You are here:
- Home
- Animals/Pets
- Pet Fish
- Fish
- Oscar Behavior
Fish/Oscar Behavior
Advertisement
Question
QUESTION: I have a Tiger Oscar, and he is about 9 inches long. He lives with a jack dempsey and lately both of them will act really weird they will start to twitch their tails and flip upside down and the oscar will open his gill and leave them open when swimming, Is this normal? or is there something else goin on here?
ANSWER: Hi Melanie,
This is not normal. Have you been doing regular partial water changes? You need to be changing 25% of the water in that tank once a week, every week, to keep those fish happy and healthy.
-- Ron
rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>
---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------
QUESTION: Yes we were doing our water changes every week but then it got to the point where the water was getting really dirty in just a few days, so i would take the fish out and drain the tank completely and now that there is new fresh water in the tank he still plays around like that doing the twitching thing. Other than that he seems to be very happy and is still coming to the tank when i would come to feed him and lets me pet him.
Hi Melanie,
How large a tank are these fish in?
The twitching could indicate parasites. Do they try to rub against the bottom of the tank or against a rock. If so, that often indicates an external parasite like ick.
Have you been feeding him live feeder fish?
-- Ron
rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>
Related Articles
Answers by Expert:
Ron Coleman
Expertise
I am an expert on cichlid fishes, particularly New World cichlids. My broader expertise includes the behavior, ecology and reproduction of fishes in general. (I am NOT an expert on Goldfish). Please do not use abbreviations, such as "my GT has a swollen eye" because I don't know what a "GT" is. The more clearly you can explain your question, the better chance I have of understanding what it is that you seek. I keep fishes both as a scientist and as a hobbyist and I currently maintain about 140 aquariums.
Experience
I am an Associate Professor at the California State University, Sacramento in the Department of Biological Sciences, and I run a website, called the Cichlid Research Home Page
Publications
Cichlid News, Tropical Fish Hobbyist, Freshwater and Marine Aquarium, Science, Behavioural Ecology and Sociobiology, Copeia, Canadian Journal of Zoology, Trends in Ecology and Evolution, AUK, Environmental Biology of Fishes
Education/Credentials
PhD (Toronto, 1993) MSc (Simon Fraser, 1986) BSc (British Columbia, 1983)
©2012 About.com, a part of The New York Times Company. All rights reserved.