Has anyone heard of this happening?

My fish who was dropped by Pet Supplies Plus and was sent to the vet turned black and her face swelled up so that one eye is completely covered within about 24 hours. She was put on Tetramycin and StressCoat+ and they hope it's that antibiotic that did this.

She also lost about half her weight. She's not a round little fish now.

I just put the question into the store about when these changes happened. The manager who oversaw this went on vacation right after I picked her up.

She is doing great! Swimming around and grazing for food. I gave her another dose of Tetramycin this morning and another will come tomorrow. Keeping up the twice-daily StressCoat+. She is very into eating.

Has anyone heard of something like this happening? Is it plausible? Could my fish have died and they replaced it with another one?

Just wondering.....

Most stores don't employ vets. Very few vets know fish. Fish are drop all the time. Most time you don't see it happen. The only fish I know that can't handle being drop is an elephant nose. I don't think what your being told about the meds and stresscoat is helping. I think its a way of making you feel good and to generate sales.

And they might have changed the fish on you.

but would that mean she died?

It is possible, yet I can't truly say that.It just struck me strange that you notice a variety of differences in your new baby. Like the weight difference, color change.The substitute to keep you from returning a fish in the 14 day grace period or whatever the store offers. And could be the manager saw how emotional you were over that fish and wanted to make you feel whole.

No one there "knows anything" of course, and the manager who handled it will be off until next Thurs, and I suppose he probably won't have the information.

She said I could return the fish, but the fish isn't really ok - does look like she could've had a trauma. I guess I don't want to take it/her back because I doubt she could be sold and I don't want to be the agent of her demise. Especially if there is any chance it's my baby. I'm thinking this fish would be euthanized if I return it. I don't want to be ruthless that way.

I'm pretty much persona non grata there, so I doubt I'll ever find out what happened. But really, they should be able to give me information.

Oh well. Just babbling.

but on the other hand,

well i did replace a fish once at the behest of a worried parent. the details were obviously to spare her child the lessons of life and death cycles.

but in your case i can definately sense something fishy. fish dont often make miraculous recoveries when they are courting Death so near his door

but anything is possible. whether they swept the issue under the rug or not.... in the end you do have a healthy lively fish in your possession that for all intents and purposes is physically identical

This fish has cute proportions, I will admit, and certainly loves to eat and root around in the substrate. I put a couple of live plants in the tank to see if she'd like to dig them up, but I think I've got them in there strongly enough.

If they did switch fish, this may not be one I'd have bought, but she seems to be doing well so perhaps I can let it go. Eventually, once the tank is definitely cycled and settled in, I want to get her a buddy and in time move them to my 40 gal breeder.

Thanks for your thoughts.