White ball thing came out of goldfish's ulcer

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Eve

AC Members
Dec 21, 2005
51
0
0
A while ago I discussed an ulcer problem afflicting one of my goldfish. This link explains the beginning (but it's not necessary to read):

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64117

I am grateful for the help I received in that thread, but the problem persists and I have new information I hope someone will be able to help me with.

My fish keeps getting ulcers and when I medicate with melafix and pimafix they go away only to come back a few days later. I also treat the tank with salt sometimes. (Usually there's only one ulcer at a time but not always.) Sometimes they are in the same spot. There have been at least five different spots on the fish's body that have become ulcerated. When the problem initially arose I was able to get rid of it for a while. With a relapse and now for the month it's been a pretty consistent thing. But I decided not to medicate for a while to see what happens. This fish acts almost completely normal. It does get touchy sometimes and it seems like this is when there's a lot of medicine in the tank. It swims away and doesn't let me see it. Normally, it is a very social fish that seems to want to communicate with me (for food I'm sure). When the problem first resurfaced I noticed a dark needle point like thing poking out on the front of the fish bellow its gills. This only lasted a few days directly followed by a new ulcer. Also, several times I noticed something white coming out of the ulcers. Today (with no extra medicine to close the wound up) a white thing finally worked its way out. I scooped it out and examined it. It's a white ball shaped (squishy, I think) and it's about the size of the the "O" on your keyboard. It looked like there was something reddish inside of it. I just looked at it again and has shrunk and now it is reddish and there's some kind of residue around and under it (probably from the outside white part breaking down out of water). Does anyone know what this could be? I don't know what to do anymore, the fish seems generally happy, but I don't know how to help Happy. Thank you very much.
 

Native American

Just Another Flying Fish
Apr 25, 2005
389
8
18
60
Altus, OK
I've checked all my books (well, my wife's books) and cannot find anything like you describe.

Too bad you couldn't get a section of that item you retrieved from your fish and put it under a microscope. Of course, you'd need a book with pictures of various samples described by where they came from and how much magnification was used to see if there were any possible matches.

How big is the tank in which you're keeping your goldfish? My wife raised them for years, starting with just one in a 10-gallon tank, and that was still way too small. A 20-gallon tank would have been considered marginal by her reckoning.

v/r N-A
 

Eve

AC Members
Dec 21, 2005
51
0
0
Funny you should mention examining it under a microscope because if I had had a slide my sister could have looked at it for me. She's going to bring me some slides, just in case (and because I like to observe and study things) and she told me how to perserve specimens, too.

I have two goldfish in a 29 gal. tank. I know goldfish can use as much space as you they can get.

Thanks very much for your reply and taking the time to look at your wife's books!
 
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