I don't know if some people remember that my fishies recovered from ich over the holidays.Thanks to lauriep and captk,I was able to cure it for a short period of time
I noticed this morning that my black moor has white spots in her tail fin again I don't think it's ich.It does not look like grains of salt but more kind of a white blotch.I have no idea what could be causing this.

Ammonia Level 0mg
Nitrite Level? 0mg
Nitrate level? ??
Ph Level? 7.5
Ph Level out of the Tap? 7.5~8
Tank size(How many Gals) and How long has it been running?
55 gallons running about 7 weeks
What kind of Filtration? 2 cannister filters
How often do you change the water and how much?
30% once a week
What kind of Water additives or conditioners? dechlorinator
Any Medications add to the tank? no
How many fish in the tank and there size? 7
Add any new fish to the tank? no
What do you feed your fish? Frozen blood worms,brine shrimp,peas
Any unusual findings on the fish? white spots
Any unusual behavior? no
If you can what is the chloramines Level
from the Tap? ??

I will try to get a pic and post asap.

My fish get this sometimes too, usually in the tail fin. I just do more water changes and add some extra salt, it clears up quickly.

I added salt last night after doing a 30% water change.I sure hope it's nothing serious


Her gills haven't recovered yet from her previous illness.When she had ich,her gill covers folded outside exposing her gills.I'm really worried about her.Please help.

I agree with Annette.

Perform extra waterchanges over the next few days. I fear that your Nitrates may be getting a little too high. Since you don't have any test kits, you can't know for sure.

I would suggest that you get some test kits ASAP. This is always the first thing in question when a fish gets sick. 90% of the time, water quality is the core of the cause. This is precisely why test kits are soooo important.

I've seen these spots on my moor, Shaggy before and Every time they appeared, I could trace the problem back to power outtages or high nitrAtes. Each time, after correcting the problem, the spots faded away, although very slowly.

Now go get those test kits!

Keep us posted, okay?

Paul

Thanks Toothless
I would love to get those nitrates test kits but unfortunately,they don't have them at our lfs I will have to go a little farther and try to find a store that carries them.
I will do another water change and see how it goes.By the way,I salted my tank last night,is that okay?If so,do I have to add salt again after a water change?Thanks...

Yes. If you were to syphon out 5 gallons of water during a waterchange, you will need to add enough salt for only the 5 gallons that you are replacing. This will keep your salinity stable.

You can keep this salinity going in the tank for up to two weeks at a time. After that, It's a good idea to start doing waterchanges without salt. This is the only way to remove it.

When you go to get the nitrAte test kits, Why not get the ammonia and nitrIte as well?

Good luck! Let us know how it's going!

Thank you very much Toothless
I did a 50% water change yesterday but I did not add salt coz I wasn't sure if I had too But I will be doing another 50% today and add salt with that.



I think you misread my post because I have ammonia and nitrite test kits nitrate is the only one they don't have at our LFS

Ammonia level 0mg
Nitrite level 0mg
PH level 7.5

Thank you very much for helping me out.I really appreciate it

Oh I see! for some reason, I thought you substituted the readings with OMG (oh my god). Sorry about that one!

Keep us posted!

I should've put a space in between(0 mg)

Thanks again

Toothless, did you check out the photo? It looks different to the type of white blotchs I was referring to. Do you think it might be fungus?

Theres a possibility.

If the spots are fuzzy like mold on food, then yes, you could easily diagnose it as a fungus. But, Fungus is well known for riding the coattails of bacterial infections. You treat the bacteria and the fungus retreats.

From what I saw in the pics, it looks more to me like its the white meaty looking raised area that accompanies scar tissue from bacterial infections. Fungus infections generally form in one spot and spread outwards from there.

Wich one of these best describes what your seeing, Coyote?

The white spots on her tail are raised and not flat.They don't look fuzzy to me but I'm not sure,sorry.I forgot to mention that 1 of my pleco died a couple of days ago.Here is the thread I started about that.
Pleco died,????

Are these related at all?

I think perhaps your other pleco could have either died from stress induced by fighting with the other pleco, or even competing with the other pleco for food. Do you remember what your plecos head looked like just before it died? right behind the eyes there is two ridges of bone. If you can easily see these two ridges, your pleco was underfed and malnourished. couple that with not knowing what the parameters were in the tank, and youve got a potential for disease. If you couldnt tell where the two ridges of bone were, it could have been well fed but still succombed to poor water quality. These are the two most common reasons why a pleco passes on.

