goldfish help
- Thread starter Russianwolf
- Start date
Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
bitshird
Member
It looks like Ich, I know copper or Malachite green will cure it in most species but Carp and Goldfishes I'm not sure of, did their water get a sudden temp change? or introduce any new fish to the aquarium /fishbowl??
Daniel
Member
It is hard to tell from the photos but it looks like Ick. pretty common problem. turn all lights off and keep the tank is darkness as much as possible. the spores cannot grow without light. There are products like stop Ick that you can get from any Aquarium shop or pet store. in really bad cases you can actually take the fish out of the tank and either drop them shortly in a bowl of salty water or even run them under tap water. then immediatley retun them to the fresh water of the aquarium. I really do not recommend the tap water as the cloriene actually burns ther gills. salt water will not hurt them at all for just short exposures.
better photos might show it as something different.
If the problem is actually lifting there scales. you have a much more serious problem called Flukes. that requires salt baths daily until it clears up as well as other treatments and honestly I have never been very successful at saving those cases even with that.
you can actually take a fish from the water and apply things like alcohol with a q-tip or other treatments and it will help. just don't over due it and remember you are tainting there water little by little every time you do it.
as for treating the tanks. start 20% water changes every day until well after the problem is gone.
Ick spores are always present in an Aquarium but any change for the fish might have reduced their resistance to it. so the emphasis is on helping the fish recover. clean water is secondary.
better photos might show it as something different.
If the problem is actually lifting there scales. you have a much more serious problem called Flukes. that requires salt baths daily until it clears up as well as other treatments and honestly I have never been very successful at saving those cases even with that.
you can actually take a fish from the water and apply things like alcohol with a q-tip or other treatments and it will help. just don't over due it and remember you are tainting there water little by little every time you do it.
as for treating the tanks. start 20% water changes every day until well after the problem is gone.
Ick spores are always present in an Aquarium but any change for the fish might have reduced their resistance to it. so the emphasis is on helping the fish recover. clean water is secondary.
Last edited:
Russianwolf
Member
at first I thought it was a fungus as it's not the specks that I'm used to on tropicals, but patches that formed around the head. I've been treating them for two weeks now, first with a broad spectrum medication that is supposed to work on both fungus and ick, then with Maracyn TC. The maracyn isn't doing a thing for it as far as I can tell.
Got the wife at Petsmart right now getting some sea salt to add to the tank (3% should do them some good if I recall correctly) and some Malacite green (which I had them confirm for goldfish).
One of these guys I gave goldfish cpr to a while back and he's still hanging in there. I'm not giving up on them yet.
It's hard to take good pics since the focus wants to default to the glass.
Got the wife at Petsmart right now getting some sea salt to add to the tank (3% should do them some good if I recall correctly) and some Malacite green (which I had them confirm for goldfish).
One of these guys I gave goldfish cpr to a while back and he's still hanging in there. I'm not giving up on them yet.
It's hard to take good pics since the focus wants to default to the glass.
Dario
Member
Do they try to scratch by hitting something by swimming and hitting it? If yes it is ick as mentioned. There are water drops you can buy at pet shop/store to help remedy this.
cnirenberg
Member
It's Ick
Jim Smith
Member
Not being able to see them in person, it's kind of difficult to diagnose, but my bet would be a fungus more than ich. If you have not already done so, isolate them now and start treatment with a fungiside. Sterilize the tank and filter and of course change the water before you put any more fish in that tank. My guess is that the fungus is attacking their gills as well, causing them to suffocate. Just one person's educated guess.
Jim Smith
Jim Smith
Daniel
Member
Mike, most of the medications are nearly worthless. if you have any type of charcoal in your filtration system you are removing the meds as fast as you add them. add the sea salt to the water at the rate of one teaspoon per gal of water. they can live in this no problem. but also make a bowl of salt water that is about 4 times that. take each fish and drop them in this bowl for up to 5 minutes. it does not hurt them. the problem for fresh water fish in salt water has to do with how they process water out of there system not the salt itself. basically eventually they will drown in salt water but it takes a while. but he fungus is getting the tar beat out of it from the salt.
you can actuall swab methiolate blue, Malacite green or other remidies directly to the areas and see if you get any better results in those areas as well. get a winner and go to town with it. Golf fish are really strong as fish go so they can put up with an amazing amount of handeling. make sure you keep your hands wet when you do handle them or you are removing the natural protection they have from infections such as this.
in truth salt baths are about the best treatment going for almost anything. if it comes down to desperation you can actually make a saturation salt bath. no more salt will desolv and give them a quick dunk. and I mean quick no more than 10 seconds or so. but by the time you get to that you are in a do or die situation anyway. I once went for broke and ran a fish under tap water for 15 minutes figuring it was a gonner anyway. got up the next morning and it was right as rain. no sign of any infection anywhere. so you never know. basically all treatments are a balance of killing the fungus and not killing the fish.
you can actuall swab methiolate blue, Malacite green or other remidies directly to the areas and see if you get any better results in those areas as well. get a winner and go to town with it. Golf fish are really strong as fish go so they can put up with an amazing amount of handeling. make sure you keep your hands wet when you do handle them or you are removing the natural protection they have from infections such as this.
in truth salt baths are about the best treatment going for almost anything. if it comes down to desperation you can actually make a saturation salt bath. no more salt will desolv and give them a quick dunk. and I mean quick no more than 10 seconds or so. but by the time you get to that you are in a do or die situation anyway. I once went for broke and ran a fish under tap water for 15 minutes figuring it was a gonner anyway. got up the next morning and it was right as rain. no sign of any infection anywhere. so you never know. basically all treatments are a balance of killing the fungus and not killing the fish.
