Goldfish hitting into another

[Elz]

Hi there,
I wasn't sure where else to put this so I thought I'd try here ?.
I've got two goldfish, both over 10 years old now, and we've just put them into a 150L tank - big I know but they're happy!
One of them, Tim, has what we believe to be carp pox. We know there's nothing we can do for that except keep the water fresh. But, he's got quite a few of them now, including big ones on his head, but, he looks content with life.
Our other fish in the tank, thing 2 ( yes there was a thing 1 and I did name them at age 10), is okay though and seemingly unaffected.
Today we've noticed two things with them.
Firstly, Tim seems to be spitting his food out. He will bite the flake and then spit it out in two. He did the same when we put aphnia (spelt wrong I think but the frozen stuff you defrost for them ) in today. I've concluded that it's my mum feeding them too much, which is easily possible, so have said no more food for a few days to help him clear his gut - although this may be wrong, would appreciate advice!
Secondly, thing 2 seems to keep nudging Tim. It does not seem that they are biting or aggressive, more of a float alongside and pat. We're not sure if it's an attempt at mating where Tim isnt into it, or if it's noticing he's weakening more than we can see, or something else???
I've attached some pictures of them. Tim is the orange with the lumps and thing two is the yellow.
If anybody knows, even if it is where to repost this, or what might be going on, I'd be super grateful!

 

[Aiken Drum]

Your new tank may not be cycled if you didnt do anything like swap the established filter or filter media from the old tank to the new. You could be seeing the effects of a water quality issue.

Can you confirm everything you did to move the fish from one tank to another? What did you do to set up the new tank? How did you acclimate the fish to their new environment?

Are you able to test your water parameters? pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate?

Have you done a water change since moving the fish?

What was their old tank conditions? What was their water change schedule? Even improving their environment could cause issues if not done correctly. Moving fish from poor quality to good water quality can be as stressful as the other way round if not done correctly.

You say they are happy, but you are obviously concerned enough to create an account and post about your concerns. Nobody is more able to notice if there is an issue with your fish than you. Are they happy just enjoying their new home or is there an issue with their behaviour?

 

[Elz]

Thanks

Your new tank may not be cycled if you didnt do anything like swap the established filter or filter media from the old tank to the new. You could be seeing the effects of a water quality issue.

Can you confirm everything you did to move the fish from one tank to another? What did you do to set up the new tank? How did you acclimate the fish to their new environment?

Are you able to test your water parameters? pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate?

Have you done a water change since moving the fish?

What was their old tank conditions? What was their water change schedule? Even improving their environment could cause issues if not done correctly. Moving fish from poor quality to good water quality can be as stressful as the other way round if not done correctly.

You say they are happy, but you are obviously concerned enough to create an account and post about your concerns. Nobody is more able to notice if there is an issue with your fish than you. Are they happy just enjoying their new home or is there an issue with their behaviour?

Hi there,
I really appreciate you responding and helping with where im supposed to put this website wise!!
The filter for the tank is a new one, but we kept the old filter running in the new tank also for a while.
With moving them, we used stress coat similarly to as we have done before for the chlorine and stress. We also added vitamin salts on the advice of an aquatics centre.
We don't have anyway of testing the water for that at this time.
We've done one partial water change since moving them and added more salts as directed.
We have always done partial water changes every few weeks. The main difference is just the size of tank and the addition of a far greater filtration system.
Thing 2 seems really happy. They're swimming around, foraging and enjoying the tank. Tim on the other hand is seeming a little more lethargic. With his lumps, spitting food out and the behaviour of thing 2 towards him it seems odd that he is not as good as thing 2. When we first put them in, he was fine, foraging, swimming through his archway etc. He just seems to have gone down hill in the last day or two.
I really appreciate your response. He may just be a fish, but we've had these fish for 11 years. They've moved house with us, moved county with us, and we just want what's best for them.