As to this being linked to your black moors spots, I feel there is a strong possibility. The white stuff you saw coating the body of the dead pleco was most likely a fungus. This could easily have spread to your goldfish by way of waterborne spores that fungus puts out. Now, your goldie might very well have been attacked by the fungus (or bacteria, or both) at some point. If these spots do not resemble what you saw on your placos body, it might be bacterial scar tissue as I suggested earlier.

Keep a very close eye on these spots for a while and let us know if you see them starting to spread (or new spots emerging).

As I stated earlier, high nitrAtes can be responsible for everyone of these ailments that your seeing. Knowing the results of your tanks water on a weekly basis can garauntee that nitrAtes will never be a problem.

I'm sorry but I don't remember how my pleco looked when he died All I could remember when I took him out is that he was covered with whitish stuff.

The spots that I am seeing with my fish is nothing similar with the ones I saw on my plecos body.

If fungus is what I'm dealing with,should I medicate my tank with something that will eliminate fungus?Or will salt be okay?

Thanks again.

Well, I've got a hunch that these spots your seeing are just bacterial in nature. Keep doing as you are doing and keep us posted on his condition.

Are they growing or do they seem to have stopped?

Can you have a look at your remaining pleco and tell us what his head looks like? Better yet, how about a pic of his head? A view from in front would be the best angle for this.

If you are worried that these spots could be fungus and you can't quite tell for sure, you could always try to swab the spots with povidone iodine or hydrogen peroxide (both are standard). Once or twice should suffice.

Post back soon.

The spots are not growing and I think they are getting a bit smaller They are not as white as they used to be.

I will try to get a shot of my pleco but I think it'll be hard coz he's always in hiding I will post the pic asap.

Thank you very much

Best shot I could get.


Can you tell from the pic if he's eating well?

It's kind of hard to tell from that angle but from what I could see, He looks fat and happy. But just a bit of fair warning: Common plecos and fancy goldfish do not mix well.For starters, they can grow in excess of a foot and a half! Comets, commons and shubunkins seem to get along with them pretty well because they tend to be very fast swimmers with streamlined bodies. I thought I had a fairly docile pleco in a tank with a couple fancies until I realized why I was seeing a few missing scales every now and then. I removed the pleco and everyones scales have been perfect since.

In case you haven't read up on this yet, rubberlip and bussynose plecos are two of the most docile plecos you can get, and they top out at about 6 inches.

As for your goldies spots, are they growing at all?

Paul

When I got my plecos,I didn't know about their compatibility with goldies until I read it on this board. I can't take him back to the store so I haven't got no choice but to keep him.

The spots are not growing I think they are a bit smaller than before and not as white.But my fish is staying at the bottom of the tank.This is so frustrating

Thanks for bearing with me.

Hmmm.

How are your water parmeters today?

Were you able to get the nitrAte test kits?

Have you been doing extra waterchanges?


Post back soon.

ammonia 0 mg
nitrite 0 mg
Ph 7.5~8

These are from yesterdays tests.I haven't got nitrate tests kits yet but I have been doing 50% water changes everyday and adding salt as adviced.

Should I test my water again today?Thanks...

Your goldies might just be a little stressed due to all the extra attention.

Are they eating?

Are their fins erect?

As for testing, Nah, your nitrAtes should be pretty low by now. You might even stop doing the watechanges altogether now. Well, At least until your regularly scheduled changes.

Hopefully, now that their water is clean and left alone for a bit, they will start to act more normal.

Keep us posted.

Right! I'll just do one more water change since I got it all ready and all

As for my other goldies,they are all eating good(as always)and their fins are all erect so I guess their pretty happy.My black moor is the only one sitting at the bottom but I can assure you that she is eating fine

Is it possible that black moors are susceptible to diseases?She was the first one to have signs of ich when I got a new fish.Maybe their sensitive?

Thank you very much for helping me out.

Well the spots are still there and now she has some on her upper eyes.But she is a bit active than before so I guess she's fine.Just thought I'd update
Thanks

Do the white spots look anything like what you see in the pic below?

If so, this is most likely just her trying to tell you something, she is actually a he!

If they do indeed look to be what's in the pic, you might start to see the little white bumps starting to form on the leading edge of his pectoral fins (like in the pic, only they start out as just a few).

Hopefully this is what your seeing..........

ooh sorry but,she is definitely a she because she laid eggs a couple of months ago
She's doing fine but sometimes she sits at the bottom of the tank.I can see that at times she gets irritated and starts chasing someone that comes to close to her.I really don't know what's wrong and it is not like her to be like this.

Hmmmm, not a he, huh?

Well, you know what they say, "A picture is worth a thousand words" ..........

