More than a couple questions.

Here is a good article on Goldfish care: http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=97350

FYI _ most of these links are found under the "Articles" section of this forumn! ;)

Also, always do a gravel vacum (IMHO) every time your do a PWC, this will also GREATLY assist in cleaning up the dust left on the gravel as well (stir the gravel a bit each time will help w/ large WCs) ... and I would especially use a gravel vac w/ Gold fish in the tank (Pooping machines)! :)
 
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Our daughters ten gallon tank has also struggled with ich from the very beginning (for 2 months now).

Malachite green would stress out the fish and kill most.
I found that in general "messing" with the tank too much would lead to other stuff like fin rot and I also found that once fin rot set in on top of severe ich, the fish would die (this of course is not a rule, it just happened to happen in this tank). And with "messing" I mean adding fish while not done with treatment, adding malachite green and salt (that can't be fun for the fish), adding new plants, or taking out stuff. Having guppies have fry (not much we could do about that..) Changing the filter and by doing so throwing away all healthy bacteria in the old filter... all the silly newby stuff that we did.

After asking over and over again, we tried the salt treatment. We slowly raised the temp to 82/83 (I would have liked it higher but the room the tank is kept in is too cold and we don't have an extra heater) and slowly, slowly added aquarium salt (mixed 2 teaspoons to the gallon in a smaller container and added it in over a period of 24 hours). We added extra air by adding a airstone.
Then, as I started to see the fish look clean I started doing 50% water changes every day, adding in the salt in the new water at once (so I took out about 5 gallon and added 10 teaspoons to the new water).
We have managed to kill a bit of the fry (this was the third round of ich, as I did not manage to kill it the first two cycles, so it was rather terrible, some of the fry looked like a little salt bomb) but right now the fish look all very happy and I hope that in a week or so I can slowly take out the salt with water changes.
We have a small pleco in the tank and I does well, even with the salt added.

I think it might not have so much to do with adding new fish to your tank, I think you may have never completely killed all the ich (if the water is rather cool, it might take 2 weeks or more for the ich to start a new cycle) so every time you add a new fish, the fish probably sits on the gravel for a little while to recover from the "new tank shock" and hopla, the ich jumps onboard. If this is the case, quarantening a new fish isn't going to help any, as it isn't the new fish that brings ich in the tank...

L.
 
one of the main problems here is stress from an overstocked tank. It's been said that a few fish die, they are replaced and back comes the ich. There should only be 1 goldfish in this tank, and maybe the dojo's but with that, you would still need double the filtration of that on a tropical tank with 50% water changes weekly to keep things stable and healthy. The more you keep adding to the tank as far as fish and chemicals, the more your problems will be exacrebated. The cloudiness is not from the gravel. Well, it could be but is not entiredly. It's due to the stock and the explosion of bacteria producted that simply has no idea where to plant themselves in the tank. Is there a chance you can get a bigger tank?
 
Overstocking, lack of temp. control, lack of water changes, lack of gravel vac-ing, adding too many meds and treatments, no quarantine, .....................did I miss anything?

Stop ALL of those things, and you might just save your fish.
 
I cant really get another tank, i have 2 as it is and I'm living in an apartment, anything bigger than a 20Gal and I wont be able to move the **** thing.
I can't believe a 20Gal tank can only house 1 goldfish...
I'm thinking of starting over.. Petstores wouldn't take fish from someone would they?
Anyways I've added salt slowly, I've done a 50% PWC, I've added a heater and I'm slowly increasing the temp (what would be the max for a goldfish tank?) Should i stop with the Ich treatment and just let the salt and temp do its thing, I'm sure the fish are stressed enough as it is.
 
You should call the petstore and see if they'd take any fish. I have about 5 stores close by and 2 of them will accept fish...any fish, one of them will only accept fry and the others laughed at me...
Our local PetSmart actually accepts all fish

L.
 
Hey thanks alot michiwop, thats a great site.
Unfortunately I lost my battle, I suppose it was all too late, I lost my fish minus one who didn't have Ich in the first place but was and still is obviously very stressed, He is in my 10Gal now along with my Loaches.
I learned alot of valuable lessons in the process though and I already have plans for a nice planted aquarium with some tetras perhaps, or some other tropical fish that aren't so **** dirty.

1 more question for you gurus out there. It's been bugging me for a while now and maybe its a stupid question with an obvious answer but I have to ask. When you go to all these fish stores(and there are alot in my area) all of their tanks, including the goldfish tanks are seriously over packed with fish, I overdid it with 8 goldfish in a 20gal but you see there are 20gals at the petstore with 40+... Im sure the fish stores suffer losses all the time but their fish seem for the most part healthy, the water is clear, and these tanks can be constantly over packed with fish and they dont seem to have the same problems that home aquarists such as you and I have. What gives? :)

Thanks again
 
When you do your first gravel vac your gonna see how much poop and maybe uneaten food has built up in the gravel.Tons of parasites in there.Most stores have no gravel on the bottom it is very easy to keep the tank clean.

Keeping one species of fish in one tank has many advantages.
 
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