Swim bladder problems in goldfish

[vanderkm]

This little gold and white fantail has been with me about 8 months, sharing a tank with a calico fantail (30 gallon). They are about 3 inches long. They are fed gold fish flakes and floating balls (color enhancing) twice a day and thawed peas once a week. Water is 10% changed per week, filter is Aqua-Clear 300.

The gold one occasionally would flip upside down for a couple hours and be ok by the next morning, but over the last month this has increased in frequency, and this week it has been happening 3-4 times each day.

I have read that this is a swim bladder problem, have been told to increase the fiber in the diet (so we added the peas), but wondered if there is anything else we should consider doing. The only thing that has changed in the last month is that the tank is warmer than before (now about 70 when it was 65 over the winter, because the tank is in a room that gets more sun with spring here).

I don't have a picture of her upside down, but this is what she looks like normally. Would really like to help her out, so if anyone has any ideas?? The other one has never done this.

[Shane Tesser]

Ive heard of this happening before but never heard of fibre being the cause. I always thought it was lack of proper protein to be honest, but then again im not a dietision. To me it sounds like you are doing everything right. But if you think its a problem with the diet..why not start there. I have a mated pair of nine year old fancy goldfish as well. They are fed and brought up on almost 100% nutrafin flake. The temp in the tank is run at a constant 75 and they never seem to have problems. The only other thing they get from time to time is duck weed.

If your sure its from diet..cut one of the foods off for a week..or even a month at a time..see if it helps. I would start with the floating balls first, which are really made for Koi that are diggers and built to digest all sorts of nasty stuff most fish cant. Fancy goldfish have unfortunately all sorts of strange things wrong with them that come from trying to acheive a certain physical look. So it wouldnt surprise me that perhaps he couldnt digest a floating pellet no matter how small. Keep us posted on your finds

[vanderkm]

Thanks Shane, we will cut out the floating balls and try the nutrafin flake - maybe it has higher protein than what we have been using. They definately have a weird body shape - sometimes they have to work really hard just to swim, but they are pretty cute! It is possible to get just as attached to these guys (and our two lionheads) as it is to the herps.

thanks again,

mary v

[leeD]

Ive had the same problem with goldfish before...usually due to the floating pellets... I dont like the flakes much because they get everywhere and are dirtier than a pellet.... Nutrafin has released a very handy sinking goldfish pellet.. I would give that a try.. The floating ones seem to mess up their boyancy with the amount of air they get from eating pellet and air in the floating kind.... just my experience with goldfish


Lee

[vanderkm]

Thanks so much Lee. I agree on the flakes, and I have a hard time judging when they have enough but I will get the sinking pellets. I have some of those for my lionheads and they really love them - actually defend the area of the tank bottom where they fall and I have to feed at both ends of the tank so they eat their own.

I seem to see the problem more the day after a water change and wondered if it is the dilution of salt in the tank that brings on some problems. I have used a basic level of salt in all the goldfish tanks for maintenance, but only top it up every month or so, even though we are replacing water weekly. I was thinking maybe the dilution was a factor in bouyancy.

Anyway, will look for those pellets - thanks,

mary v.

[djnzlab]

HI,
I uesd to have a few goldfish and they can bloat rather quickly, MAny gold fish are being bred to increase the overall sive of the abdomen and appearance, this may not be in the best interest of the fishsdue to air bladder location and functions. I wonder if the over sized abdomen may be due to increased sized bowel thsi could cause a tendacy to bloat with food.
Fresh food seems to help the right greens, I always fed my goldfish fresh flake some of the Japanese foods seem to be well balanced with sea kelp and such. smaller amounts of food semms to reduce the bloat more quickly. Fish can go for long perods between feeding be sure your not over feeding
Ask your petstore if they have an anti bloat food??
Doug

[vanderkm]

Thanks Doug,

These two certainly have overgrown abdomens and I am sure I am likely overfeeding to some extent. They are fed twice a day and usually hoover everything within a few minutes, but they have still grown quite a bit since I got them and they do look full most of the time - I am just never sure how much of that is body shape and how much is them being pigs. They eat a lot of the algae that grow on the back of the tank too.

