deformed fry

sean mckinney

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Feb 11, 2003
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I have all of last year's goldfish fry in tanks and despite my inattention to water parameters all but 2 have done well. One I culled about a month ago, the other is the deformed fry of the title. On Friday it was belly up and not looking good. I caught it and put it in clean pond water, it recovered almost immediately and has stayed the correct way up since then. All the water in all three tanks has been changed.
Anyhow, from the side this fry has always been straight or nearly concave from dorsal to head and one of the runts but it is the first time I have taken proper notice of it. The rest are all convex from head to tail. Its head is quite wide in the eye area and it looks like it is trying to resemble a bubble eye or hammer head shark. Looking from the side niether gill flap seems to close properly.
It swims ok but slightly more sluggishly than its siblings, it is a bit of an occasional loner and doesnt feed as ravenously as them either.
I cant tell if it is happy but I dont think it is distressed. I doubt that it will ever do well and I wouldnt want it to breed but should I kill it or let nature take its course.
The fry are all within 2 months of each other and there are 7 others close to it in size but they are all bigger than it. The biggest fry, full stop, is about 3 or 4 times the length of the deformed fry but the majority are probably twice its length
 
Welcome...

Sean, Aquaria Central, home of the most concerned fishkeepers on the Internet:)

If you have the space and it's not a water-quality issue, I would keep the fry, but then, I don't like killing anything... Your fish doesn't have to eat ravenously to do well. Let's face it, fish in the wild do not get to eat two square meals each and every day, anyway. If your fish seems distressed, you'll know when it is time to euthanize him.

Once again, welcome....

Val
 
Hi Sean... how's it going across the "pond" ?

If this little fish is that deformed but you can't bring yourself to "cull" him then I would suggest you seperate him from the others before spawning age. It's still possible he can reproduce and I wouldn't take a chance on that.

Just my thoughts...

TJ
 
Hi TJ I was thinking along those lines myself but then its on it ownsome. Anyway how is your ice doing? It must be more than 12" now, the last I remember if I havent got it confused with some one else is your hubby flat out on the ice fish spottong
 
:D no you're not confused...my nutty other half -
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Actually Sean we built a cover for the pond..we were having some problems....
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Ice around the ponds edges is still quite thick - maybe 8inches but there's now at good sized hole in the ice and the water temp has risen a few degrees.

In all honesty Sean... I'd cull the goldfish - just my personal preference. After all, in "nature" it probably wouldn't really stand a chance. Personal choice, it's up to you...

Catch ya around.. TJ:)
 
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