Finrot and Unusual Behavior

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akmandlarge

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Oct 14, 2009
Messages
16
Location
I live at home with my parents in San Diego, but a
I have 2 problems with my Black Moor Goldfish.

1) He has finrot on his tail, and developing on his top dorsal fin. I have tried everything from water changes, Maracyn, Maracyn II, Tetracycline, Fungus Clear, and Anti-Bacteria medicated fish food and NOTHING will get rid of it. I follow the instructions to a T and still his fins remain the same. The only time that I got partial results was when I put him in a 1 gallon "hospital tank" and used the tetracycline, but it made the water quality so harsh that within a week he was laying sideways on the bottom of the tank with bloody eyes. EEK! So I put him in his big tank and his fins stayed in the "reparing" stage for a while, but then began to regress back to shreds. This has been going on for about 5-6 months now. What should I try next?

2) Lately my fish has been sitting at the bottom of the tank. Nothing else (other than the fin rot) is significantly wrong with him, and all of his water levels (pH, NH3, temp, etc) are fine. The pH is approx 6.8, the NH3 is at 0.0, and the temperature is about 80 degrees. When I walk over to his tank he perks up and swims around, but often I walk in my room just to find him laying/sitting on the bottom of the tank, motionless. Most other sites said that this was due to poor water quality, but that is not my case. What is going on and what should I do?
 
The temp is way too high for a goldfish.
It's probably stressing him, and weakening his immune system causing the fin rot to take over again. How long have you had him in 80F temps?
 
80 is a bit high, but is manageable if there is good aeration in the tank. The temp on its own should not be the cause of the finrot. <Although ideal temp for fancy golds is 75 or so, they can prob. go 5 or more degrees either way.>

How big is the fish (age & size) & how big is the tank? Other tank mates? Do you have other water parameters - of interest would be NO2 & NO3. Also, in view of pH of 6.8, what is the KH, and is the pH stable? <What is your tap/source water pH?> What is your water change schedule? And what are you feeding?

In addition to water quality problems, other causes for finrot may be a subacute infection (parasites, tb, etc) that is weakening the immunity of the fish, malnutrition, being picked on by another fish, etc. So far I have more questions than answers. But we might be able to sleuth out a cause with more details.

And welcome to AA!
 
There has been very warm weather in my dorm and I do not have any way to lower the temperature, except to add treated ice cubes... I have also heard that higher temperatures are actually GOOD for sick fish because it lowers their stress levels. There is good aeration in the tank due to his filter; whenever I put my bubbly air stone in there he gets very freaked out and hides in a corner. He has never had any problems at this water temperature before, and I do not know how to lower it 5 more degrees.

My fish is approximately 1", 1 yr. old Black Moor goldfish, alone in a 10-gallon tank. No tank mates, no live plants. I have a water meter that tracks pH, NO3, and temperature. I do not know what NO2 or KH measures, but if it would REALLY be of help, I guess I can buy something that measures that? I do 25% water change every other week with treated water (Amquel) and I have lately been adding aquarium salt to hopefully ease some stress. I feed him about 4 or 5 little pellets a day (Top Fin brand). Since I am in a dorm, my only source of water is tap water (however, I treat it and let it sit out for a day before I add it, then I cycle it with my fish in a separate bowl).
 
You should get a chiller.... or give the fish to someone with a larger, cold, goldfish tank. Goldfish have sensitive gills, so an airstone in such a small tank is irritating him! The tank is too small, too warm, and he needs buddies.... do the right thing and fix his habitat, cause hes not happy!
Thats the only option to ease his stress, you're forcing him to live in conditions opposite of his needs. Please!
 
The air stone is not in there, i said I don't put it in because it freaks him out. I live far away from home in a dorm so I do not know anyone who would be better suited to take care of him than me! And if I can't get my one fish to be healthy and happy, I'm sure not going to take on a second one...
 
Goldfish can tolerate higher temps, but it isn't good for them in the long run. Honestly, after everything i've read, the only good reason for raising the temp for a fish is with ich. That is only because it directly effects the parasites life cycle.
High temps raises fish metabolism. Higher metabolism means...More energy is spent, more oxygen used, more nutrition is required, which means more waste is produced. Gold fish are already extreamly messy. The higher temp also means less oxygen in the water.
I would get a clip on fan for your tank. That will disturb the surface area and lower the temp. Also, try doing your PWC atleast once a week, and add salt to the aquarium at 1tbs per 5g. I personally wouldn't try using more meds, but you can if you like. The bacteria might become resistant to the treatment though, and you run the chance of causing your tank to recycle.
 