 

[Aiken Drum]

If you cant confirm your water parameters i would be changing 30 to 50% of the water a day until you can. Running your old filter alongside the new for a while will have helped, its normal to do this for a couple of weeks to give the new filter chance to grow some beneficial bacteria, but you really have no idea if you are cycled if you cant test the water. There could be a water quality issue and you have no way of knowing.

The going downhill over time would be consistent with water quality, which would deteriorate over time too if you arent cycled.

Out of interest, how big are these goldfish and how big a tank did they used to live in? The 150 litre tank you say is big, is really the minimum you should be keeping 2 goldfish in. There might be some stunted growth from their old living environment which is catching up with them now.

 

[Elz]

If you cant confirm your water parameters i would be changing 30 to 50% of the water a day until you can. Running your old filter alongside the new for a while will have helped, its normal to do this for a couple of weeks to give the new filter chance to grow some beneficial bacteria, but you really have no idea if you are cycled if you cant test the water. There could be a water quality issue and you have no way of knowing.

The going downhill over time would be consistent with water quality, which would deteriorate over time too if you arent cycled.

Out of interest, how big are these goldfish and how big a tank did they used to live in? The 150 litre tank you say is big, is really the minimum you should be keeping 2 goldfish in. There might be some stunted growth from their old living environment which is catching up with them now.

Hi there,
I will put the filter back in this morning to get the bacteria back in. I will also do the partial water change. I will see if my aquatics centre has the stuff for measuring the parameters of the water like you suggested.
They were in a 60L tank, which we were told was okay for the two. Tim is around 6 inches long, and thing 2 a little longer. Tim has a larger tail than thing 2 though. It could be stunted growth if they should have been in bigger before, will they be okay if it is that?
Thankyou again for helping me

 

[Aiken Drum]

If your old filter media has dried out for more than 3 or 4 hours then it probably isnt worth putting back as the beneficial bacteria will have already died off.

I would expect a 10 year old goldfish to be fully grown, so 10 to 12 inches. At 6 inches there is some stunting and this will effect their internal organs and shorten their lifespan. But they have had a decade. Not much you can do now, a bigger tank will give them better quality of life, but their bodies arent likely to start growing now. Its not as bad as it could be, and i would hope they have a good number of years left in them.

60 litres isnt big enough for 1 goldfish, let alone 2. But they have done remarkably well. You must have done a very good job looking after them.

 

[Elz]

Hi there,
Thankyou ever so much for your help, you've been amazing!
It's sad to know we've been letting them down so poorly, but at least they can improve life wise now. We rescued them initially from a woman who had put their tank outside without a lid in the garden after getting bored of them.
I'll get the stuff to check the water quality tommorow and act accordingly.
They may only be goldfish, but we've had them a long while now. My niece and nephew love feeding them when they stay, and it's good to know they'll be able to enjoy their tank more once I've checked and improved the water if needed.
Thankyou once again for your help,
Best fishes

 

[Elz]

Forgot to quote

If your old filter media has dried out for more than 3 or 4 hours then it probably isnt worth putting back as the beneficial bacteria will have already died off.

I would expect a 10 year old goldfish to be fully grown, so 10 to 12 inches. At 6 inches there is some stunting and this will effect their internal organs and shorten their lifespan. But they have had a decade. Not much you can do now, a bigger tank will give them better quality of life, but their bodies arent likely to start growing now. Its not as bad as it could be, and i would hope they have a good number of years left in them.

60 litres isnt big enough for 1 goldfish, let alone 2. But they have done remarkably well. You must have done a very good job looking after them.

Thankyou again!!!!

 

[Autumnsky]

If you also changed gravel or rinsed it off with tap water, not declorinated, then you also lost BB there.
And just in general the cleaning of the water an changing tanks can ve a bit of upset in the nitrification cycle with loss of BB, then new water compared to what the mineral level were before changing tanks.

If you used declorinated tap water to refill the tank from evaporation, you may have been compounding the TDS / total dissolved solids. With water evaporation the minerals and dissolved solids stay behind. Most people don't use RO or distilled water, which with mineral content is removed. That, over time is a gradual build up the fish can get used to over time. But the new water isn't always changed enough to clear the TDS level to the new tap water which is lower. Then changing to a new tank and mostly new water and a significantly lower TDS than before also causes a big stress.