I have gotten them on some sinking pellets and am mixing those with the sinking food we use for our lionheads that is Japanese (really expensive and stinky though!), and so far she has gone through three days without flipping over - though she does spend some time kind of on her side, so hope this may be solving it.

Will ask about anti-bloat foods next time we are in to the shop.

thanks,

mary v.

[coltiger]

It is all about diet in feeding fancy goldfish. Vegetables play a big part in the diet. I suggest feeding them a food that is balanced. On the subject of pellets, goldfish can be fed pellets. The problem usually arises with the goldfish sucking down the pellet before it has enough time to absorb the water. Maybe presoaking the pellets before feeding. Pellets are a better way to feed larger fish. Both goldfish and Koi are carp and prefer eating off the bottom maybe alittle insect larvae like bloodworm might help. Anyhows keep the diet balanced.

The salt in your aquarium does help to prevent disease but I would only add salt once in awhile. The salinity of your water can cause alot of problems for goldfish. The salt is normally added in petstores or the suppliers to prevent a disease outbreak in a crowded enviroment. I'd stick with fresh only and a good filter. Try keeping the water as cool as possible, warmer water on a regular basis might help growth and reproduction but does shorten the life of your goldfish. Try a 30% water change a week.

[vanderkm]

Thanks Coltiger,

They definately suck in the floating pellets before they have absorbed any water but the sinking ones seem better - they have a harder time finding them because they are smaller and they search the bottom for 5-10 minutes before they find them all. I assumed that the complete pellet or flake foods were balanced and worried about adding veggies or meats - I guess as long as we limit the supplemental food we are likely ok.

On the water changes, we were doing 20-25% changes a week when the goldfish pairs were in 20 gallon tanks when we first got them and they were smaller, but we ended up with cloudy water (not due to particles - the stuff to clear it didn't make a difference) 4-5 days after a water change and were told it was because we were replacing too much. We increased tank size and went to 10% changes and have not had the cloudy water. Don't you have problems with that when doing a 30% change - anything we could do to prevent it?

thanks,

mary v

[corr]

I was staying out of this discussion simply because I've never kept goldfish. But from what I know about swim bladder problems, floating pellets could definitely be the problem as with African ciclids too.

Sinking pellets seem more suitable anyway because goldfish like to sift through the gravel anyway, don't they?

I agree with coltiger about the 30% water changes... never heard of clouding water because of changing too much.

[Darlene]

Hi there. I've been keeping fancy goldfish for years. Currently have 4 tanks just for them. Any time I have seen cloudy water at change time it has been too warm when added or there is rotten food in the tank from over-feeding. I feed my fish 4-5 times per week & once or twice per month I weight a piece of leaf lettuce into their water. I don't feed anything else until it is gone. It seems even better then peas in my experience. The only bladder problems I have had have been with my orandas (darn sensitive things but I love 'em ). I found the best cure to be "Shimmy Blocks" which , believe it or not , I buy from Walmart. They help with any stress related problems and since I started using them I have had no bladder trouble at all. I kept them in with my problem fish for 3 months after it seemed cured to be sure. Now I use them after a move of any type(new home or new tank) or when I do a total tank change/cleaning which is twice a year. I use salts every couple of months. I don't do official water changes as I have extra bubblers in my tanks so there is lots of evaporation which leads to just adding fresh every so often. Hope this helps you out with your fish.

[vanderkm]

Thanks both Corr and Darlene. I have been using the sinking pellets for about a week now, and after the first two days, I have not seen any problems, so I will definately keep them on these. Because these pellets are smaller I think they have to work harder for their food, which is likely good for them too.

I will try the lettuce and look for the shimmy blocks next time I am at Walmart. We will try a 30% change in this tank this weekend and monitor how it works. We are pretty accurate on temps of water when it is added (another use for the laser temp gun we bought for the snakes!) but it is about 2-3 degrees warmer now that spring is here. We may move this pair to a 50 gallon this summer once we shuffle some snakes. I will try the shimmy blocks with our lion heads. Though they don't flip over like the fantail did, the larger one tends to spend a lot of time with his head down, so maybe it will help him.

thanks again for all the ideas. Even though they are dirty fish, these goldfish are real pets and I like to keep things the best we can for them.

mary v.