HELP! ornate bichir

[bomb-]

Well he's one of my favorite fish (the species). my old one died (i checked him, he seemed to be fine but i have him for a really long time, he mighta died from old age?), and so i got a new medium sized one.

i got this new one and he did fine the first day but the second day i've been noticing everyone has been picking on him even if he's a good medium sized fish. so i put him in a little separate quarantine tank. i'm afraid it's too small, he can't move that much, but if i take him out he just gets eaten. and since he's a bottom dweller and i have a vampire pleco (my vampire pleco and old ornate bichir did fine together.. they "played" with each other often). and this pleco has teeth and he hurt him pretty bad.

some of his scales are outlined red (blood obviously), fins are chewed up, open woiunds in various places.
one of the main things im noticing is how he cant stay upright, he always turns upside down

what do i do?

[flamingo]

Add Melafix, and leave him be. Messing with it more than you have to will just stress it to the point of death. I've had a bichir hit concrete, roll under a dryer, get full of stuff, and almost dry out- and it lived months afterwards. Pretty resilient, so no need to worry.

Btw, your other bichir probably didn't die of old age- a projected lifespan is at 40+ years. TFH had a story of one bichir being passed down in generations.