Unusually large cherry barb

[Apistogramma]

Hi there, havent been on here for a while,
Turned the light on this morning to find a incredibly fat female cherry barb, i would of said it is carrying eggs but from gills to anal fins the fishes scales a very lifted(from the anal fin to the tip of the tail it is normal). i also noticed a red blemish just behind the gill only on the right side, other than that he is acting normal, eating and he is not breathing rapidly(just like normal).
As far as water quality is concerned, it is very good, i have kept glass cats and bamboo shrimp in it for a while(6 months) now and have had no deaths, all the other fish in the tank are fine.
The tank is a 100ltr rekord with a fluval 205 and jewel internal box filter that came with the tank. The tank mates are 6 glass cats, 6 cherry barbs, 4 bamboo shrimp, 5 ember tetras and a baby albino bn pleco which i plan to move up to my 240ltr tank when the time comes.
Thanks,
Will

[William]

Sounds like dropsy to me if the scales are lifted as you say. Do a google image search for dropsy and look at the pics. Is that how your fish look??

[wolf_eyes]

Hmmm sounds like dropsy if you ask me
http://www.fishandpics.com/images/dropsy/dropsy4.jpg
http://www.koivet.com/images/dropsy_large.jpg

The usual tell tell sign is the "pine cone" look to the scales and bloating.
In most cases, dropsy does not have a good outcome. Dropsy itself is just a side effect of a disease so it can be hard to figure out what to treat with. Often when the fish starts to swell the damage is hard to reverse. Is the fish lethargic, not interested in eating, or showing any other signs of not being in good health?

The other options would be she may be eggbound or constipated. In the case of constipation you do not want to feed her meaty foods or any food for a few days. This will give her body time to digest the food in her belly already. the other suggestion would be to feed her a pea that has it's shell taken off. This will give her some fiber to help loosen her system up.

[Apistogramma]

Yes, its looks like dropsy, the only doubt that i have is that he is acting just the same as all the other normal cherrys(eating, moving around, breathing normally). If it is dropsy, should i isolate the fish in a breeding trap, or into a separate tank?, is it contagious?

[wolf_eyes]

It can be contagious, it all depends on the disease that is causing the dropsy. As said, dropsy is just a symptom of an infection. Sometimes its bacterial, sometimes though rarely it's viral. Most healthy fish should be able to resist the disease but I would remove the fish from the tank and put into another one, just in case it is a contagious version. In my opinion its always best to err on the side of caution.

The fact that she is acting normal makes me thing its either very early stages or she may have another issue going on. After separating her, try to feed her a pea if you have any around. It may just be bad constipation in link with her being full of eggs... at least that's what I hope the case is, since its a much easier fix :).