# Fin Rot and cloudy water



## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

So I just noticed fin rot on 2 of my goldfish today. The one was laying at the bottom of the tank not moving and had whit on the tips of his tail and top fin. the other had white on the tips of his tail also. 

I am just about to go to the petstore to pick up some tetracycline antibiotics and pimafix (incase it turns to fungal infection) to treat the entire tank. I added salt in the water yesterday and did a 10% water change this morning and added stress coat

SO the water has been cloudy for a month now (my not-so-smart brother decided the fish were hungry and dumped a ton of old fish flakes into the tank). There was a lot of tiny particles and left over food and i tried scooping as much out with a net and did water changes but it has been cloudy ever since. 

I have also been switching around their food to try and see which gives them the least amount of bloating. I have been feeding them algae wafers daily along with a sinking goldfish pellet (I soak both of them in tank water for a few minutes and then dump out the cloudy water and then put the food in the tank). they also get the occasional blood worms.

I've recently done a 30% water change, replaced the aquarium salt and added a Tetra algae control to the water. Water is still cloudy. Noticed the lethargic fish today and did a 10% waterchange and added stress coat to the tank. I will get my water tested when i go to the pet store today. 

ANy advice on how I can fix the cloudy water (and is my fin rot treatment choices okay? I dont wanna loose another baby :'( )


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

help! so 3 of the fish are lying at the bottom of the tank not moving. I took my water in to get tested and they said everything is off the charts! nitrates and nitrites are high, alkalinity is low. I did a 50% water change with stress coat. I bought melafix and pimafix but the lady at the store was not sure if I should add that into the water now or wait a day or so.

ok a new piece of info, my dad just told me he changed all the filter cartriges in the tank to new ones a few days ago! I didnt realize he changed all of them, so is the tank cycling all over again??? (its been set up for over a year)

questions: should I add the pimafix and melafix now? when should I do a water change again? Should I be feeding the fish? Any idea on how to lower the nitrates/nitrites? 

Tank lights are off, filters are on (2 filters, 95gph) and air stone is on. i tried feeding today but 2 of them didnt budge to try and eat. 

any help/questions/suggestions! ahhhhhhhh!


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## navigator black (Jan 3, 2012)

Forget the meds. Do 50% water changes every day for ten days. Then see how they are doing.
If you have a food spill or such, water changing has to be extreme - your tank has had time to turn into a stagnant pond. You really should have been doing 25% every second day or so for the 2 weeks after the food incident. Whether the fish make it or not depends on luck, timing and changes. You can't buy a cure, but you can try to work one.


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## snail (Aug 6, 2010)

I would not add meds. The fish are sick from the stress of bad water quality. Meds will not help the water quality and will add more stress. Get the water under control and the fish will get better on their own (if it's not too late). I'd start with a 50% water change every day for the next 4 or 5 days.

Your filters have no bacteria, but hopefully because the tank is established it will help the filters 'cycle' quickly.

EDIT:I wrote my post before the last one but didn't press the 'post' button by mistake. It's nice to see we think alike, lol.


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

The food spill didnt seem major to me when it happened, he hadnt dumped the entire can or anything. I did a 30% water change then and a bit more than normal water changes every week since (about 25-30%). There wasnt any difference in behavior of the fish since that happened until this morning so i thought the cloudy water was just an algae bloom  

all of my fish are just laying at the bottom of the tank now. I did a 50% water change this morning and conditioned the water with stress coat. Their tails are started to get that white outline but I guess I should wait a few days of the 50% water change before I start treating the bacterial infection? Also, should I just be feeding them normally the next few days? I didnt feed them today


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## snail (Aug 6, 2010)

4 goldfish in a 35 gallon tank is heavy stocking. A tank that is heavily stocked is not forgiving, things go wrong quickly and badly. A food spill and new filter media has tipped the tank over the edge, causing the tank to crash. 

Once you get the current problems sorted I think you should be looking at 50% weekly water changes to keep the nitrates down.


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

35 gallons for 16-17 inches of goldfish is overstocked? the tank is well filtered but i agree that the food being dumped and the filter media change pushed it over the edge. Need to establish a look but dont touch rule with the family. 
when my dad told me he changed all the filter media I checked it out, he had changed all of them in the big filter (it holds 2 carbon filters) and he just put the old one next to the tank (didnt throw it out) so i replaced one of them with the old one. The other filter has the same old filter media. 

I bought pimafix, melafix, and Prime.
Im not going to use the meds yet but how about the prime to lower the nitrites? or will that cause too much of a shock to the fish? 
Can I feed the fish tomorrow?


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

I added prime to the tank last night (2 .5 capfuls = enough for 125 gallons = almost 5x the size of the tank for a treatment dose to lower the levels)

i just tested the water this morning and it reads as follows:
nitrate = 80
nitrite = 0 - 0.5
ph = 7.5
kh = 40
general hardness = 180
ammonia = 0.25

I am about to do a 50% water change, when should i test the water again (my 1st test kit)


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## navigator black (Jan 3, 2012)

I'd still stay off the meds, and do changes with treated tap water. Goldfish are tough, so they'll take any bounces with prime normally, but now that they are sick, they are fragile.
As for bacterial infections, if you don't know whether you have a gram positive or gram negative infection, you can't know which med will work on it. Pimafix and melafix have a proven active ingredient, but at such a low concentration I consider them perfume for the fishtank. They smell really good. They may be good for preventative medecine, but in an active outbreak, I would trust water changes more.
I would not feed the fish more than every third day for a week or two. 

You are overstocked, because you care for your fish well. They will respond by growing, quickly. Never stock by looking at a fish as it is - look at what it will be. 17 inches of fish will be 40 before you know it. And one inch a gallon is for a fish built like a zebra danio. Your goldish is 5 inches long, 3 inches high, one inch wide. If you were to take chunks of clay the size of a danio and fashion your goldfish out of them, how many would it take? 30? 35?

The usual rule for long time goldfish survival in a tank (without enormous maintenace time) is 30 gallons per fish. You can override that with big filters and lots of water changes, but then your fish will grow and caring for them will be a chore rather than a pleasure.


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

so what do i have to look for with the water parameters? nitrates and nitrites to be zero?

i tested the tap water and the water in my betta fish tank and they all read pretty much the same... do i have to worry about my betta tank? should i pre-treat it with the melafix? the tap water here is always very hard and the ph of the tap water n betta tank read the same as the goldie tank


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## snail (Aug 6, 2010)

Ammonia and nitrites should be 0. Nitrites less than 40ppm. Nitrates are not as toxic as ammonia or nitrites but are still dangerous in high levels.

In a goldfish tanks (because they are such messy fish)occasional low readings of ammonia or nitrites of 0.25ppm are not uncommon. If it's only sometimes and not higher than that it's not overly worrisome.


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## squishy (Apr 13, 2011)

i treated the water with prime today and will be using that as the decholrinator during tomorrows water change (i had been using the stress coat decholinator). I also replaced the salt i had been using to treat the tank (7 spoonfuls for the 35 gallon). 

new: i notice all the fish have a white hazy-ness all over their body now


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## snail (Aug 6, 2010)

It's okay to use prime but don't keep repeating the dose because it can effect the oxygen level.

When you say you replaced the salt. Did you put another 7 spoons of salt in the water? Salt doesn't evaporate so what you put in the tank stays in the tank until you remove water. Only replace the amount of salt needed for the water you are changing with a water change. When you are upping the amount of salt in the water or decreasing it is better not to do it to quickly because the fish need time to adjust to the amount of salt in the water.


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