How hardy are Goldfish Really? Ick...

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Doudou

Aquarium Advice Newbie
Joined
Sep 22, 2018
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How hardy are goldfish really?

Tank Size: 10 gallon (normal)

Type of Tank: Goldfish aquarium (1 fake green plastic plant, 1 real fern-like aquatic plant, pink gravel)

Fish: 6 3 - 5-month-old comet goldfish ( I don't know exact age) I had a new-born baby bristlenose pleco, it died from the ich.

Diet: Goldfish granules. Brand; Aqueon.

Heater? Yes, it doesn't change temps and keeps the water at 72 farenheit. Brand: Top Fin.

Filter? Yep! It's a 20-gallon filter, we recently changed the filter from a 10-gallon filter to a 20-gallon. Brand: Top Fin.

Aeration system? Nope, sadly not.

Sickness Type: Ick, the parasitic disease. I did some research on it already, so I need some actual people help. I believe it was brought to my goldfish by my 2 rosy red minnows who I recently introduced; they died shortly after.

Any Medication? I have the slightest bit of aquarium salt; about 1-2 tablespoons full. Nothing else. Please don't tell me to buy medication or a new heater, those are expensive. My mom doesn't really care that my fish are sick either, so that option is gone.

My experience with fish: Beginner. Whoop... (first actual tank)

Water? I put about 1/3 to half a table spoon every 3-5 days, due to the lack of salt I have. I use dechorinater, of course. (we don't measure water perameters, we don't have the equipment)

Changing schedule? I change the water every 5 days - 1 week now, about a 25% change. I always add a bit of aquarium salt. The new water I add is warm.

Fish status: I noticed they had some faded white spot about 2 weeks ago, so this has been going on for sometime. From there, we did a full-water exchange, which brought the ick down to about 5%. Then, it started growing. About 5 days later, the ick had full-blown taken over 1 fish; a little bit spread to the other. The ick covered his entire tail and fins. The next 2 days, my pleco died, and the goldfish had ick all over his body now too. I started noticing red spots.
The next 2 days, the other goldfish seemed to be doing great; the ick only clung to the edge of their tails. The badly affected one though, it started have red streaks all over his tail, and so much more sores.
The next day, he sat on the bottom of the tank, barely swimming. He'd freak out and beg for food when us humans were around, lol.
We worried, thinking he'd die, so we moved him to a "quarantine tank" (actually just a round, clear, bowl that held about 3 gallons). We changed the water daily for 3 days; and every hour, we'd take out half the water and replace it with warm-hot water (to get the ick off). We added the plant for aeration. We added lots of aquarium salt.
He started swimming around more, so we put him back to his old home (much cooler water) and he did great; in 3 days, he swam like himself; though his fin was flat. No problem! The next day, his fin was up and dandy, he acted like he had no ick. We noticed that the ick was almost gone (from all the fishes) and only noticed 3 fishes with a slight ick problem.
Now, the fish that was affected the most, only has the parasites on the edge of tail, and the ick on his body is gone.
Or is it? There's sorta a whitish fuzz that's barely visible; what is it?

Other Problems? about 3 fish have torn fins; the edges are very ragged. These are the fish with the longest tails. The others are great.

Please help, thanks!
 
A natural cure for ick requires a tank temp of 86 degrees. Salt treatment of at least 1 teaspoon per 5 gallons of water and upwards of 1 teaspoon per gallon of water. Water changes of 25% daily or every other day with a gravel vac. Anything outside of this would require medication. Any fish not properly treated when disease and parasites break out cant be considered not hardy. As far as the other problems you are seeing in your fish now is probably secondary disease from their low immune system which is to be expected from a fish that's been diseased for extended periods of time.
 
Hello Dou...

A simple answer. Just change out most of the tank water every few days. I like to add a teaspoon of standard aquarium salt to every 5 gallons of treated tap water for all my Goldfish tanks. This keeps the scales healthy and retards the growth of any parasite.

Here's a good rule for keeping Goldfish, that I've found helpful. The first Goldfish needs a 15 to 20 gallon tank. Then, add a few gallons in volume for every Goldfish after that. I have a 75 gallon tank that's been home to 19 Goldfish for quite a while. All I do is change out half or more of the tank water weekly. The cleaner the water, the healthier the fish.

B
 
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