………anyone who’s managed to keep a few goldfish alive and healthy for a couple of years knows what the problem is - these guys get BIG and, what’s worse, they breed.

Most goldfish are purchased by beginners who don’t have any idea as to what they are in store for. Personally speaking, I’ve gone through a lot of new, bigger tanks and filters as my family of goldfish matured. This is rather an expensive proposition and not many folks buying goldfish are prepared for this. Despite their growth demands, I’ve tried my best to give them a decent habitat, but they have now entered into an age where this has become a double challenge.

Yes, I’m talking about the age where breeding begins. Anyone who has had several 8” goldfish slamming around in their acquarium 24 hours a day, week in and week out, knows what I mean. If you didn’t know better you would be sure they were possessed. Well, I suppose they are. A passion-crazed heavy, chunky-bodied goldfish can do a lot of damage, not just to himself and to the object of his “affection”, but also to the tank environment in general. They will, for instance, knock over any decorative tank items and tear your power filter intake tubes right out of their containment. Their continual chasing/slamming around the tank will stir up sediments and knock off scales from the other fish, even leaving wounds. But perhaps worst of all is the egg spraying that goes on. This stuff is like a mix of epoxy and fine pea gravel and bonds instantly onto every surface it is sprayed against – and that means pretty much everwhere and on everything. I’ve even seen this spray out of small openings on the tank and you find yourself cleaning it off the wall. Your aquarium soon becomes a nasty, foul, milky mess – thick as soup. Filters plug off and the environment can get toxic fast.

I have been moving my goldfish family into an outdoor pond for the summer and, when they wish to please me, they do their mating there. But not always so. Sometimes they wait until I have returned them to the indoor tank for the winter. Apparently, if you take care of them well enough and they are consequently healthy enough, they will reward you with this mating ritual. And it is not over and done with quickly, but can go on for weeks – long after the tank has become virtually uninhabitable.

I’d like to hear from anyone else who has persevered with goldfish long enough to suffer a similar fate and anything they found they could do to moderate the problem.

I haven't yet had my goldies long enough but the only thing that I can think of is to seperate the males and females.

.............yes, you are right there. One needs an extra good sized tank, all cycled and ready, with good filtration. I've tried partitioning a single tank but the males slam themselves repeatedly (!) against the partition until they are wounded and it has to be plenty strong for even half grown males to not dislodge.
To bad this info isn't available for all newbies who are impulsively buying goldfish. But most goldfish don't make it past 4" or four months of age before they succumb to our ignorance anyway. Poor things.

The longest I have ever had a goldfish was 6 years... but she never did any of that, but maybe that is because she was always alone. Miss Coral lived in a 20 gallon tank all by herself and never did anything of the sort. But out of curiosity, Madame, are you trying to convince people to not consider buying goldfish? Just curious.

My goldfish spawned in the tank last January. I was VERY pleased ;o)

I loved reading your post, it was very well written, so much so, I could picture the goings on in your tank perfectly. I was almost in tears from laughing heehee. I guess it's funnier when it's not my tank ;o)

It sounds like your goldies are VERY well taken care of.


Jessica

What a scary post! My 5 guys are under a year old, I just got them a 300 gallon prefab pond for next summer, I thought "every thing taken care of, no problem", and now I get a picture of goldie mayhem!

Tell me it isn't so!
Robin

I just bought a new oranda today, and I purposely picked a male to go into my "all male" tank. I wouldn't dare put an unsuspecting young lady in there

how can you tell male from female in the fancy variety? am considering getting a 30 gallon with 3 in there. 1 oranda, pearlscale, lionhead.
Haven't heard too much of this happening with goldfish, hope it doesn't happen to me, is making me wonder now

If you are lucky, they will be showing their breeding tubercles. In the headgrowth varieties, the tubercles on the gill plates are often not visible, but look at the front edge of the pectoral fin. You will see tiny white bumps, sort of like sandpaper on the males. Once you have seen them once, they are easy to spot in future.

Very young fish will not show the tubercles, too, and unfortunately, they are not visible all year round.

In non-headgrowth fish, they will also show the tubercles on their gill plates. They are tiny, white raised bumps. The headgrowth varieties have these, too, but they are often buried under the growth and hard to see.

Garrup, very well written indeed! All I can say to your post is that it is the ideal way on how goldfish should be raised, and to what they can grow if kept properly. For everybody who thinks a goldfish is happy in a small environment and grows to his full protential - go read Garrup's post and think again!

I found this out they hard way, loosing the two males to a post-spawn parasite when they were exhausted and stressed. My answer, I now have two females so I hope there will not be a repeat!!!

I have invested in numerous large tanks, so my males and females are kept separately. (except for an ocasional goof!) I also carefully keep temperatures even year long in attempts to prevent starting any breeding behaivior.

But you are exactly right! I had to laugh sooooo hard when reading your post!!! Well stated!!!!!

