Please help!, very poorly fishes!

[juliestimpson]

Hi,

I am new and have come in search of advice and expertise!

I have two fish, both 3 1/2 years old, one a goldfish and one a shubumpkin( not sure how to spell that!)

We noticed in the last 6 months they were getting very big, so decided to treat them to an extension and get them a bigger tank.

I have always been very interested in my fish taking regular water checks, feeding them a mixed diet of flakes, bloodworms and fresh greens and generally lots of attention and tlc.

So we got them a new tank , i gradually moved some of their existing water to new tank whilst topping up theirs very slowy to ease the shock as the new tank was so much bigger i didint want a massive 50 -60% new water to be added.

We got them all settled in and then realised our new tank had a crack! so in a panick they went back into their old tank whilst we found them a new one, same size but they had to go through all the moving again two days later.

They seemd fine and settled in well, but two weeks later we saw one morning that they were lying very lethargicly on the bottom of the tank, it was of course a sunday, so i took a water sample to our local aquactic centre for an expert water check the next day , but all was perfect.

I was given a medication for them as by this time ( 24hrs later) there fins were clamped with the shubumpkins tail having lots of red lines through his tail.

By that night they were both covered in white spot, flying themselves around the tank at lightening speed one minute and the next lying on the bottom of the tank.

We gave them protozin medication on days 123 and 6, it is now day 7 and theres really no change except a lot more white spot and now very bad rotting on their fins.

Also on day two i introduced a heater and have since had the water between 70 and 80, but due to how long this has been going on i am very worried about feeding and water changes as the protozin says to do neither until medication is finished but to medicate again if they are not better

I honestly thought they would be dead by now, but they are still hanging on, does it sound like the medicine is working because they are still alive, or do you think they are , sadly, suffering a prolonged death??

My two fish , Alan and Gary, are my absolute pride and joy and i cant bear to see them like this , can any one suggest any thing, as i have been to every pet store and got the same answer which doesnt seem to be working.

Please please help if only to reassure that im doing the right thing, its causing me an awful lot of heartache to see them going through this

Thanks

Julie, Alan and Gary x x

 

[dkpate]

Welcome to AA!
Is the new tank cycled? You can use stuff like filter media and decor from the old tank in the new one to "seed" it. The brown junk on the filter is the good stuff.
The meds are not going to work if the tank is all out of whack.
I would do pwc's and find some Seachem's Prime water conditioner to help out with the ammonia and nitrite. I would also get a liquid test kit for the water.
Don't change the temp around, because that is really stressful for them. I think goldies like water around 72*, so I would try to keep it there. Make sure you change it gradually though.

 

[logansmomma1228]

Welcome to AA , dkpate has lots of good questions for you up there. +1 on the water changes and continuing(sp?) to check your parameters daily until you can get the tank more stabilized. I don't know if this has been answered already but do you have API liquid test kit? It is far more accurate than strips. I had a good website for goldfish diseases, dk I actually believe I got it from you a while ago on another thread, but I lost it from that stupid virus on my computer so I found this one for now : Quick Reference: Goldfish Illness | Illness and Treatment hopefully this can help you out.

Also, what size tank did you move your fish from and to? Goldfish get very large and I believe that they eventually will need a pond, but if you have a big enough tank you should be ok

 

[juliestimpson]

Thanks to you both for your replies but alas this morning both my fish have taken a very big turn for the worse,

One looks like hes actually falling apart as he moves which is very little,

I have moved them to a bucket with fin rot treatment a plant and covered them for darkness, as a think this will be their last few hours,

they are bearly moving and didnt even flinch when i gently carried them out of the tank,

thanks again,



Julie, alan and gary x

 

[dkpate]

Sorry about your fish.
If they keep suffering, you can use 100% pure clove oil, pour it into a dish until it turns milky, and then put the fish in there. They will go to sleep, since it's like alcohol for them. Then put them in the freezer so there is no chance of them waking up.
Also, before you get more fish, make sure you get rid of the ich (the white spots) in the tank. The ich falls off the fish and into the substrate, creating a cyst, which then explodes into thousands more ich parasites, and will attach onto another fish. So you can either raise the temp of the tank to 86*F for 10 days or so or completely clean out the tank and start the cycle over.

 

[BigJim]

Sorry to hear about your fish. Don't give up. Everyone goes through a tank crash at some point.

