Every time I try to medicate I get freaked because someone dies. I put Prazi from goldfishconnection in tank with about 7-10 nitrates. Immediately Estaban, my black moor turns upside down, he is at the top sucking air. Should I change my water? What...HElP!!!!!!

none of the other fish are experiencing this issue, just him. he uprighted and is looking for food, but is this normal...flukes fighting the meds or what? I know I am a worry wart freak, but geez the last time I tried to medicate I killed all my fish. I don't want to be paranoid...i am just worried!

Hey newb and sorry to hear you're having troubles. Medicating fish is soooo tricky. We've all talked on here about "shotgun" medicating, but I understand thats not what you're doing. Flukes infect the gills from what I've understood which would cause them to "yawn" trying to backflush the gills, and possibly would cause them to stay at the surface. The floating upside down sounds more like a swb issue, which one of the helpers or mods could give you more advice on. I don't think the Prazi is causing this, as Prazi should routinely be used for any new fish and doesn't harm your cycle.

I'm sure you know that any time you medicate the ammonia and nitrites need to be 0, and stay there for the meds to be effective. I would definitely do a large wc if I were you, and make sure the temp and ph are the same as to not stress out Esteban any more than he is.

Possibly you could answer all the questions at the top so we can see if there's anything not right in your water. Does Esteban have anything that looks like grains of salt on him?

Good luck and don't get discouraged. Hopefully this will get figured out.

Ok Emergency is over. I sat and watched for a couple hours and everything calmed down. The fish are doing great. I just get so scared when I medicate and something weird happens because of what happened in the past! Thanks for the help!

Sometimes, when a fish's gills are particularly loaded with flukes, the Prazi can kind of stun the fish when first applied. All the flukes go into spasm and die - I watched some under a microscope when Prazi is added. They twist and writh in agony as they die. Imagine that going on in the fish's gills and you can imaging why a heavily infested fish may react strangely when treated.

Each subsequent treatment should be better and better as more and more flukes die. Remember - the flukes damage and kill gill tissue. So even after you have eliminated all the horrid nasties, it will take weeks/months for your fish's gills to heal.

So I wasn't really freaking out. My poor babies were infested too much. Sorry fishies! Well they were sooooo much better this morning. so tonight water change and next dose! Thanks so much!