Lithobates getting whooped on.

[Hobbiest]

In my 90 gallon I have mostly Malawi species. They were living together as well as expected for 9 months. I then sold eleven yellow Labs. In addition I set up the tank with little cover to discourage digging by a Zebra. I had lots of rocks in there just not lots of hiding. Anyway one of my Lithobates males started getting pounded on by the Cyno Afra big shot of the tank. They had been doing fine almost a year. The problem becomes that after separating the Lithobates he does not eat, and I have no fish to throw in with him to snap him out of it. I have in the meantime added four more fish to the 90, and will do some more too later to compensate for the Labs that I sold. I may have to put the Lithobates male back in the 90 if he is not going to eat. I have another male in there too who the Afra leaves alone. It is a beautiful fish, and I would just list him for sale if he were eating. It doesn't seem like a good idea to put him back in there but he has not touched food in maybe a week. So either way it might be curtains for him.

[lilscoots]

Sounds like he's got bloat.  Treat him with metro, a week without food is nothing for an african.  I wouldn't keep a lithobates with a bunch of mbuna but some people do.  Also, digging is natural behavior for them...removing hiding spots is probably going to mean that this lithobates is just the first in what's going to be more fish getting sick from stress.

[Hobbiest]

He bit the dust. My fault for not being setup with auxiliary tank. They assassinated him.

[Ava333]

I had a similar situation a while back. The fish was a little thin, maybe not getting enough to eat because of being on the bottom of the pecking order? He didn't really look bloated but I did an Espon Salt dip anyways. 1Tablespoon in a gallon of tank water for 30 minutes. But I stayed with him to observe. That's a LOT of Epson Salt, distress can happen quickly! After 2 days, 1 dip per day, he started to pooped. He was back to eating the next day, so I started him on Metro soaked food for a week. Best guess was the bulling caused stress which caused a bacterial infection.