 

[juliestimpson]

Thanks for all your advice,

sadly alan my shubunkin passed away at 1pm today, and his poor brother was just there nudging him, very very upsetting,

gary the goldfish weirdly seemd to have perked up slightly and hasnt crashed on the bottom for nearly two hours??

i have cleaned out the tank comletely, and removed some items i fear maybe covered in the cysts, treated the water and have put the filter system back on with heater at 70F,

if hes still with us in the morn i will try putting him back in,

I am confused tho and wonder if you can answer this question?

The white spot treatment didnt help with fin rot at all, but what are you supposed to do when both ich and fin rot are severly attacking your fish? can you treat both at same time? or which is more deadly?

Alan seemed to be shedding this morning , it was something i had never seen before and it sort of came away from him as he moved, is this part of fn rot?

Anyway alan is in heaven with tom ( my childhood goldfish ) god rest x x

thanks again to you all

 

[logansmomma1228]

I am not sure if it would help any, but I know a lot of people use aquarium salt and heat to treat lots of things for their fish. If you raise the temp by a degree or two a day slowly and add I think it's 1 tsp of salt per 5 gallons or something like that, it could help with the ich at least. You should research it a little more though because I am not sure if this info is accurate. It has been a while since I have read about it. Good luck and I hope Gary pulls through, I am sorry about alan

 

[jsoong]

Getting to this thread late, but you are getting good advice ...

To summarize:
1. When changing tanks, it is important to move your biofilter to avoid a "cycle". You need to move all the substrate/decor, and run the old filter (with the new) for several weeks to transfer the bacteria. Failure to do this causes trouble, which prob caused the illness.
2. It is too late for any seeding now. To prevent further problems, you must maintain pristine water conditions with lots of pwc's until the cycle reestablishes itself. It would be useful to do daily testing & pwc's to keep ammonia less than 0.5, and nitrites less than 0.25.
3. Ich is fairly easily treated with salt (at 0.3%, raised slowly over 2 days) in goldfish. However, ich is only susceptible to treatment for a short window during its life cycle, therefore it will get worse before it gets better. However, since you have already started with meds, you may as well carry on.
4. Raising the temp will speed up ich lifecycle. This can cause an explosion in the number of ich particles & make things much worse. you should not raise the temp before effective ich treatment (salt/meds) are in place. Although high temp (87+) can kill ich outright, this is very stressful for goldfish and should only be attempted with extremely good aeration.
5. The peeling you are seeing may be the slime coat sloughing off. Thickened slime coat is often seen with external parasites, and it may peel off in big patches. At this point, it is important to prevent secondary bacterial infection. In addition to keeping clean water, a bit of salt might help (0.1%) if you are not already using salt to treat the ich. If any secondary infection sets in (fin rot is worrisome), you will need to treat that as well. Although ich will shred the fins, a secondary infection should be suspected if there are white /rotting looking patches on the fin, or red, inflamed looking veins on the fin. In addition to salt, either "natural" cures like Melafix or anti-biotic food (preferred) can be used. <What is in your protozoa cure? It may not be compatible with other meds in the water, so you have to either switch entirely to salt, or add an anti-biotic food.>

 

[dkpate]

JSoong, you are awesome.

 

[juliestimpson]

THANK YOU JSOONG!
unfortunately they had gone before i got this but i dont think there was much more i could have done,
I think the temp bing uped did cause an explosion of the cysts cause over night it wne t from just tails to all over their bodies, even their eyes,

it was extremely sad to see this happen and i still feeling sad about it now,

but we are planning to start the tank up again soon, then maybe get some new fellas in a couple of weeks,

learn from experience i guess, but they were the first fish i ever had and i cant believe how hard it was to lose them and how helpless i felt!

thanks again for your help, hooked on this website now, its great and very friendly

 

[dkpate]

Remember, ich will get worse before it gets better. The heat speeds up the life cycle, so your fish will have more. Make sure there is no ich left in the tank before you add more fish, and I would suggest a fishless cycle.

 

[Aquarium1]

Remember, ich will get worse before it gets better. The heat speeds up the life cycle, so your fish will have more. Make sure there is no ich left in the tank before you add more fish, and I would suggest a fishless cycle.

+1, however, jw, how would julie know if the ich was gone or not?

 

[dkpate]

Best thing to do is google how long the ich can live without a host. Personally, I would clean the entire tank and start over.

 

[logansmomma1228]

Personally, I would clean the entire tank and start over.

+1. New fish = new beginnings. A little scrubbing and rinsing will also allow for you to redo the whole tank. Give it a whole new look! Fun stuff

 

[Aquarium1]

Personally, I would clean the entire tank and start over.

I would do the same thing. In fact, that's exactly what I did with my qt tank lol.

 

[dkpate]

I know you did LOL.