Red Devil Cichlid

Question

Red Devil  

Weird Swim   OK... Well, I have had this Red Devil Cichlid with me for about 4 years and he already had 2 years of age when we bought him. Therefore he is about 6-7 years old. The thing is that I had him living on a 160 gallon aquarium where he lived by himself. However, I decided 2 weeks ago to divide the tank into 2 so that I could put some other ones. And so, I did as planed and everything was going fine until last week when one of the Frontosa Cichlid crossed to the other side and my Red Devil ate him. This was a conclusion of mine, for the Frontosa suddenly dissapeared and wasnt any where in the tank nor the filters. Two days later my Red Devil started to be depressed. He is only at the bottom of the tank laying down on one side of his body and at other points he is at the surface floating on one side. But, he is mostly at the bottom of the tank. He doesnt want to do anything like before, and the only times he swims is when I try to tease or move him to move. At those points he starts moving normal, but suddenly he starts making weird kind of like crazy movements and goes back to his laying down position. Oh... He does eat... I give him floating pellets... And he doesnt seem to have any marks of disease in his skin... I dont know what could be happening to him... Is he sick, stressed, old? I tryied to help him with some stress coat an API product but it didnt change anything...

Answer
Luis,
It could be a couple of things. When you added the new fish, did you quarantine them for at least two weeks before adding them to the main tank? If the fish you added were sick, when your other fish "ate" it, it could have picked up the illness. It could also be swim bladder disease. Fast him for 2 days, and on day 3 feed him a couple of cooked shelled peas and then fast again for 2 days. Fasting him once a week and feeding a shelled cooked pea the next day, will help prevent this problem. If after the pea, he does not get better, or he gets worse at any time, let me know.