Then a lower water quality, increases stress.

Priority will be to see how ammonia, Nitrite, and nitrate are. Make a note if the levels also of pH, TDS, and alkalinity/Kh

Also look up breeding stars on Goldfish and see if that could vecwhat you see on the fish.

Hope all turns out well.

 

[Elz]

Water test results

Hi,
So I did the test on the water. Everything except the ammonia and nitrates are fine. The ammonia is at 1 and the nitrates at about 100 to 250 - the strip wasn't representative of any of the colours in particular, but nonetheless it was way to high according to what I have looked at online.
With buying the strips, we also bought stability, the new tank stabilisation system, as when I mentioned the bacteria they said it may help - although I'm not sure of it will solve this issue???
Everywhere says to do a partial water change, but we did one of those a few days ago so seems odd to need to again.
I really appreciate everyone responding

 

[Autumnsky]

You do the water changing to reduce the amounts of ammonia and nitrates in the water to make it safe for the fish to be in the water.

Check out the article in my signature link which gives necessary info on the nitrification cycle and building the BB colony in your filter.

This info can help you save your fish much unnecessary stress or worse.

 

[Elz]

New here

You do the water changing to reduce the amounts of ammonia and nitrates in the water to make it safe for the fish to be in the water.

Check out the article in my signature link which gives necessary info on the nitrification cycle and building the BB colony in your filter.

This info can help you save your fish much unnecessary stress or worse.

Hi there,
I'm not sure how I find the signature link? ?
Many thanks

 

[Autumnsky]

https://www.aquariumadvice.com/guide-to-starting-a-freshwater-aquarium/
It's below this post at the bottom, but now I added it above for you. Happy reading! It was really a fish life saving thing to know about the nitrification cycle and not throwing away your filter pads!!!

 

[Aiken Drum]

Lets start with nitrate, even though its not the immediate issue. A good upper target for nitrate is 40ppm. To start with, i would do 2 x 25% water changes today, a couple of hours apart. Then change 50% daily until you are down to around 20ppm.

A more immediate issue is the ammonia. Your target for ammonia + nitrite combined is to be no higher than 0.5ppm. At 1ppm ammonia and no nitrite, that's a 50% water change. The above mentioned water changes to get your nitrate down will also take care of ammonia. Once your nitrate is where you want it, test your ammonia and nitrite daily, do a water change sufficient to get to the combined target of 0.5ppm combined. In an uncycled tank you might be doing daily water changes, possibly even multiple daily water changes. Remember you have a very large bioload in an uncycled tank. When your cycle establishes, you can cut back on water changes, typically to control nitrate to the above mentioned 40ppm.

Seachem Stability might help, it wont solve the issue, but it may speed up how long it takes to cycle a tank from several months to weeks.

Im going to add a caveat. As mentioned goldfish have a high bioload. They are very messy, need big tanks and bigger filtration systems. Your tank of 150 litres is minimum for 2 goldfish. Although yours arent fully grown and may not grow much more now. You should be looking for filtration rated for double the tank size for goldfish, so filters rated for 300 litres in your case. It could be your filtration simply isnt enough to remove all the waste your fish produce and it will never remove all the ammonia. If you are making no headway, and still seeing ammonia in a couple of months you may want to consider more filtration.

 

[Autumnsky]

Excellent advise!

I will add that GF tank filtration recommendations are for a 10x flow of gallons per hour.

Your filter manufacturer should indicate how many G / gallons or L / liters per hour it cycles through. Look on your paperwork or look up the model online.

 

[Autumnsky]

https://www.aquariumadvice.com/foru...uire-big-tanks-visual-perspective-265871.html

Applies to fancies and larger Comet types. Though Comets could need even more room as they get huge in a pond /xxl tank,. 12-16" or larger.