# Lost my mother medaka...



## Tamyu (Mar 17, 2012)

A while back, my wild male medaka passed away. He was a grizzled old thing - one of his eyes was missing, one of his fins was bent, and he had a ton of missing scales. A more knowledgable friend (who breeds medaka) took a look at him and told me he was in the late stages if his life - an amazingly elderly fish.

He hit it off with one of my pink females, and they created many many happy little eggs together. Then, one morning, he lost his appetite, started sitting on the bottom (or on top of the filter) and after a few days passed away. 

The little pink female stopped laying eggs. I have other males, but she wanted nothing to do with them even though they chased her around trying to get her to mate.

She kept getting more and more full of eggs. She dropped a couple, but was so full she looked like she was going to burst. I isolated her, fasted, did an epsom salt bath and tried to relieve it, but she was clearly stressed. 
Yesterday evening, she dropped about 25 eggs (normally only lays about 8 at one time), twitched for a bit, then lay on the bottom of the tank and slowly stopped breathing.  Her abdomen was like a deflated balloon...

She left behind tons of fry, but... I feel terrible. It feels like she died of lovesickness.


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## Olympia (Aug 25, 2011)

Poor girl.  Sounds like she was only after the wild men.
At least you have some babies from the first two?


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## Tamyu (Mar 17, 2012)

Olympia said:


> Poor girl.  Sounds like she was only after the wild men.


I know, and it is kind of funny in its own way. I even added another adult male (store bought) to try to tempt her, but she took no interest. I guess I should have tried to find another wild male for her... But maybe it was just _him_. The grizzled old gentleman.



> At least you have some babies from the first two?


Almost more than I know what to do with. The last of their eggs hatched a couple days ago, so I have a tank full of fry. My friend also gave me a pack of mixed eggs from her pond so that I would have some genetic diversity in the next generation. 

I know that they are fish, and that their world is not that complex, but it is so easy to make a tragic story in my head.


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## djembekah (Feb 13, 2012)

;-; i would think the same thing. like Olympia said, at least you have their babies <3


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## Olympia (Aug 25, 2011)

You can't deny the unique charm of a grizzled old man. xD
It's more fun when fish have drama.


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