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My 8-9" tiger oscar has a bad case of popeye. The eye has swelled outwards at least 15cm and it has been sulking on the bottom for about 2 days. I am currently doing a tetra-cycline treatment with carbon removed (about 3-4 days) , but this is having no effect, actually it is getting worse rapidly.
My water conditions are ok although nitrate was about 15ppm last time I checked.
The eye was clouded for over 3 months previously but I could not cure it at that time. There are no other visible symptons at the moment.
My local aquarium suggested getting the O to ingest some of the tetracycline tablet in its food (it is obviously not eating atm). Others suggested adding salt aswell.
Are these reasonable things to try? Is it possible my O will only loose the eye if it continues to get worse?
Any suggestions wiould be helpful. Thanks.

Originally posted by Marko
My 8-9" tiger oscar has a bad case of popeye. The eye has swelled outwards at least 15cm and it has been sulking on the bottom for about 2 days. I am currently doing a tetra-cycline treatment with carbon removed (about 3-4 days) , but this is having no effect, actually it is getting worse rapidly.
My water conditions are ok although nitrate was about 15ppm last time I checked.
The eye was clouded for over 3 months previously but I could not cure it at that time. There are no other visible symptons at the moment.
My local aquarium suggested getting the O to ingest some of the tetracycline tablet in its food (it is obviously not eating atm). Others suggested adding salt aswell.
Are these reasonable things to try? Is it possible my O will only loose the eye if it continues to get worse?
Any suggestions wiould be helpful. Thanks.

I know this may be an unpopular suggestion, but the only time I had a case of popeye I did nothing special. No medication, nothing at all, other than watching the water conditions, keeping up with regular maintenance, etc. The pop eye cleared up on it's own after a couple of weeks. The fish was a South American Goldsaum (the commonly sold "Green Terror") and was juvi. With an Oscar, I probably would add a general medication like Clout to the aquarium because they are more prone to disease from stress than many other species and a general med would be a good deterrent. --Mark:cool:

Pop eye is more a symptom than a disease. The cause is generally a fluid build up behind the eye. Why the fluid builds up can be caused by a kidney disorder, an air bubble that infiltrated behind the eye socket ( usually from a young fish swimming into the filter discharge flow), dropsy, eye injury, or poor water quality, to name some. I am sure I forgot a few others. The general treatment for pop eye is to salt the tank (1 table spoon for 10 gallons), if no other reasons for the problem show up. Meds can be used, however its hit or miss on which one to use. Since only one eye is swollen, I will rule out dropsy, (both eyes tend to swell) the other possible med reason would be kidneys. Since the eye already had a problem, (cloudyness) I would rule this out as well.
Cloudy eyes are a symptom of poor water quality in most case's or an eye injury/infection.
I don't know your tank size, fish in it, or how often, and how much you change the water, so I can't really comment or rule out water issues. As Mark said treat with a broadspectrum antibiotic, (I think clout fits the bill) or if you want another option you could use furan, or kanamycin, or spectrogram.
In most case's of pop eye its not a fatal outcome, but yes in most case's the fish will either lose the eye, or become blind in it.