How about one?

Very weird...it looks like an infection of somesort I experienced a similar thing, where my moor had this fungusy area on her stomach. No matter what I did, daily water changes and salting (that was in the quarantine tank though, so ammonia does get up to 1 then) didn't help - stayed for weeks. She has always been the indicator/weaker fish though, and I realised she does unique things like sleeping with fins slightly folded, but is generally healthy.

Anyway, when I put them in their final cycled tank, with definitely perfect water quality, the fungus patch actually disappeared in a day. So I was thinking in weird one-off cases like this, unless if it is major parasitic problems, the fish should really heal on its own, under good water conditions.

My female moor (because she gets chased by her bf hehe) also has whiteish dots above her eyes, but I'm not worried about that so far as she's not showing any symptoms.

Sitting at the bottom doesn't sound right if it's not her usual behaviour. Hope you figure things out soon...

Do others recommend fungus cure type solutions yet (probably in isolation), assuming it could be a form of fungus?

I hope these pictures help.They're the best I could take

Hi Kathy, I was on vacation and missed all your threads. Sorry about your pleco and the moor. Paul has been giving you excellent advice so I'll just lurk a bit more but I'll definitely keep track of this thread. Good luck!

Thank you.I need a lot of luck right now
Welcome back Captk

It looks to me like theres something bacterial in nature going on. Assuming that you are still adding salt to the tank and these spots are still appearing, you basically have two options, You can do nothing except keep the water pristine, salted and warm and hope that your moors immune system can kick this on it's own. Or you can try to locate a good wide spectrum antibiotic treatment coupled with a medicated food.

Since there seems to be too many white spots forming for it to be considered "not a big deal", I suggest medicating. It's just going to take a little research before you go and buy any medications.

Do you have a local fish shop that carries a large supply of medications? If so, Can you find out what antibiotic treatments they have? I would even go as far as to call around to several shops in your vicinity to get lists of any of them they might have. Whatever meds you can find, Post back here with the names and any of the ingredients you can find. I know this might not be very easy to do, it's just that we don't seem to have any listings for available meds in Japan and the more we know of, the better choice we have for treating your little one.

Here are some very good ingredients to keep your eye out for:

Furan 2 (or any furan based med)

E.M. tablets (or any erythromycin based med)

Jungle fungus clear (maybe?)


Maybe even try a search engine for medications available to you in Japan. I'm sure there's bound to be an online catalog or mailorder deal somewhere near you.

Post back soon.

Thank you very much.I will do my best to find the meds

I have two medicines I got when my fish had ich.
Malachite Green for ich,fin rot and fungus
Green F for ich and fin rot

If ever I don't find any more,will these do?

Well, malachite green is basically only used for microparasites and fungal infections. If this is actually a fungal infection, the malachite green should help. But we have no real way of knowing what this is exactly. This brings me to my next set of suggestions until you can come up with a medications list (hopefully including ingredients):

You can try a series of swabs on the infected areas. I would suggest povidone iodine for the first couple and then hydrogen peroxide if more swabs are deemed needed. These swabs should be easy enough to complete on the spots not too near the eyes. Extra care should be taken near the eyes or the swab at that spot should be foregone.

For swabs it is always easier when you've got an extra pair of clean hands. You'll need a clean wet (tankwater) rag just big enough to fold around the fish like a taco. The best way to catch the fish is to shoo it into the rag while the rag is submerged. Extra care should be taken to ensure that all of the fish's fins are folded back when in the rag. Extra special care must be taken with the fish if it has telescope eyes or bubbles or other protruding characteristics. Swabs are best carried out in a temorary container just big enough for two sets of hands to work over. The fish can stay out of the wwater for 30 seconds to 2 minutes maximum. Actually longer but this is a safe time frame. A firm but gentle grip must be kept at all times. Do not hold the fish more then a couple inches above the water at any given time. Transerring the fish from the tank to container is best done with a receptacle just big enough for you to scoop the fish out. this will reduce the amount of thrashing and addd stress from the swabbing.

If you cannot find any good antibiotics anywhere near, try looking for a product called methylene blue. This stuff might prove useful for a few prolonged dips after the swabs. Do not use it in your tank as it can cause negative effects with your bio-filter (same with malachite green) It has very good antiseptic qualities and is very safe for use with goldfish (as well as most other fish).

Post back soon.

Okay this is the only meds that they have aside from the ones I got.

Tropical Gold
Trichloro,hydroxyethyl,phosphonate 2g/100g
Acrinol 3g/100g
Methylene Blue 5g/100g

I also got the methylene blue.

