i think its ich?? please HELP

[aznknight]

i have already gone thru two 3 day cycle of quick cure and started another one...........u think it was a bad mistake?? =(
another thing i might add......before when first spoted the dots resembled salt...........but now........they seem to be more........rounded???.......like very very small white balls...........is this still classify as ich u think??

 

[ChilDawg]

Hi, azknight, and thank you for the nice compliments in the pm.

I don't think that "Quick Cure" is adequate for ich as it has a long life-cycle...you can only kill it during the free-swimming stage as it is encysted and resistant to medication in all the other stages...the free-swimming stage is short compared to the other ones, so a three- to four-week treatment is recommended.

 

[ChilDawg]

In addition, I would recommend that you read this article very carefully before another dose of ich treatment (a prolonged one this time). I think that it is among the most helpful available in the hobby.

As for the other parasitic possibilities, I would recommend reading articles at www.skepticalaquarist.com and seeing if any of these are your parasite in question...

http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/othprotist.shtml seems to be along the right lines, but I have some more holistic concerns about the tank.

It is overcrowded. You will need to up the filtration and possibly separate these fish into three completely different tanks...I think that this will help mitigate the problem, but knowing your enemy is a good part of the battle as well! If neither of those sites is correct in diagnosis, I would consider fungus to be a possibility (as you yanked out the green things and fungus is usually a secondary infection at the site of injuries). I would also Google the aforementioned Argulus lice.

HTH,

Matthew

 

[avoxo]

Hello aznknight, I agree with what chilidog has to say about the tank being overcrowded. I did not want to give you the speech but you got to learn. You already know that it was a mistake to put them in an un-cycled tank and they are or will be overcrowded. You are going to have heath issues because of this. Sooner or later you will need to upgrade the tank or get more tanks. The general rule for goldfish is 10 gallons per fish, anything larger than 4 inches and your talking at least 20-30 gallons per fish because they produce lots and lots of waste.

The only thing you can do right now is to finish the salt treatment of 7 days. Remember 3 teaspoons per gallon. Feed them very very lightly once every 2-3 days. Do 30% water changes every 3-4 days. The puregold and the skepticalaquaist sites are great but here are some more links to help you identify those diseases.
http://www.koivet.com/[/URL] lots and lots of info.
http://www.fishdoc.co.uk/ another good site.
http://www.bristol-aquarists.org.uk/goldfish/info/diseases.htm also very good.
You could also get Fancy Goldfish by Erik Johnson and Richard Hess, this is one of the best goldfish books out there. Wish you luck.

 

[aznknight]

yah i agree with the overcrowing but i was just a temp sitution
i got a 40 gallon now
just gotta clean it out...........have u ever heard of a product called cycle?? bottle up benefical bacteria whats your opion on it?

 

[ChilDawg]

I think "Cycle" was pretty well panned at AC, but "Bio-Spira" seems to do pretty well for our members. If you can get that, that would be wonderful for having your cycle done quickly.

 

[aznknight]

ok so the ich is all gone........pretty much now my baby has black spots all over her tail.......i was told they r ammonia burns..........for some reason she like to.........kinda just idle in 1 spot.......under the filter........watefall........for prolong periods of time...........but now and then if i walk by she will begin to swim.........should i be concern?

 

[ChilDawg]

Um...who told you that? Do they look like the textbook colouring of the Shubunkins?

 

[aznknight]

i read on some site its ammonia burn.............no idea
but the tail my my fish has alot of black spots...........

 

[avoxo]

Hi aznknight, it is hard to say what those black marks are from but the ammonia burns sounds right, your tank is still cycling so you will have problems like this.

Do you have any test kits for your tank, PH, ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, gh and kh. If you do telling us the results will help.