My fish needs sunglasses & a cane!

Does anybody know a good fishie optometrist? My poor black ocellaris clown seems to have gone blind! I woke up this monrning & the poor little guy was swimming back & forth in the tank until he bumped into something & changed directions. He doesn't respond to visual stimulae, and couldn't find his food. Has anybody heard of this happening before?

Some of the things I've recently changed:

- Started putting in some B-Ionic two part Alk/Calcium buffer
- Put a dose or two of Brightwell pH8.3 before changing to the B-Ionic
- I put a little ball with soft wavy protrusions all over it in the bottom of the tank, thinking the clown might like it as a simulated anemone. (I did this just last night, and removed it this morning) It's this one, only smaller.
- I dosed with Prime for a few days to try to get my Nitrate down
- Raised SG from 1.021 to 1.024 in about 3 days.
- Inserted some (lightly) used filter pads that are supposed to remove phosphate & contain activated carbon in the fibers.
- Vacuumed the very shallow sand bed and stirred it up tremendously. (1 wk ago)

pH: 7.8
SG: 1.024
NH3/4: 0.0
NO2: 0.0
NO3: ~20

Thanks for any thoughts and input!

 

does he have a haze over his eyes

 

No he doesn't appear to.

 

sorry to hear, it must be real heartbreaking to watch. on a lighter note....maybe its giving echo location a try:-/. ihave never heard of blind fish but have heard that blacklight can cause this. not saying that is whatyou used though

hope all is okay

 

Well of all the strange things! I get home from work & he appears to be just fine! He's responding to light & movement, and is chasing after his food like old times. No more bonking his head, thank goodness! This was certainly weird.

Thank you for the well wishes!

 

i have a suspicion that it may have been due to stirring up the sand bed... but not sure thats the cause

 

Did you wash that "koosh-like ball real well? I'm always suspect of placing items coming from China and other nations with a history of dangerous materials/chemicals being used for domestic products.

Just weird to me that it's the one thing you removed and he's recouped. It may have leached something into your water.

 

That is my suspicion as well. I've had the thing for quite some time, and it has been rinsed, though not right before I put in in the tank. It is now in the garbage can, and there it will stay.
Well I'm glad he recovered. I thought I might have to teach him to play piano and start calling him Ray.

 

Heck, get him to write a jingle for Pepsi and you'd be golden 8)

 

i was dieing when i read that ;D