Have you ever seen a fish do this before....?

[Mmathis]

I just found one of my goldfish lying on its side, at the top of the water, among some floating plants..... Oh no, you can imagine where my mind was going by now. But the fish was active, just not "going anywhere." On a closer look, it looked like the fish was eagerly gobbling up something on one of the plant stems.....algae maybe, a bug..... Then I realized that the silly fish had impaled himself on a stem of something [I think it was a clover stem]. The stem had gone from his mouth and was sticking out of his gill! I was able to get him off, but he swam away before I could catch him -- I wanted to isolate and watch him for a while. I snapped a few pics, but they're not good -- I was more concerned with rescuing him -- but I think you can see the stem. Poor little guy! I have no idea how long he'd been like that.....

 

[Tula]

Oh dear ! Is the stem still hanging from it's gill?

 

[Mmathis]

Oh dear ! Is the stem still hanging from it's gill?

Yes -- all the way through!

 

[Faebinder]

It's mating season so stuff like that happens now.

 

[bagsmom]

OUCH! Poor thing!

 

[MitchM]

I've seen fish run into things before when they've become startled for some reason.

 

[Meyer Jordan]

Do not attempt to remove it. It will fall away given time.

 

[Lisak1]

No, but I sneezed milk out of my nose once...

 

[Mmathis]

Do not attempt to remove it. It will fall away given time.

I was afraid the fish was going to harm itself since the gills are delicate. Maybe, if I'd not panicked when I realized what was going on, I could have cut the stem at the "mouth" end and either pulled it out in the same direction as the impalement, or cut it and left it there.....to let nature take its course.

 

[Meyer Jordan]

There is a chance that more damage would be done to the lamillae by manual removal than by natural means.

 

[Mucky_Waters]

Nope never seen that before. That fish just won a Darwin Award. lol
Yeah cutting the stem off near his mouth and gently pulling it all the way through would have been the way I would have done it. It probably would have easily slipped right through.

 

[bettasngoldfish]

Oh my goodness, I have never seen anything like that....poor lil dude (cute by the way)

I hope he is okay, please keep us updated

 

[Mmathis]

I watched this little fish for a while yesterday and it seems to be OK.

At least now I know what NOT to do if this ever happens again. Actually, I'm sure it happens more than we think, it's just that this little guy got stuck on a long stem and I happened to find him in time.

 

[addy1]

That is a opps!