# Blue ram died...ease my mind?



## Kyrol (Feb 24, 2012)

The sunken belly looks like it was internal parasites. I run the medicated fish food in my tank about every 3 months just as an insurance policy. The sunken looking belly is what my tiger barbs would get. They would still feed but never put weight on. The faster you treat it the better off you are. Alot of times it's just to much damage and you lose some.

Were you able to keep up with water changes?


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## Zefrik (Oct 23, 2011)

I am sorry about your loss. I have had fish tanks for over ten years and I have had weird deaths happen too. If you got the fish at a store you never know how old they are to begin with. So it is possible it was just getting old and frail. These things just happen, and most people are not able to perform a fish "autopsy" so to speak.


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## ThatGuyWithTheFish (Apr 29, 2012)

Are you sure that wasn't a Bolivian Ram instead of a German Blue? That has no color, and if it was a GBR, that suggests illness. I've never seen a GBR that pale due to stress. I had a red tail shark once that died of tb-it lost a lot of color and its neck sorta sank into the gill area, making it look like it had a big head. 

Also, welcome to the club. I'm surprised you haven't lost one until now. The first one is always heartbreaking, but (unfortunately?) you'll become desensitized to that fact. The real hard part is when an outbreak kills almost all of your fish. Ich/fungus once killed 5/6 of my fish in two tanks.


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## Miles (Sep 9, 2011)

ThatGuyWithTheFish said:


> Are you sure that wasn't a Bolivian Ram instead of a German Blue? That has no color, and if it was a GBR, that suggests illness. I've never seen a GBR that pale due to stress. I had a red tail shark once that died of tb-it lost a lot of color and its neck sorta sank into the gill area, making it look like it had a big head.


That is definitely a GBR, even with very little color bolivians and GBR's look totally different 










GBR's have very pronounced spots on the back, and there are blue dots around her gill plates. Females also develop a red belly which you can see in the post mortem photograph


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## LB79 (Nov 18, 2011)

Internal parasites...


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## Kwitzats (Apr 23, 2012)

Had to be the neons. Those things are EVIIILLLL! Cards are much nicer.
Seriously tho I hate losing Rams even tho they don't live long. And the reason i don't like neons is that they often come from places like walmart petco and whatnot which are ripe for introducing pestilence into your tank. I hope you find a replacement, they can be hard to find at smaller lfs since their water parameters are taxing to some. If you want a comparable replacement I suggest Kribs they are gorgeous, hardy and breed like rabbits. Oh and sometimes fish just die do not fret too much it happens.


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## Kwitzats (Apr 23, 2012)

BTW the deceased pic shows a postmortom red belly(dont know how to judge this) but the dorsal elongation while alive is indicative of a male i think. Hard to tell washed out tho.


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## dysorder (Oct 9, 2008)

I had the same problem after introducing a female to my planted tank after QTing for a month as I normally do. Within 2 days of being introduced eggs were laid. The next day she was dead.


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## treasy (Sep 9, 2011)

Kwitzats said:


> BTW the deceased pic shows a postmortom red belly(dont know how to judge this) but the dorsal elongation while alive is indicative of a male i think. Hard to tell washed out tho.


She was indeed a female and was part of a breeding pair.

To the person recommending kribs: I've actually found rams to be easier to find than kribs down here. I have never seen anyone selling kribensis down here, including a local fish farm


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## msawdey (Apr 6, 2009)

also.. that was not a bolivian... the striping are wrong in his top pics for bolivians.. that may have been a cross between the two.. I have seen them called colombian rams. Or just a veryyyyyy sick german.


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## VivaDaWolf (Feb 5, 2012)

Oh no, are sunken stomachs a 100% sign of internal parasites? I have 2 in my tank right now, its been maybe a month and one of them is showing the same thing, I started feeding a bit more thinking it wasn't getting enough food but all the other fish and the other ram don't look like that. Otherwise he looks healthy? :\ What should I do?


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## treasy (Sep 9, 2011)

msawdey said:


> also.. that was not a bolivian... the striping are wrong in his top pics for bolivians.. that may have been a cross between the two.. I have seen them called colombian rams. Or just a veryyyyyy sick german.



She was just very sick, hence the death.

Here's a picture from when I first got her, her coloration and morphology look exactly like a blue ram to me.


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## Guyute87 (Dec 28, 2013)

Oh no! I think the same thing is happening to mine, she looks just like the first pic. you posted on this thread  I had 2 females in my 55g community tank (I have pics on here of when they were healthy). The larger of the two died unexpectedly and now the smaller one is very pale and has white, stringy poop. She's acting normal and eating fine. None of the other fish (platys, angel, gourami, etc.) seem to be affected, but I'm thinking I should pull her into quarantine to treat her. My question is: I know GBRs get very easily stressed with moving/changes, so would it be worse to transfer her into quarantine or should I leave her and try to treat the whole tank? I have kuhlis so i don't want to put anything to harsh into the tank.


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## Josiah (Apr 16, 2013)

I agree, Looks like internal parasites.

Get some garlic/methane flakes/pellets from Ken's fish if it ever happens again.


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## mattjm20 (Nov 2, 2013)

IMO if your levels and general tank health are good, but one fish is suffering and you can't see the problem (e.g. - ich, fungus, etc.) you should put in a hospital tank and treat with anti-parasite meds. I have recently used Prazi Pro. It requires that you do a large w/c and re-dose every day for about 5 days or so, so make sure your hospital tank is of the 10-20G variety (both for ease of W/C and so you don't spend a ton of $ on the meds re-dosing a large tank).


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