Thanks

I don't know what else I could do.I separated her and tried to treat with methylene blue but the spots won't go away.They're not spreading or getting any bigger but they're still there She still acts different and she now stays mostly at the surface.Thank you to everyone who tried to help but I guess she won't be getting any better.

Hey, those look EXACTLY like the spots Harris used to develop on his tail. On him they were a bacterial infection oozing out, which invariably followed a period of poor water quality. The worst attack he had was after my filter failed one hot afternoon and the tank quickly became a warm smelly soup. I think Toothless has had experience with the same bug on his fish, judgng by his early comment.

I treated Harris by salting the tank to 0.3% and swabbing the spots with a half-strength solution of TCP (TCP's a British antispetic, like iodine). This worked every time; the spots cleared up within a couple of days. You can also use Savlon if you dry the skin a little first as it is waterproof and nicely anti-bacterial. TCP is much easier to handle though. If you want to try that then give us a shout and I'll run you throught the procedure.

EDIT: I forgot to add, be very cautious if you have used Meth Blue in the tank: it DOES crash the cycle. Test the water daily if this stuff is in.

Thanks emmaj for the tips
Actually,I've done everything as adviced and nothing seemed to work for her.Out of all of my fish,she's the only one with those spots.I haven't got any issues with my water quality except for nitrates coz I don't have any nitrates test kit. if there is anything else I could try to get rid of these spots please help.

Nothings changed...she still have those white spots and now she has split fins I think fin rot Maybe I should consider putting her down I think she's suffering.She still stays at the surface most of the day.This is really frustrating

Awww, sorry I didn't notice your updates sooner.


Well, have you been keeping the water really clean with extra waterchanges?

Have you continued to keep the salt % at 0.3%?

How long did you try the iodine swabs?

Did you ever try separating her and using the methylene blue?

Can you describe your latest attempts in treating her?

What about a vet who specializes in fish? Any chance of you bringing her in to have a culture done of the infections? This is a sure fire way to find out the bacteria/parasite/fungus involved and he will most certainly have drugs to combat them. This, I feel, is your best course of action if you wanted to get her issues resolved. It might be a bit expensive but its worth it to save a well loved goldie.

Post back soon.

Don't be sorry....I understand that you have a lot of people to help and it's not easy to keep track of them

Ph 6.5~7
ammonia 0 mg
nitrite 0 mg
nitrate 20 ppm(finally found test kits)

Now to answer your questions....
Yes,I am continously doing 50% water changes but instead of everyday I cut back to every other day.My water quality is always good.

I have stopped adding salt about a week ago because I read that being in salt water for a long period of time tends to stress the fish(is that true?)

I didn't swab because I can't find povidone iodine or hydrogen peroxide.

I separated her and treated with methylene blue for approximately 1 week but no progress.

I don't know what else to do but to keep the water pristine.I am trying to find a fish vet and take her but chances are slim that I'll ever find one.

I love my fish but if she's in pain,I would rather put her down than to see one disease to another attack her and see her almost lifeless at the surface of the tank

Thank you very much

Cathy, I'm so sorry, I haven't been keeping up to date with this thread. From what I have read, I would guess that it is a bacterial infection and possibly gone systemic.

Is he eating? Can you get any medicated food? Do you have any antibiotics?

I'm surprised that you couldn't find any iodine or peroxide. What about betadine or something like that? You should be able to get peroxide from chemists/drugstores and even some hairdressers. You really need to swab the tail and fin.

Warm the water to 78*F, lots of aeration. Give him medicated food and treat the tank with antibiotics. It is not too late but the clock is ticking.

Please keep us posted.

Hi Captk,please don't be sorry...I do understand

okay,to answer your questions..

she's still eats but not like she used to.she's not growing thin but her poop is sometimes kind of whithish in color and constantly with bubbles.
I'm having a hard time finding medicated food.I was adviced to ask a breeder but I haven't found one yet.What kind of antibiotics should I get?

I will try and look for hydrogen peroxide again.I have betadine that I could use but I've had it for 4 years or so.Will that be okay to use?

Thank you very much

Any board spectrum antibiotics would be a start. Maracyn-2 is good. If no luck, try a gram negative one as type type of bacteria are more common than gram+.

If you can get some new betadine will be better. The only thing is that they are not as strong as iodine. What you can do is pour some betadine into a small dish and let it sit and evaporate. Wait until there is about 50% volume left before using it. That way, you have double strength betadine.

Thank you
One more question,the tank is salted for 2 days now.Will it be okay to mix the antibiotics with salt?