Air in eye

jduong916 · Sep 17, 2022

My shoulder tang was getting bullied by a sohal. I have since removed the sohal and it has been six month. The shoulder had a hazy blind eye and now the eye is protruding with multiple air bubbles in it. It kinda went away for a bit but came back and has been this was for at least three months. Is there something i can do? Im even open to possibilities where i have to remove the eye. It is very unsightly and the tang often bumps into rocks with the protruding eye.

Jay Hemdal · Sep 17, 2022

Those gas bubbles are caused by an injury and sometimes don’t reabsorb. I’ve tried drawing the gas off with a tuberculin syringe needle, but they come back. I even built a pressure chamber that would shrink the bubbles, but when the pressure was slowly released, the bubble would return. In some cases we’ve had our veterinarian remove the eye. I’ve never tried to do that on my own.

Sorry that there isn’t a good solution for you!

Jay

vetteguy53081 · Sep 17, 2022

I am 2 for 3 in this subsiding. Often it worsens the eye resulting in loss of eye or blindness. You can try maracyn AKA maracyn 1 for 5 days which is ethromyacin often effective for cloudy eye issues. Its a gamble you take but more comforting to me than waiting to see what happens next.
Agree with jay- Gas bubble which often ends up at the weakest part of the fishs' body- The eye

jduong916 · Sep 19, 2022

It was definitely from an injury, the sohal i got rid of went to town on the shoulder for a few days. The eye is just very unsightly, i almost want to remove the eye myself, but i dont know how and im not going to attempt it. So i guess im just going to leave him be. Feel bad for the guy, but seems like its out of my hands now.

Jay Hemdal · Sep 19, 2022

jduong916 said:
It was definitely from an injury, the sohal i got rid of went to town on the shoulder for a few days. The eye is just very unsightly, i almost want to remove the eye myself, but i dont know how and im not going to attempt it. So i guess im just going to leave him be. Feel bad for the guy, but seems like its out of my hands now.

In case you want to dive into this further, here is a link to an article I wrote of fish eye health:

Aquarium Fish: The ‘Eyes’ Have it: A Review of Eye Health in Aquarium Fishes

Aquarists need to inspect their fish closely every day, for signs of impending health problems. It is much easier to resolve a problem when it first starts, than to attempt a drastic emergency treatment when the fish is close to dying.

reefs.com

Jay