

[mibelle85]

Yes I feel you. Is the fish doing like in the video I posted earlier in the thread? Don't want to discourage you, but in my case, when they started doing that it was a matter of time before they died.

I did not even see the video until now. It is kind of similar, but he's more so just kind of chilling. But, that's mostly because he's contained to one side of the tank. I will try to get a video if he starts swimming, he's more so just cruising along the bottom.