Chances of survival?

[Jaynee]

Tonight I found that one of my cories had impaled himself on one of my synthetic plants. It's a spiky plant with super-long threads and when I got home from a friend's house tonight I found the cory - one of the threads ran through his mouth and came out his side gill. He was about 4" down from the top of the thread and basically unable to move. It was almost like he was swimming and accidently ran into the thread with his mouth open, but then couldn't dislodge and ended up going deeper and deeper onto the thread. When I saw him tonight, I immediately reached in and pulled him off, and now he is laying on the bottom of the tank, very listless.

I put Stress Coat in the tank in the hopes that would help, but I'm curious whether you think the cory will recover from this. Should I quarantine him and use a different kind of medication than Stress Coat? As I said, I have no idea how long he was stuck - he certainly wasn't like that this morning when I fed the fish. So it was sometime this afternoon.

[lohachata]

there is a chance that your cory injured a gill... if so; it is likely it won't make it.. if a gill was not damaged; being impaled and unable to move for so long would have caused considerable stress.. but there is a chance it will survive...
just keep your fingers crossed......and good luck..

[Jaynee]

It does look like he has injured a gill - while the gills normally lay flat against their body, this one side it noticibly sticks out and you can see the pink underside.

He is still alive this morning - and even swimming around occasionally (I just saw him swim to the surface and back down). However, he doesn't move when other fish swim by.

[Hydr0 JoE]

poor guy, hope he gets better, good luck

[Jaynee]

Well, seven hours later he's still hanging in there. Just watched the tank for a few moments. He wasn't moving much and then swam to the top and dove back down again. His gills look better than they did last night, but that could also be wishful thinking on my part.

[<3~Pleco~<3]

awww thats so unfortunate!
I hope your little guy stays strong!

[Jaynee]

He's still hangin' in. When I did the 6 p.m. feeding he did skate around the tank and eat, which was promising.

[Jaynee]

This cory fish is amazing - he is still alive! Not only that, but his gill looks a LOT better (could the Stress Coat really have helped?). He ate this morning when I fed the fish and every time I go to the tank he's in a new spot - so he's moving around the tank as opposed to just laying around doing nothing.

[Jaynee]

Oh. My. Word.

I do believe my fish has fully recovered! Today he is swimming around the entire tank, full of energy and his gill looks perfect - it doesn't even look like he suffered any damage whatsoever.

I count that as a miracle!!

[Zakk]

he is one lucky fish. i dont think he did much damage to his gills. all the best!