Well, the automatic "Your tank is too small, get a bigger one" response for all goldies problems is not that helpful. Yes, I know that ideally, you want a 40+ gal tank to keep goldfish. But I think we should still be helpful to those with smaller setup.

Personally, I don't think that 10 gal is that bad a setup for a single fancy, esp. if he is only 1" in size. You do need to be more diligent in keeping water conditions pristine, but it is doable, at least when the fish is small.

The main thing in looking after a sick fish is to make sure that there is no toxic waste accumulation. Normally, fish produce ammonia (NH3), which is converted to NO2 (nitrites) then NO3 (nitrates). You should have zero NH3 & NO2, and less than 10 or 20 of NO3. Those 3 tests would be the minimum tests needed when dealing with a sick fish. <You would want a liquid master test kit - which would test all 3 plus more ... The API kit is fairly cheap & reliable.> The in-tank disk indicators or test stripes, unfortunately, are not reliable & tend to give false results, so I won't trust that at all.

In the absence of test results, I would suggest increasing your pwc's. Weekly water changes in a small goldfish tank is the rule. Some would go as much as 2-3x a week (and daily when the tank is cycling or having water quality issues.) So for starts, I think you should be doing weekly 25-30% pwc's.

KH measures the buffering capacity of the water, and its pH stability. Goldies in small setups can overwhelm the buffering capacity & drop the pH. This is a leading cause of goldfish mortality. I mention this because your pH is 6.9. This is outside of the goldie's preferred range of mid to high 7's. If the pH had been dropping, that is a concern. If you can get the pH of the tap water (fresh and after it had sat out for 24 hrs), I can infer the KH and if the tank is having a pH crash. <Measuring the KH is of course better.>

I really don't think the temp of 80 is that bad. My tank routinely run into the mid 80's in the summer without problems. <& so do goldfish keepers in tropical countries.> Hot water has less O2, but that can be compensated by increasing aeration. If you wish, you can leave the tank top open & run a fan over it. The evaporation can drop the temp 5 degree or more. <But you have to top up the tank with water every day or 2.> I am surprised that your fish freak out with an airstone. <I don't think an airstone would irritate the gills, it is just bubbles in water ...> At any rate, the purpose of the airstone is to agitate the water surface. You might try putting it right close to the water surface. That way, you still create water movement, but without the bubbles in the water column.

Before you embark on anti-bacterial or anti-parasite treatment, the first thing to do is to get the water parameters under control. Goldfish often recover with just provision of clean water & maybe a little bit of salt. Without clean water, all the meds won't help in the long run.
 
Ok,I took my fish out (put him in a temporary bowl) and I have done about a 40% water change, treated the new water with Amquel and let it sit 12 hrs before putting it in the tank, then I cycled the tank and let it be for another 12 hrs. I got a test strip kit to measure the water levels and can now report that my tank has a GH of <140, KH of <180, pH of 7.5, NO2 of 0 and NO3 of 0. The temperature is approx 76 degrees and I have my air stone disrupting just the surface of the water. What next?
 
I hate to disappoint you, but the test stripes are not that accurate .... You now have 2 pH readings, one read 6.9, the other 7.5. I am not sure which one to believe. <I assume that the pH meter in tank had not changed? If you did the water change & the pH had changed from 6.9 to 7.5, that is a totally different story .....>

I don't understand why you took the fish out for the water change, nor do I understand how you "cycled" the tank in 12 hours. Can you elaborate?

