Goldfish with dirty tank?

Question
QUESTION: So I've been through a lot with my goldies in the 2 months I've had them. First I started with a 10gal, found that was too small, upgraded to a 38gal. I've still yet to get the new tank cycled & on top of that, my black moor has fungus & my 2 pearlscales have ick/ich. My question is, since they are doing so poorly, should I just completely clean all of their gravel & ornaments, do a 95% water change & just start over? I only feed them twice a day, only what they can eat in about 2 to 3 minutes, have two feeder fish, a filter that was made for a 50gal tank, a nice airstone & fake plants. Hope that gives you enough information, please let me know what I should do about their disease-ridden tank!

ANSWER: Hi Kerry
No, I wouldn't break it all down and start over.  It's very rare that you would ever want to do that.  Let me ask a few questions to get a better idea of what's going on.

How many fish are there-you said the black moor and 2 pearlscales, and you mentioned 2 feeder fish-are those like rosy minnows?  Or feeder goldfish?

What's your ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and ph readings?

Now, how long has the new tank been up and running approximately?

For the fungal infection....what's it look like and where's it located on the fish?  A true fungal infection is usually a secondary infection to an injury or bacterial infection/sore.  It also looks like a cotton puff, kind of.  There is a bacterial infection that resembles a fungal infection though called Columnaris.  That disease has a wide range of symptoms, I'll enclose a link for you to read over and see if you see other symptoms related to yours to help distinguish if it's bacterial or a true fungal infection.

http://www.flippersandfins.net/flexibacter.htm

Now the problem....if that is a bacterial infection, you don't want to raise the temperature of the tank-like you normally do to treat ich.  Bacteria thrives at higher temps.  At this point, depending what you have the temperature set at, raise it very slowly to about 78 F.  Add 1 tablespoon of aquarium salt for every 5 US gallons.  That's your treatment for ich I would use.  If it is a true fungal infection on the other fish, the salt will help that.  But let me know if reading through that link if it sounds like it's that bacterial infection.  Because then you'll need to treat with antibiotics...more bad news, most antibiotics will kill off your beneficial bacteria in the tank....

Let me know when you can about those above questions.  I'm probably going to have to swithc to a vacation setting on here for a few days, should be back on by Monday or Tuesday.

Christy


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Ok, my feeder fish are a Plecostomus & a golden algae eater. Yes I have 3 goldfish, the black moor & 2 pearlscales. I got the first 10gal tank on august 13th, the new 38gal about 2 weeks ago. I read your article (& did lots of research on google) & my black moor definitely has fungus. white, cottony, has it in two splotches on his body and slightly around the mouth. I have been treating (all of them in same tank) for the fungus with API fungus cure, & I believe it is working, although the "cycle" is supposed to finish not for another 72 hours.

I have been adding salt, exactly as you said, 1tbsp for every 5 gallons for the past 3 days now since I saw that ich, I'm just afraid of doing anything more than that seeing as though I'm already currently treating their tank with the fungus cure.

I definitely don't want to go through stressing them by starting over, but I definitely don't know what else I can do right now. Waiting is not fun. Should I separate the pearlscales (only those two have ich) back into their original 10gal tank and treat them there? Maybe do the opposite, stick the black moor in the 10gal and treat him for fungus separate & treat my pearlscales for ich & raise temp in the 38gal?

So many questions, but not many instances online I could find where some fish had ich, some had fungus in the same tank and you guys have always been great help to me thus far!

thanks,
Kerry

Answer
Hi Kerry
Ok, you meant bottom feeder/algae eater fish :)  One thing with that golden algae eater, they're a color variation of the Chinese algae eater, and they have a tendency to get a bit aggressive and territorial to the other fish as they get older.  They also stop eating the algae.

That's good the fungus meds seem to be working.  Just keep using it for the right amount of time and same with the salt.  You don't want to separate fish when treating for ich.  When treating ich, you're treating the tank.  The only time ich is killed, is when it's in it's free swimming stage, not when it's attached to the fish.  I would just leave all the fish where they are and treat them there.  

After looking at your water parameters on the other message, when ph falls below 7.0 ammonia is converted into a non toxic form, I think it's called ammonium-I need to look that name up to verify it though.  So, that won't harm the fish.  The salt will help the fish also since there's nitrites present.  Nitrites inhibits the fish's ability to absorb oxygen into their blood stream.  Something with the salt allows the oxygen to be absorbed.  So I think you'll be ok till it's time to change the water again.  Just remember though, salt doesn't evaporate from the water.  It's only removed when you do a water change and remove water.  And since you're treating for ich, you'll want to treat with the salt for about 4-5 days after the spots fall off the fish.  I'm going to post some links about ich and treatments for you, one mentions about how long it takes to treat ich at different temperatures.  

The only thing strange about your readings, ammonia is .25 nitrites .5, and nitrates 5.0.  You shouldn't be showing any nitrates this soon, but maybe you used the stuff from the old tank in the new one?  If so, there was probably some beneficial bacteria growing on that and helped kick start your new tank a little bit.  Just ride it out, sounds like the cycle is going along good.  The ich is most likely showing up because the tank is cycling so the water quality is off, which is stressing the fish.  Keep an eye on that fungal infection though.  Like I said, fungus usually shows up as a secondary infection.  And that bacterial infection columnaris does look a lot like a fungal infection, especially on the mouth area.  If it doesn't heal up, let me know and I think it maybe a good idea to try an antibiotic then.  But let's wait and see how it goes with the fungal meds, hopefully that will work and that's all it is.

Ich links:

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?cls=16&cat=1791&articleid=2421

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichthyophthirius

This one is also a pretty good goldfish site:

http://www.kokosgoldfish.com/Ich.html

Good luck and let me know how that goes!

Christy