The treatments for white spot are designed to be powerful enough to kill the parasite, so you shouldn't need to do a water change in the middle of the treatment period in order to remove the parasites from the water. The ideal way to do treatments is to do a 25% water change before you put the treatment in, followed by a 50% water change at the end of the treatment period.
You do not need to leave your tap water overnight before a water change. As long as you add a good dechlorinator, e.g. stresscoat or the one Waterlife make, these will remove the chloramine as well as chlorine, which are both harmful to fish. The only reason people leave water overnight is to make sure that the chlorine/chloramine dissipates from the water, but is unnecessary if you add dechlorinator.
What are your current water tests showing for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? What filtration do you use?
Your shop is giving you bad advice by saying to cram 12 fish into a tank in order to stunt their growth. This is bad for the fish and will not stop them growing. It just puts high pressure on the filtration which can lead to diseased fish.
If your tank is 24" long, you need to add no more than approx 12" of fish. The 12" is the eventual size of the fish, not the size you buy them at. I work in the industry, (not to sound heavy handed or patronising) and for a 2" tank, I would never advise more than 4 goldfish in a tank your size. So your current stocking level is fine, but I wouldn't add any more.
If you are sure it is white spot on the fish, continue the treatment, stop feeding (as you are doing), but what I would do is add some live plant (e.g. elodea) as the fish, if they do get hungry, can munch on these.
White spot has been a real problem in a lot of people's tank this year, and some cases have proved very difficult to clear up. You may have to use a different treatment after your current one in order to knock this on the head. You're not alone in struggling with this!
A possible other treatment would be API's Melafix as you add this each day for 7 days, and goldfish seem to respond well to this treatment. We use this on our stock tanks when things appear from time to time.
I hope you get on OK with this.
You do not need to leave your tap water overnight before a water change. As long as you add a good dechlorinator, e.g. stresscoat or the one Waterlife make, these will remove the chloramine as well as chlorine, which are both harmful to fish. The only reason people leave water overnight is to make sure that the chlorine/chloramine dissipates from the water, but is unnecessary if you add dechlorinator.
What are your current water tests showing for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? What filtration do you use?
Your shop is giving you bad advice by saying to cram 12 fish into a tank in order to stunt their growth. This is bad for the fish and will not stop them growing. It just puts high pressure on the filtration which can lead to diseased fish.
If your tank is 24" long, you need to add no more than approx 12" of fish. The 12" is the eventual size of the fish, not the size you buy them at. I work in the industry, (not to sound heavy handed or patronising) and for a 2" tank, I would never advise more than 4 goldfish in a tank your size. So your current stocking level is fine, but I wouldn't add any more.
If you are sure it is white spot on the fish, continue the treatment, stop feeding (as you are doing), but what I would do is add some live plant (e.g. elodea) as the fish, if they do get hungry, can munch on these.
White spot has been a real problem in a lot of people's tank this year, and some cases have proved very difficult to clear up. You may have to use a different treatment after your current one in order to knock this on the head. You're not alone in struggling with this!
A possible other treatment would be API's Melafix as you add this each day for 7 days, and goldfish seem to respond well to this treatment. We use this on our stock tanks when things appear from time to time.
I hope you get on OK with this.
