Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

So this video features "Dawn" my kids goldfish who has been living on her/his own since about September last year.

I just did a whole tank water change on Monday and then yesterday noticed this lump on his/her tail which at the time was trailing a long tail of white slimy looking stuff.

Water gets changed every fortnight or so. Dawn gets fed every 2-3 days just a few flakes of normal cheap goldfish food.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Ich doesn't normally have anything trailing off it, it appears as white spots. I'm not entirely sure I know what I was meant to be looking at, unless it was that darker spot- which definitely would not be Ich, but perhaps it is some sort of fungal infection. If so, salting to 2ppt may help. Are you sure it wasn't some sort of parasite that has latched on?

Being a relative newbie I have NO idea what it is. I've had goldfish with definite ICH before and also scale lifting... But my goldfish seems otherwise well besides this weird bump....Strange that a parasite would only show up now after the fish has been essentially in isolation for months?

Just checked the fish again and the slimy white stuff has not returned...

I might salt the water just in case. How do I calculate how much to add to get it to 2ppt?

2 ppt (w/v) is 2kg in 1000l, or 200g in 100l
Just multiply tank volume in litres by 2, to give the number of grams of salt required.

Thanks Gunagulla

Updated photo - whatever it is cleared up for a little while but it's back and worse than ever.

It's visibly swollen on both sides of the fin, dark brown in colour with white margins:



I haven't attempted the salt treatment yet...

SydneyChick,

So... this isn't Ich, and doesn't look like Fin Rot. Does the fish seem to be bothered by this?

Perhaps you can simply cut it out without too much stress to the fish? I think I'd only consider this as a last resort.

Just a guess would be septicemia, or VHS (Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia). You obviously can research this online, but I've seen 2 medicines mentioned as successfully curing this: brand name Maracyn 2 which is minocycline and brand name Fish Mox which is amoxicillin.

Please take this as a wild guess and see if your research on this jives with what you see. There are some online vets that might be able to help rule in or out something with a quick chat:

JustAnswer.pet - My goldfish has blood streaks over all her fins and tail ...

Good luck. Hopefully Dawn recovers quickly.

--
Sam

*squints at picture*

Doesn't look like a parasite or fungus, definitely not fin rot... most likely carp pox (stupid name but it's a real thing), lymphocystis, or a tumor. Carp pox and lymphocystis are both viruses and can be triggered by stress or poor water quality. You said you did a full water change not long before it showed up? I don't do complete water changes unless it's a real emergency, it's way too easy to change something (temp, pH, hardness) far enough to shock the fish. 1/4 to 1/3 at a time is gentler.

Is the tank heated? If it is, turn the heater up to about 22-24 degrees C for a week and salt the water the way Gunagulla suggested. If it's not heated, consider putting a heater in for now. If it's carp pox, that should help; if it's lymphocystis, it won't hurt and might help. Check the pH, ammonia and so forth. Also have a look in your local pet shops etc and see if they sell acriflavine or acriflavine-based treatments - this is recommended for lymphocystis and some other problems, follow the directions on the bottle!

If you go a week or so and it's not improving or is getting worse, it's probably a tumor and your best bet will be to catch the fish and carefully cut it out with a clean pair of scissors. (It's easiest to do this with a pair of curved nail scissors - the blades are short so you can't accidentally chop off a huge chunk of tail if the fish flaps in your hand and makes you jump, and the curve makes it easier to cut around the tumor.)

Looking at things longer term... how big a tank is Dawn in, and what sort of filtration have you got going?

This is Dawns tank. It's 16L and I've just set up (1 week running) a small Tupperware grow bed on constant flood. There's also an air bubbler going 24/7. The growbed was set up using established scoria from my big Aquaponics system - so it's doing well at managing Ammonia etc

Do you think this tank is too small for a goldfish?

Ah! I didn't realise this was the tank you're doing the mini aquaponics with! I had another look at the video to get a better sense of how big Dawn is in proportion to the tank and it looks okay, especially since a teeny media bed counts as a pretty big filter. If all goes well you shouldn't need to do big water changes any more - that said, the smaller the system the less stable it is, so do keep doing regular water tests. If it goes out of balance it'll go hard and fast.

Dawn will outgrow that tank, but you've got a while before you have to upgrade. When you do, though, I suggest you upgrade to something BIG, like a three or four foot long tank, and get some tankmates - a few more goldfish about the same size, and maybe a couple of bristlenose catfish to scrub the glass for you. If you only go one tank size up you're just going to need to upgrade again before too long.

(I need to get a photo of my friend's goldfish tank. She's got some whoppers in there, I bet she could grow a lot of veggies on their poop! )

I've just treated Dawns tank with 12 drops of Wardley ICK Away which has Acriflavine as one of the active constituents.

Oddly the swollen ball of fluff has now started to detach from the Goldfishs tail and is almost fully detached leaving a circular hole behind....

I decided to scoop Dawn out of the tank and remove the lump - it came off easily in my fingers. But when I put it on a tissue it looked for all the world like a soggy tick.





What do you think? How do I treat the tank so that the goldfish doesn't get reinfected?

Reminded me a bit of this while it was still on the fish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argulus_foliaceus - I havne't looked to see how it's treated but maybe treating the fish the same way would work? I suppose this could be the only one in the tank, maybe there has to be more than one to breed?

...huh. And also ew.

Given the fluffy edges, and the fact that it left an actual hole behind, I'm still thinking it's more likely to have been an infection or a tumor than an actual bug, just with... stringy bits. Blech. Also, google image search for Argulus wossisface shows them as mostly more obviously bug-looking or greenish... but definitely keep an eye out for anything swimming around in the tank or showing up on the fish just in case! The ick away seems to have shifted whatever the heck it was, so that's a start. I'd also do the salt if you haven't already, it helps to prevent problems when fish are stressed or injured.