...................so glad so many read this post - I was hoping, for the sake of all goldfish, I could get the message out. The message is important and its directed to all wanabe goldfish owners. If all the suffering goldfish in the world could scream we'd all be deaf. To me, fish and all other creatures are "people" to some extent. When we live with them long enough we see that they have fears, joys and feelings - maybe not exactly like ours, but they are real. It is seldom that we are told that goldfish can grow 8" a year if they are cared for properly and some even reach two feet in length (although I doubt any of the fancy varieties do so). Not many people are prepared for that and surely not for their breeding. A nice big pond will do the trick, but even that will fill up with young goldfish in a couple of years.
So if you find you can't take care of your big goldfish, or all the new young ones after a breeding festival, what do you finally do? Give them away to someone else where they will be misstreated and die? In my experience that's usually the case because people will take them but not many people are going to properly care for a lowly goldfish. And let's face it, to most people they are just "fish".
The only answer, of course, is to know what you are getting into, know which are male and which are female, separate them appropriately and to be dedicated to their care as they grow and grow and grow! They could, afterall, be your friend for twenty or thirty years - longer than your cat or dog.

Housing all those "spawnlings" can be a bit of a hassle if you know what I mean. Outdoor ponds placed in unfinished basements can usually help. Normally you can keep your temperature a little cooler down there for them. I'm told that helps slow down their metabolism AKA the "happy dance" with other fishies might be less likely. That aside from using every single 30 gallon tub you can find to get another tank up and running for the little ones.

But yeah, I guess the safest bet would be do go with the sex separation.

Robyn

I've never had that problem, because my fish aren't even big enough...

wow, scary I hope my fish aren't so vigorous when they get that big! and I will only have one tank too.....EEEK!

Excuse the ignorance of this question if it is obvious to others, but is it possible to remove the eggs or are they hard to find?

..............almost impossible in a pond as they hang up in weeds, etc. In the tank its quite a cleanup job - like scraping silicon glue off stuff underwater. They will continue this "egg spreading" for days, even weeks, so the job is formidable and your tank will almost certainly become toxic to the fish - especially since the filters can get plugged off. I doubt that anyone keeps grown goldfish inside after this happens the first time!

I think I must be taking care of my goldfish just fine. I've had several of the fancy varieties (and two koi) in my backyard pond for about 3 years now. My fantail? (BIG orange fish, with split fancy tail, egg shaped body) started out at about 3 inches, and is now about 10 inches from nose to tail. And last year, They bred indiscriminately and produced several lovely children. My neighbor has about 20. and I have about 40 in my basement. I really need to start checking the sex of them, so I can separate them.
My local fish store will take the excess babies, but I need to wait until they are too big for feeder fish, because I don't want them to suffer that fate, so I have to expand my line of tanks. Soon I will be out of living room!!!

I have found a really nice solution to overwintering them in the basement, in addition to tanks. Rubbermaid puts out a horse trough, made out of VERY heavy duty plastic. They have them in 100-200 gallons sizes, and are sturdier than tanks of the same size. I just use overhead flourescent lights on a timer as their lighting source, and a canister filter for cleanup. One thing I really like about the trough instead of pond containers, is their shape. They are oval, and hold more gallonage in a smaller amount of floor space than the round varieties. You can obtain them at most feed supply stores, or on the internet.

http://www.mytscstore.com/detail.asppcID=8...&productID=9364

I presently have 6 goldfish in my 54gal tank. One black ranchu about 4" (male?); one redcap 5-51/2" (female?); pearlscale 4-5" (male?); an oranda 4-1/2-5" (male..could be female?); a lionhead- I really think is a ranchu 3-1/2" (female?) and a Ryukin 41/2-5" (male?) I'm not sure I have sexed them correctly but I know I definately have a mix. Am I safe from the breeding ritual or will these 6 interbreed? :crp

Very informative post, now. I have had my 2 fantails for 5 years and going strong and an evergrowing koi for 1 1/2 years. And they're all males and i have had this happen im sure cause of the ever so descriptive actions. While Chaser (koi) is the biggest he gets along well with Angel and jesus (spanish pronunciations) 55 gal seemed good at the earlier times, well now upgrading may be in need. Love them guys to pieces. Drives my cat nuts though. I am looking into getting them some "love" Cause they all are such strong fish, wouldnt mind doing the breeding thing.

What do you do with them when they grow up? I have two commons one is ayear and a half and 8 inches and the second a half year and 4 inches. I also have two fantails that are 4 inches. I would like to get rid of them but how do I find them a home? Gsmith

I'd snag them in a heartbeat, but dont think they would enjoy being stuck in an envelope . Im upgrading to 100gal tank soon, Hopefully in wall. So i will be getting more fishies.

Yes, they will interbreed. All goldfish will. Goldfish are descendants of the wild crussian carp, first captive breeding was in China over a thousand years ago. Originally bred for food, much inbreeding occured, causing many to have a gold color. The Japenese saw the fish on a trade mission, and brought some back to Japan, where many of the varieties that we find today were developed. Goldfish genetics are extremely pliable, and lots of shapes can be bred into the fish. If you breed them yourself, you will find that in only a few generations of free breeding, the common shape and color of the wild fish will come back. Thats why culling takes place, to enhance certain features and abolish others. If the fish is allowed to breed freely, we will all own the wild crussian carp, instead of orandas, pearlscales, and black moors. I bred a shubunkin with a half oranda, half black moor, and had common, orange and brown goldfish. A few had telescope eyes, a few had nacreous scales, but most where orange and brown common goldfish.
Sorry, I've done my homework, and love to ramble on.

I agree with you! :angry:

perhaps this is a predictable question, but how can you tell the difference from a male and female (for future referance)? Is it the same in all fish, or different according to breads? (if so, my husband and I will be getting a moor)

It's not very easy when they are still very young. Have a look at this link for info. on sexing goldfish.