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I have a small fancy gold fish in a 20 gallon tank paired with a black moor, today i realized my fish's left eye looked sunken in while the right looked puffy and large. Also this same gold fish tends to steal all the food from my black moor(my black moor tends to move slow and i'm almost sure his vision isn't too good)which leaves my little fish floating because he ate most of the food. Iv'e tried seperating them and feeding the floater only raw foods but still he floats. Help!

Ok, you have a few things going on. Eye problems (different right to left) and a floater.

The number one thing we check with physical or behavioral issues is the water quality. Have you checked ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH? With a 20 gallon and two goldies, I can almost guarantee that the nitrates will be very high, unless water changes are done every 3 days at about 20-30%. There is a chance that the filter cannot cope with the load, giving way to ammonia and nitrite. This is only theoretical, given that I do not know how often you clean the gravel and change the water.

High nitrates alone will deteriorate health over time and if really high, more quickly. Goldies float due to the crunched body structure. Any inflammation will worsten the condition. High nitrates cause inflammation and it is seen in angry looking tail fins that appear varicose-vein like.

I would recommend bottling some water for testing and promptly do a same temp (I mean within 1F) change of 30%. At the minimum 25% or 5 gallons. Test the water or get it tested. If there is ammonia or nitrite, or nitrates in excess of 40ppm you will want to continue with these water changes daily, if not every 12 hours to get the water under control. Adding one drop per gallon of Prime will also help bring it under control. Too much will have them gasping for air.

Infections can cause the eye problems and swim bladder problems, aside from water quality issues. Lets see what the water quality is first. Antibiotics or antimicrobials can send a tank right into a mini-cycle with high ammonia and/or nitrites so we want to proceed cautiously. I would advise medicated feed in the form of Jungle Anti-Bacteria Medicated feed available at Petsmart only. It will be more widely available later. There are other medicated foods from Koivet.com that are even better, but you will be waiting a week or more to get it from them and have to buy alot at once. MediKoi would be my recommendation as opposed to MetroMed also available at the same site.

But here is the medicated feed: http://www.petsmart.com/global/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524441806679&ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=2534374302023693&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374302030134&bmUID=1105591363569

I hope there are plans for a bigger tank for these two in time. How long have you had them? How long has the tank been running?

Last edited by Cory_Di at 12-Jan-2005 22:43

I didn't edit in case you were already reading my reply.

I also meant to suggest that you get some of this for your floater, especially if the floating seems to occur post meal and linger for hours and is corrected with fasting.

I use to try peas and other stuff, but it didn't work that well. Instead, I feed about a 2inch square algae sheet, attached to a lettuce clip. It rapidly becomes gel-like as it soaks up water, giving moisture within the digestive tract and moving things along. When I feed it concurrently with a few pellets or flakes, there is no floating . Others have tried it at my recommendation and have had similar success. If I feed it even a half hour post meal, he floats for a while and I have to feed more algae sheet to halt it. Here is what it looks like and you are further ahead ordering it online. Either one of these two are fine and are technically the same: 100% marine macroalgae.

In the meanwhile, boil some rice per the instructions (without any oil or butter) and drop it piece by piece to let them, especially the floater, feed on it. Feed as much as they will eat in 5 minutes. Many other swear by this.

Using peas, lettuce and all that are fine, but I don't find the long lasting affects that I've experienced with the macroalgae. Yoshi has been float-free since I've been feeding the macroalgae with each meal (generally once/twice daily).

One other thing I like to try with a floater is a dewormer as intestinal worms can bring it on or make it worst, but lets wait until we make sure water quality is in check and any infection under control.

Once again, you can get the Anti-Parasite, also by Jungle. http://www.petsmart.com/global/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524441806678&ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=2534374302023693&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374302030134&bmUID=1105591449205

There is a chance that the sunken eye versus bloated eye is an early sign of dropsy. Look closely at the fish from the side view and see if the scales appear to be pineconing or starting to lift away from the body. If so, then the fish is going into dropsy - a condition where either the kidneys are not filtering out water well enough or the heart is not pumping well enough to allow for good filtering. It is often fatal. This is a fish whose best chance would be medicated feed ASAP, if still eating. Sometimes infections can bring it on, but not always. Declining water quality, genetic issues, parasites, viruses, can also be at the root of dropsy. Prognosis is not good, even with medicated food, but some like to try. I know I do.

Last edited by Cory_Di at 12-Jan-2005 22:47

Thanks for all the info. I looked at my fish and his scales look quite alright and about his eyes i dont think one is sunken any longer but the other is really getting puffy.

How about those parameters? Some daily water changes could clear everything up. Then you may be able to cut back to twice weekly (since I don't have your numbers I have to make some assumptions based on what I know about goldfish and waste). If you can get them into a larger tank, it will allow you to back off and do the changes less frequently - that's the tradeoff to having them in a small tank. You need to do however many water changes are required to keep the nitrate below 40ppm. If you don't have a test kit, just bag some tank water and take it to a local store. They'll do it for you. Write the numbers down as they give them to you tho - they are yours and you need to keep track of them. Don't accept "fine" or "normal". Let's do this scientifically, ok?

Getting puffy? Keep watching those scales.

Try the boiled rice.