Assuming that the new tests are correct, and you now have a STABLE pH of 7.5, zeros for NH3, NO2 & NO3, reasonable temp & aeration ... I would sit back & monitor the tank & fish for the next while. You might consider adding a bit of salt for the fin-rot (say 0.05 to 0.1% = 1/2 teaspoon per gal). I would then monitor the pH & other levels daily for the next while. I have a suspicion that the tank is in fact not cycled (depending on what you did to cycle it) & you might have some NH3/NO2 issues. <A tank is not considered cycled until it can maintain zero NH3/NO2 at all times, and a rising NO3 to at least 5 or 10.>

If the fish is acting fairly well <minor fin-rot, but still eating, reasonably active, no other signs/spots/symptoms>, I would just see if maintaining clean water & a bit of salt will cure the problem. If the fish is getting worse or have other signs, then I might consider treating for a bacterial infection or an internal parasite. <Internal parasites are common in new goldies ... this can stress the fish & bring on fin-rot. Also, fin rot can be a secondary bacterial infection of external parasites.>
 
Well that's a bummer that my strips aren't good :( luckily they were on sale for only $4. What exact kind and brand do you have/recommend? I am kind of on a budget, but I want to get this right.

I guess my vocabulary isn't correct when I said that I cycled my tank. All that I meant by that was that I let the new water run through the tank and filter in order to stabilize and get to a normal temperature. The reason I took my fish out was because when I take out 40% of the water the filter no longer works (because the tube doesn't reach down far enough) and then when I added the new water a lot of stuff that my gravel vac didn't get was floating around in the water (poop and seaweed), and I wanted all of that to get collected by the filter before I put my fish in it. Also, all the gravel and plants get disturbed when I pour the new water in. Should I have left him in? I just thought it would be kind of crazy for him. I kept him in a bowl in the same exact water that i took him out of, and then i eased him back in at the same temperature.

Today he had been doing better, but then tonight he is back at the bottom of the tank. Maybe I'm not giving it enough time, but so far nothing has changed. I will keep checking the water levels every day to see if they are staying consistent.

He obviously still has his finrot but otherwise he is active and definitely maintains his big appetite.
 
The API Master kit is good (& reasonably priced - $20 or so online). <Some lfs will do water testing for free - jsut make sure they don't cheap out & use the stripes!>

At any rate, the pH test is prob OK using the stripes ... If you can test your tank AND tap water pH's, we cna at least get a start.

Moving the fish (and having him in a small container for 12 hrs) stress him out. That is esp. true if you net him. <I don't even own a net. I catch my fish using small plastic containers so they are never out of water.> Turning the filter off is no big thing when doing pwc's. It is the same as you moving the fish to an unfiltered bowl ...

It sounds like you have a lot of MULM in the tank, if doing water changes is kicking up a mess. I would suggest doing more frequent & through gravel vacs ... Goldfish are messy. You need to keep the tank clean ... having the stuff sitting in the gravel isn't that good. It is contributing to poor water quality.

In a planted tank, I would suggest doing pwc by thoroughly vacuuming out the surface of the gravel. If that means taking out 50 or 60% of the water, so be it. You can leave the fish in the tank during the process. When you refill, you need to make sure the water is already at the tank's temp, dechlorinated & matched in parameters (salt, etc.) Using a separate bucket to prepare water ahead of time is helpful here. I use an airline (or other small) tubing to siphon the water from the bucket into the tank. I take 15-30 min. to refill the tank. This minimize any shock from changing water parameters, but the slower water flow won't kick up all the mess inside the tank.

The fact that the fish is better immediately after a pwc & getting worse again suggest that there is a water quality issue. I rather suspect that the tank is not cycled. <Or the cycle had been disrupted with your previous antibiotic use.> Read this for more:
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/articles/articles/24/1/Nitrogen-Cycle-/Page1.html

I would suggest doing daily pwc's (& gravel vacs) for the next week or so to see how he responds. <This is a "best guess" solution. I can be more certain with 1. your tap water parameters & 2. Test results on tank NH3/NO2.>
 
One other thing ... I was suggesting salt for the fish ... If you have live plants, some will not tolerate salt. You should go no more that 0.05% for most plants. If you have to go higher (say to treat parasite) you should remove the plants or they will die.
 
I hope this is normal and not contradicting itself, but today the levels are:

GH: ~180 KH: ~180 PH: ~7.5 NO2: 0 NO3: 0

The only change is that the GH went up. I think that the KH got a little lower, but the test kits goes from 120 right to 180, so I kind of have to guess in between.

I measured my tap water and the pH is much higher in the untreated water form the tap. The tap water levels are:

GH: 180 KH: 180 pH: 8 NO2: 0 NO3: 0

Again, these are only approximate. Does the API master test kit give you an exact number?
 
