Gas Bubble Disease and Popeye
David Cripe, Ed Kowalski and Melissa Phipps
Posted to The Breeders Registry emailing list, 26th May 1999.
Just a little hiccup to Ed's comments. His last remark about using an airstone - I have had, over the years, more than one fish develop "popeye." One possible cause suggested to me has been the use of airstones, which leave tiny bubbles, which the fish can take in, causing such things as popeye. As clownfish are my main interest, I have stopped using airstones except inside a skimmer. If you do want to try one in a tank, coarser bubbles are one thing to consider perhaps.
Mellisa Phipps
"Popeye" is not caused by the size air bubbles that typical airstones produce. Gas bubble disease, the disease that has been suggested to you as a cause, is usually produced by air being taken up on the intake side of a pump, then churned up by the pump (which creates extremely tiny bubbles, and then spit out into the tank. Bubbles taken up on the out-take side or airstones do not usually produce bubbles small enough to cause the disease. In fact, in all my years, I have yet to see a case of gas bubble disease not cause by air being pulled in on the intake side.
Also, with gas bubble disease, you can usually see symptoms in other areas of the body as well, like under some scales or in the skin of the fins.
Your problem is more likely associated with a bacterial infection. This is often caused by an injury. The fish scrapes the eye (which is usually not seen by the aquarist) and later, sometimes weeks, the eye becomes infected. Sometimes the injury comes from being chased around the tank.
The bacterial infection can also be passed from fish to fish but this is less likely than the last scenario.
I have, ONCE, seen a case where a very large fish was caught up in a net to be moved and as he struggled in the net violently, an air bubble did get up into the eye. You could actually see the bubble in there. However, the eye never became infected and the air bubble cleared out on it's own.
I just thought I would help out with this problem as we do an extreme amount of fish medicine here (like most public aquariums). And unlike most hobbyist, we have the ability to get necropsy feedback from a lab. (By the way, our on-exhibit mortality is virtually nil, but we do experience some mortality on new shipments in the first couple of weeks.)
David Cripes
Gas bubble disease, like Melissa said, is not due to air bubbles in the water, but actually dissolved gases (both O2 and N2). With many fishes, signs of GBD, will show up when the total dissolved gases exceed 110-130%. With some fishes, O2 levels of over 300% did not produce GBD. Usually, on smaller systems, this is due to the entraining of air on the intake side of a pump. The easiest solution to this is finding and fixing the pump, but having a trickle filter (dembolizing tower), water "fall" into the tank or sump or strong aeration in the tank or the sump will off gas any supersaturated dissolved gases. For this reason, as a protective measure, I have overflow drains, as opposed to siphon/suction tube, and aeration (usually in the sump) on all of my systems. This will also help off gas a build up of CO2 and the associated pH drop that some tanks experience when the lights go off. Also GBD will manifest itself in more than just the eyes, and unless the supersaturation is fixed, it is usually fatal in a very short period of time.
Unilateral exothalamus (popeye in one eye) is often due to external damage (being spined, having a rock fall on it, etc.). This can lead to a bacterial infection, but may not. I have had unilateral exothalamus resolve itself without any meds, and have never seen a benefitial effect of anitbiotics/bacterialcides on unilateral exothalamus. Systemic bacterial infections usually manifest themselves with bilateral exothalamus. I would check on the stability of the rockwork and the "spinyness" of the tankmates as they are more than likely the suspects of the popeye.
Ed Kowalski
Just a small addition to Melissa's comments, I''ve had nematode infections in assorted species of tadpoles cause a gas bubble type of disease that appeared in about 10% of the total clutch. At the time I thought that the air stones might also be the culprit, however when the necropsy results came back a infection of nematodes was indicated. The nematodes were eliminated with several antihelmitic baths and the gas bubbles stopped appearing in the tadpoles.
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