upside down goldfish !!

[thebreeches]

We have a goldfish which lives in a tank. It currently swims upside down! I believe it has swim bladder? does anyone know of a cure.

(No move to Australia jokes please!!!!)

Thanks

[andy hughes]

I don't believe that swim bladder problems are curable, but fish do sem to manage with their change in circumstances and live out their normal lifecycles in spite of them.

[Impret-Sir]

This can be a fairly comon problem with goldfish, particularly if they are of the 'fancy' variety, ie the ones with big floaty tails and fins. It has nothing to do with their swim bladders either. The problem comes from air being trapped in the bowel. Because the fish has a short, stubby body, unlike a normal long thin 'fish shaped' one, its bowels are very convoluted inside it, this results in blockages and trapped air pockets. This problem is exacerbated by the continual feeding of dry flake fish food. After a good crap or two the problem may improve, but once it starts its unlikely to go away completely. The problem will be worse in an older fish, as, (like all of us!) bowel motility slows down with age. It does seem to be true that the fish gets on with its life quite happily like this, we have had several that have gone on for years like it, in fact we have a 10 year old fish with this condition right now!