Daniel
Member
Mike, is this a growth on the surface of the scales or are there actually holes or ulcers that penetrate the skin?
Daniel
Member
Actually sterilizing any aquarium is a bad idea. the system is balanced by bacteria. steralizing kills all the bacteria including the ones the fish need to stay alive. same problem with medicating an aquarium. moving them to a small tank that you can treat is a basic when treating sick fish. but the original tank needs to be allowed to balance itself and the fish need to be brought back to a conditon that there natural defensis are doing their job. salt not only harms whatever it is that is on them. it stimulates the production of the fishes protective coating.
Russianwolf
Member
no ulcers or sores, just seems like the slime coat is having issues. Their eyes are cloudy, the patches show up (again thought it was fungus, but it's not growing like fungus usually does, no sheep), the the tips of all the fins get small white dots on them and start to slowly deteriorate, but not as badly/quickly as fin rot that I remember.
Knowing goldfish as well (and poorly) as I do, I'm betting their waste has finally caught up with the tank. I've got a Magnum 350 adn undergravel filter running on the 55 gal tank, but we had 12 goldfish ranging from 6-12 inches in there,
Knowing goldfish as well (and poorly) as I do, I'm betting their waste has finally caught up with the tank. I've got a Magnum 350 adn undergravel filter running on the 55 gal tank, but we had 12 goldfish ranging from 6-12 inches in there,
Dario
Member
Gold fish is one of the "dirties" fish I know...I mean they can make the water really toxic that only they can survive and yes you need to replace the water at times especially if there are that much that size in it.
white spots are almost always cased by Ick...
Go get some ick remover, which is essentially Iodine (I think) that turns the water purple...the ick dissapears after about two doses, usually...then do a 1/3 water change...Never change more than a 1/3 of the water at a time, or you'll get rid of all the helpful bacteria that keep the fishtank healthy!
So go get some ick remover (a little bottle at Walmart cost about 4 bucks - you only need a teaspoon or so), and your fish should be fine soon!
Andrew
Go get some ick remover, which is essentially Iodine (I think) that turns the water purple...the ick dissapears after about two doses, usually...then do a 1/3 water change...Never change more than a 1/3 of the water at a time, or you'll get rid of all the helpful bacteria that keep the fishtank healthy!
So go get some ick remover (a little bottle at Walmart cost about 4 bucks - you only need a teaspoon or so), and your fish should be fine soon!
Andrew
Russianwolf
Member
exactly why they belong in ponds and not aquarium. I had these in ponds but LOML felt sorry for them when it got cold and had me get an aquarium for winter, then she wouldn't let me put them back in the pond.
I had a bunch of live plants in the tank that helped clean up their waste, but they destroyed them faster than the plants could grow.
I had some awesome plants back when I had my Cichlid tanks, but can't find them anymore. I think they were called "wonder bulbs" as they were a bulb that you put in the gravel and they grew, and grew, and grew. great plants.
If the ammonia level is too high, that could be causing the problems too - change the filter in your tank often, and use one of those 'ammonia clear' pucks that lower the ammonia level in your tank...
Andrew
Andrew
mrcook4570
Member
Two thoughts
1) golfish make good catfish bait :wink:
2) goldfish are hell without tartar sauce :biggrin:
1) golfish make good catfish bait :wink:
2) goldfish are hell without tartar sauce :biggrin:
Daniel
Member
Mike, can you do an Ammonia test. the problem could be ammonia it could very well be something like that. I am not used to seeing it because I tend to tinker all the time with my aquariums so forgetting to keep up with water changes and stuff is not often an issue. if Ammonia is high Ammo Carb is the instant fix. small water changes over the next few days is the long term fix. that and getting the filter system un clogged.
What usually happens is something causes there slime coat to be compromised and then bacteria set in. bacteria are almost always involved at some point but not always the problem. with the ulcers I was thinking of something like Lateral Line Disease which is suspected of being neurological or something like that.
you definitely have some sort of bacterial or fungal problem but that is not necessarily the underlying problem. Ick is fungal. bacteria still look cottony but may not build up into balls like Ick will. some bacteria will simply coat the entire fish in a thin layer. the cloudy eye tells me it is bacterial rather than fungal.
What usually happens is something causes there slime coat to be compromised and then bacteria set in. bacteria are almost always involved at some point but not always the problem. with the ulcers I was thinking of something like Lateral Line Disease which is suspected of being neurological or something like that.
you definitely have some sort of bacterial or fungal problem but that is not necessarily the underlying problem. Ick is fungal. bacteria still look cottony but may not build up into balls like Ick will. some bacteria will simply coat the entire fish in a thin layer. the cloudy eye tells me it is bacterial rather than fungal.
not to highjack your thread here or anything. But since we have folks with insight on animals.
Every day when I get home from work, and just like clockwork my dog will go over and pick up his food bowl and bring it to me just as I'm sitting down on the couch.
I've tried to break him of this habit, any ideas? I beginning to think he's trying to tell me something.
Every day when I get home from work, and just like clockwork my dog will go over and pick up his food bowl and bring it to me just as I'm sitting down on the couch.
I've tried to break him of this habit, any ideas? I beginning to think he's trying to tell me something.
Daniel
Member
Actually he is, in a dogs way he is deciding when he eats. as leader of the pack you decide that. take the bowl and put it on a shelf. he will give up in a few days. feed him only after you have eaten. and if it still goes on only feed him after he has obeyed a direct command such as set. what all of this is doing is reinforcing that not only are you the Alpha, you are the Alpha because you provide the food. and you only provide food when you choose to. Never share your food with your Dog never that is inviting him to be Alpha. most often people do this by feeding them from the table.
food rules a dogs world.
food rules a dogs world.
Daniel
Member
I breed and trained dogs for 7 years. I only play with aquariums.