jack dempsys

Question
none of my other fish so signs of sickness. the water has a white cloud to it. i have tried everything to get rid of it and i cant seem to get it to go away. i bought a test kit all my levels are fine. i have tried 3 different water cleares. it starts to go away but then comes right back. today i am gonna try another water change and see if that hepls at all. i have spent countless hours on this trying to figure it out. for now i have seperated my big jack into one of my smaller tanks untill he recovers from whatever it is
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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
it is possible but i never see it happen. there is another jack in the tank and they seem to have paired off. 10inch+ oscar he is pretty mellow a 6 inch oscar who tries to jump out the tank 5 times a day and two baby pirahnans (sp.) its a big tank and there never seems to be confrontation.
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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
one of my jack's have white rings around his/her eyes where they connect to the body and it a apperars the belly is swollen and he/she just is kinda being mellow sitting on the bottom
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Hi Brandon,
  It sounds like that fish has been beaten up a little (which often shows first as eye damage).  Is that a possibility?

-- Ron
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>

-----Answer-----
Hi Brandon,
  The only other possibility is that your water is really, really nasty but I will assume that isn't the case.  More likely, they are fighting when you aren't watching.  

-- Ron
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>


Answer
Hi Brandon,
  The white cloudiness comes from a "bloom" of bacteria.  Basically there are too many free nutrients in your tank, either from something dead in there (which I assume you have checked for) or an overabundance of uneaten food, or your filters simply can't handle the biological load made by the fish.  The solution is to do more frequent water changes.
You need to be changing about 20-25% of the water once a week, every week.  When you do that, be sure you are using a gravel siphon because that's where the problem is likely concentrated.   In the short term, I would do a 25% water change every other day for about 3 times -- that should clear it up and then go to the once a week routine.

Be sure that you are not putting in excess food. Put in only what they eat immediately and never put in food for them "to eat later".

-- Ron
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>