Gold Fish Disease
Many factors can cause Gold Fish Disease which can make your fish sick, and even kill them.
Some disease can be treated with medicine while others are harder to get rid of. Your fish should look healthy and be active, if they aren’t the list below might help you determine treatment.
When inspecting your fish for Gold Fish Disease, go one step further and look for tiny dots that are white and may be fuzzy looking This indicates the parasite Ichthyophthirius, sometimes called Ich. It is a common parasite affecting all kinds of fish. This disease can be caused by poor water and is easily contracted by fish whose immune system is weak. If caught in time, it can be treated with medication that you buy in the pet store.
If you don’t clean your tank regularly, you may find Grayish cottony patches on skin or gills - This is probably a fungus caused by large amounts of decaying matter (fish waste and food) in the tank. It should be easy to clear up with treatments if it has not progressed too far. You can buy treatments online and, of course, clean the tank more often to prevent this from happening.
Diseases don’t keep to themselves so the Gold Fish Disease can at times be found in fish that have fin rot. This is another problem that can happen because of poor water quality. It can be treated with a medicine made for this problem. You may want to consider isolating any fish that have rotted fins to keep the disease from spreading.
If you notice your fish scraping against the bottom then he may have flukes. Flukes are a parasite that attach the gills and skin of the fish – once again poor water quality can be to blame. This disease is difficult to get rid of and the tank should be treated at the first sign of outbreak.
fish gasping for air - Perhaps your tank does not have enough oxygen? Try adding a airstone that will add oxygen to the water through air bubbles. Plus it looks neat in the tank!
When medicating your tank for Gold Fish Disease, never overmedicate. Prevention is the best route to a healthy tank, and since most of these disease are caused by poor water quality, your best bet for healthy fish is to perform periodic water changes and clean the tank regularly.