Goldfish missing parts of fins.

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Aquarium Advice Newbie
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Jun 23, 2016
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1~Two gold fish about the size of quarters. No aggressive behavior they seem to like to be around each other constantly. About a week ago the tank light seems to be agitating them. When I turn it on they dash around rapidly before hiding inside the plants at the bottom of the tank. I turn it off they resume what they were doing with no problems. There was a tiny bit of brown moss growing on the tank which I scrubbed off. Week later I suddenly noticed fishes' pelvic fins are missing pieces from the them. Dorsal and Caudal fin are perfectly intact. I can not tell why this happened or if they are getting better or worse. I attempted to fish one out with a net to get a closer look but ever since then they seem very skittish of me. Only differences since before these events and now was a change in filter and the water temps have been going up due to local area changes. They seem stressed, but do not know why.
2~Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates, about 76F, pH around 8. Values may not be exact due to using walmart water test kit.
3~Tank is a 20 gallon long. It has been up about 2 and a half months.
4~AquaTech 10-20 Gallon Power Filter.
5~Only two fish in the tank. Used to be 6 but they did not make it very long. These fish were saved from being thrown away after a wedding. Do not know the conditions they were stored in but it was not humane. They are gold fish I believe. I do not know what exact type. They have grown from the size of a dime to about the size of a quarter.
6~Last water change was last Sunday. I tend to do one once a week. About a 50%(10 gallons) water change. If nessisary I do a 25%(5 gallons) water change in the middle of the week.
7~I have had them for about 2 and a half months. Did not have time to acclimate them. The condition they were in was terrible. 6 fish in a small cup they were gasping for air I had to get them into the tank as fast as I could.
8~Only a change in water filter. And dechlorinator when I do water changes.
9~I use tetrafin goldfish flake food. I have not changed their diet since I started them on this food. I may be overfeeding them, but I do not know.

I could really use the help. I love my gold fish. I do not want them to die.
 
Hi, congrats on saving the fish. And welcome :)


What filter media do you have and what did you change? I'm just wondering if you removed filter media which held good bacteria and out the tank back into a mini-cycle.


The water changes sound good as the tank will get small for them. Are you temp matching the change water to tank water roughly?
 
I have been roughly temp matching. Past two changes I have been trying to lower the temp of the tank a bit hoping it would help the fish feel better. The filter was an activated carbon filter with a replacement activated carbon filter. I added a little bit of aquarium salt yesterday. I feel the amount the carton says I should 1 tablespoon for every 5 gallons seems way too much to me. So I only added two just to be safe as well as diluted sulfuric acid to lightly reduce the pH. As I feel it is a bit high for my fish. They seem more active than usual but they are still really skittish and dont trust me.
 
Was this all enough to cause so much harm to these fish?
 
Possible if they were in bad conditions before and the fish were generally a bit run down in health imo.

I have found that fish can be fine with something wrong in tank, fine when something else goes wrong next and then something minor on the third event will cause a bit more of an issue than expected.
 
Alright. I am most worried about getting their fins to heal. As well as figuring out what is causing the fin damage.
 
Out of interest what is the nitrates reading?

Ammonia burns can take up to three days to show so perhaps you had an ammonia spike, fin loss, then tested - by which time tank bacteria are all good again.

If not healing, then I'd look into a treatment for bacterial fin rot and keep up the water changes would be my thought.
 
Everything is reading near 0 only thing that seems off is the pH which is high. It might be bacterial how can I deal with that?
 
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