Aquarium ce héros
« Popeye » is not caused by the size air bubbles that typical airstones produce. Gü bubble disease, the disease that has been suggested to you as a cause, is usually produced by air being taken up on the intake side of a pump, then churned up by the pump (which creates extremely tiny bubbles, and then spit out into the tank. Bubbles taken up on the out-take side or airstones do not usually produce bubbles small enough to cause the disease. In fact, in all my years, I have yet to see a case of Gü bubble disease not cause by air being pulled in on the intake side.
Also, with Gü bubble disease, you can usually see symptoms in other areas of the body as well, like under some scales or in the skin of the fins.
Your problem is more likely associated with a bacterial infection. This is often caused by an injury. The fish scrapes the eye (which is usually not seen by the aquarist) and later, sometimes weeks, the eye becomes infected. Sometimes the injury comes from being chased around the tank.
The bacterial infection can also be passed from fish to fish but this is less likely than the last scenario.
I have, ONCE, seen a case where a very large fish was caught up in a net to be moved and as he struggled in the net violently, an air bubble did get up into the eye. You could actually see the bubble in there. However, the eye never became infected and the air bubble cleared out on it’s own.
I just thought I would help out with this problem as we do an extreme amount of fish medicine here (like most public aquariums). And unlike most hobbyist, we have the ability to get necropsy feedback from a lab. (By the way, our on-exhibit mortality is virtually nil, but we do experience some mortality on new shipments in the first couple of weeks.)