Well, a liquid kit would give you more accurate numbers for KH & GH, but you don't really need that. A ball-park number will do. <The liquid kit is needed to give you accurate numbers for NH3/NO2 & NO3.>

Your KH/GH number in the tap is in line with the tap's pH number. To be sure, leave a sample of tap water out overnight & retest to make sure that pH si stable.

Your tank ph should be close to your tap pH. The fact that it wasn't (6.9 to start) would indicate a badly neglected tank. <Unless you ahve peat or driftwood or something to deliberately drop the pH in the tank.> Fish waste & other decomposing matter make acids. Your water has adaquate KH, and should be able to hold a steady pH. A dropping pH in the tank would indicate accumulation of a LOT of waste. <You would be surprised at how much poop a goldfish make!>

The droppong pH is not good for the fish, and neither is the waste in the tank. The best thing to do is to do pwc (25% or so) & good gravel vac daily or every other day to clean up the tank. Your tank pH should be the same as the tap water pH after it had sit out & equilibrated to air. you did the 40% change & it is now 7.5, so it is on the way up. You will prob need to do the extra pwc's for a week or 2 to get the tank pH back to the tap pH. After that, you would want to do enough pwc's to maintain it. <As said before, weekly 30-40% changes is the rule for a goldfish in a small tank.>
 
Ok, I will look into getting the liquid kit, but for now here are my test strip results for today in my tank:

GH: ~120 KH: ~80-120 pH: ~7.5 NO2: 0 NO3: 0

I left a TAP water sample untreated overnight and when I tested it my results were:

GH: ~180 KH: ~80 pH: ~7.5 NO2: 0 NO3: 0

I am going to do another PWC in my tank tonight to get some of the mes out of there.


Added info: No, I do not have any live plants or peat or driftwood. Also, I am assuming that the very initial pH reading I gave you (of 6.8) was incorrect since I am pretty sure that it is an unreliable meter. Thank you, for pointing this out to me.
 
OK, your tap water has a bit of "volatile base" in it, since the pH went from 8.0 to 7.5 overnight. <That base is likely NaOH or Ca(OH)2 which the water co. added to decrease pipe corrosion.>

At any rate, now that you know the tap water will settle out at 7.5, you can be assured that the 7.5 in the tank is normal, and any drop in that would indicate that you are falling behind in your water changes.

Since the initial pH was inaccurate, you might reason that the ammonia reading of zero might be in error as well. <If it is the same meter.> I would still be suspicious that the tank may be cycling & do extra pwc's on spec. <At least until you start to see some nitrates.>

Since you were talking about plants, I thought those might be live. Without live plants, I would go ahead & gravel vac not just the surface, but the depths of the gravel as well. Getting rid of as much accumulated crud as possible is going to help with water quality.

BTW, how is the fish doing? Is he acting better with all the intensive tank cleaning?
 
Thank you so much for all of this help. I was extremely busy today and I did not get a chance to do my pwc, but I really really am going to do it tomorrow. I also ordered the liquid master test kit, so soon I will have an "accurate" reading for all of my numbers, including ammonia. What exactly am I looking for to determine that my tank has cycled? More NO3 and otherwise consistent levels?

My fish had not really been improving (but not getting worse either), until today I noticed that his fins are growing back! I didn't want to jynx it, but on the edges where it seems to be "shredded" there is a very thin layer of skin growing back. It is about 1 mm long right now (he is probably missing about 5), but I'll take it. As of yesterday he was still stressing out, sitting at the bottom motionless, but I have not seen him doing that today. However, as I said above, I have been busy today and out of my room so I wouldn't have seen it if he did.

On a tangent, I have some pictures I would like your opinion on. See, he has had "fin rot" before, but it looked different. The first time he ever had it, he had it concurrently with ich. his fins looked more chopped than shredded, and they reacted very quickly to a Maracyn II and he healed within a few days. Here is the picture of his fins during this:
26207-albums762-picture5257.jpg


But now, his fins are shredded almost in a way that looks like it could be natural, except that I know it is not. They are shredded in tiny points instead of an obvious stunt in growth. Here is a current picture (kind of hard to distinguish, but also hard to take a picture of!):
26207-albums762-picture5260.jpg

26207-albums762-picture5262.jpg


Do you have any thoughts about what causes it to look differently?
 
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