Disappearing/reappearing (but wounded) fish.

[Bert Nagel]

The past summer, on impulse, we added 4 gold feeder fish to our existing 2 grown, 1 mostly grown, family. They've grown nicely to a good 7'' to 8' excluding tails. In any event, this past April one of them vanished. We assumed it was likely a heron as while we've had raccoons in the yard they've never shown any interest int he fish. Oddly enough, about 12 days later it reappeared but with a chunk missing from it's side. Nasty looking wound that as healed nicely but wound or no wound it obviously hadn't been taken by a heron. Two weeks ago and second smaller fish vanished only to reappear 9 days later also with a chunk missing. It was rather disoriented...tail frantically swishing back and forth and, for the most part, swimming with it's head down. Within twenty 24 hours it was swimming as normal. We've had water snakes eat small bull frogs and we have skinks but neither of them are good candidates for what's happened. Any ideas?

 

[Meyer Jordan]

The raccoons aren't as harmless as you think. If you had a turtle, I would also suspect that.

 

[bettasngoldfish]

Is there anything in the pond that you can think of that they could be getting hurt by?

 

[Bert Nagel]

Nothing. Certainly nothing that would cause these great of wounds and, even if there were there something, why the disappearing. It may always be a mystery. In regards to raccoons I don't for a minute think they're harmless but we've been picking up (game camera) raccoons, possums and black bears in the yard for as long as we've had the pond and, except for the bears stopping for a drink, they've all ignored both the pond and the fish. In regards to turtles, their habits (gotta sun themselves) would make them too visible.

 

[bettasngoldfish]

Nothing. Certainly nothing that would cause these great of wounds and, even if there were there something, why the disappearing.

My guess is that once the fish is injured it becomes stressed and is hidden near or at the bottom of the pond. Once they have recovered enough and are feeling better (or not scared) they are back out and about where you would normally see them.

No idea what is harming them though...

 

[Mmathis]

Is your pond covered?

 

[springknee]

I don't see the snapping turtles (mud turtles) sun bathing like the other turtles. They can be very elusive and can stay under for a very long time.

 

[Dave 54]

May I suggest getting down and dirty to find out whats predating your fish in this way "play the preditor at its own game and spy it out on a remote camera at least then you'll have your answer".
You can then proceed about ridding your garden of what ever it is

Dave