Saturday, April 13, 2013

Re: [tropical fish club] goldfish thriving

 

Larry,  I don't know where you've been reading up about goldfish but that is some misinformation if I've ever heard it.  Sand in a goldfish tank is a bad idea, especially with fancy goldfish who like to dig through the substrate.  Not only can sand cause damage to the gills, get ingested and block intestines, but as you pointed out, it's also very difficult to keep clean, which gets to be a problem with fish as dirty as goldfish.  Sand is also very dense which means lack of oxygen in the substrate... nitrifying bacteria need oxygen to survive and reproduce.  Sand will give you a denitrifying situation which can be harmful to the fish, and is why refugiums usually contain sand substrates instead of main tanks.  Yet another problem with sand and fancy goldfish is that fancies spend a lot of time scooting around the bottom of the tank, rubbing their bellies on the substrate, along with their faces while they scavenge.  Sand is sharp and will cause
skin abrasions and damage the slime coat... which leads to bacterial infections and open sores.

Another problem I see is the mixture of comet goldfish and fancy goldfish.  Those 2 types should not be mixed.  Comets are much more aggressive and much better swimmers than fancy goldfish and as they get a little bigger/more mature the comets will literally chew the fancy goldfish to shreds.  Just an example for you... end of the yr one yr I had to bring a 2 1/2 inch comet in from the pond and find a place to put it for just a few days until it's tank was ready so I tossed it into the 120 gallon with my 8 inch fancy ryukin/oranda mix.  48 hrs later my fancy goldfish (Freddy) was laying on the bottom with shredded fins and stressed to no end.  When I sat and watched for a little while it was very obvious what was happening... the comet was ambushing Freddy and there was no way for him to get away because he just didn't have the swimming ability to escape.  Needless to say the comet ended up in a rubbermaid tub until his tank was ready.  If I had
left him in there any longer he would have killed Freddy... and it took a good month before Freddy was healed up again. 

Aside from my own personal experience with goldfish, which is extensive over the course of the past 20+ yrs, I have seen many other situations both in store and in other people's tanks where they've tried to mix comets with fancy goldfish and the end result is damaged or dead fancy goldfish every time. 

I hope this helps you to avoid losing your fancy goldfish to the comets, especially having 2 of them in there with 1 fancy for both to pick on endlessly.  They might be ok at the moment but that won't last long. 

Dawn

Dawn Moneyhan
Aquatics Specialist/Nutritionist
To learn more about me go to
http://www.helium.com/users/449334


--- On Sat, 4/13/13, Larry Blanchard <labl02@aol.com> wrote:

From: Larry Blanchard <labl02@aol.com>
Subject: [tropical fish club] goldfish thriving
To: tropicalfishclub@yahoogroups.com
Date: Saturday, April 13, 2013, 1:37 PM

 

OK, I tore down the tank and redid it with new sand substrate with

some1-2" rocks in it for appearance. I got two feeders and they've been

in there for a week. I moved the ryukin in with them a couple of days ago.

They seem to be doing fine. Eating greedily and sifting sand to make

sure nothing is missed.

Which brings up another problem. Everything I've read says sand (or

bare bottom) is the best substrate for goldfish. All the sources also

point out how much mess they create. How the heck do you vacuum a sand

substrate? The poop weighs more than the sand grains! I don't vacuum

planted tanks, but plants and goldfish are a lost cause.

To bring this back on "tropical fish" subjects, the 5 dwarf neon

rainbows (M. praecox) I bought a couple of weeks ago are also doing

great. They've gotten over being shy and are racing around the tank

disturbing the lazy catfish :-). I've got (I think) 2 males and 3

females. Another few months and I expect to see eggs. I'll have to use

a spawning mop to get the eggs out before the corys eat them.

I just got an email from Fred Meyers apologizing for misunderstanding my

problem and asking for the UPC code (which I'd already given once) so

they could send me the MSDS. So maybeI can find out for sure if it was

the ammonia.

My wife just had a bone spur removed from her heel so I'll be doing

husband, wife, and nurse duty for the next several weeks. So it may

take me a while to respond to online stuff.

Larry B

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