Can not figure out why my goldfish are dying

[Bfos812]

About a month ago I clean my pond bought some aerator to put more air at night. I test the water lvl. PH 7.6 high range is 7.4 0 for ammonia 0 nitrite 2- and 0 for nitrite 3-. some of the goldfish have big belly.

 

[mrsclem]

You say you cleaned the pond. What exactly did you do? what type of filtration do you have, size of pond, number of fish?

 

[Bfos812]

Maybe close to 80 fish koi and gold fish mix. Filtration system is the Oase so I have two of those. My aerator I use is Aquascape. But I think at fish too much ph. Size of my pond I’m not quite sure.

 

[Bfos812]

You say you cleaned the pond. What exactly did you do? what type of filtration do you have, size of pond, number of fish?

You say you cleaned the pond. What exactly did you do? what type of filtration do you have, size of pond, number of fish?

I use well water too. Never had this problem until I cleaned the pond.

 

[Bfos812]

You say you cleaned the pond. What exactly did you do? what type of filtration do you have, size of pond, number of fish?

These are the ones that are sick so I took them out. Picture of the koi/goldfish has trouble swimming floats. The other laying side ways

 

[Jhn]

When you say cleaned the pond, how did you do it? I.e. Net leaves off the bottom, vacuum out sludge or did you drain the pond and literally clean/power wash the pond?

We are asking you to be specific because if you did the latter you destroyed the biofilm and bacteria population in the pond, so it is like starting over again with a newly setup pond.

How big is your pond? That is a lot of fish, especially if some of them are koi.

 

[Bfos812]

When you say cleaned the pond, how did you do it? I.e. Net leaves off the bottom, vacuum out sludge or did you drain the pond and literally clean/power wash the pond?

We are asking you to be specific because if you did the latter you destroyed the biofilm and bacteria population in the pond, so it is like starting over again with a newly setup pond.

How big is your pond? That is a lot of fish, especially if some of them are koi.

I really cleaned it all out the pond redone all the rocks. So I destroyed my biofilm and bacteria. Thanks. Area is 97.7 ft^2 perimeter 37.8 ft and how deep about 2ft to 4ft deep.

 

[Faebinder]

You have about 2.1k gallon pond which is a good size for maybe 4 koi. My guess is:

1- The well water has recently gotten some spill over toxin that caused this.

or

2- There was an ammonia spike that is now gone and you have elevated nitrites. I don't know what you mean by 0-2 nitrites in your test but even 0.5 ppm is toxic.

 

[j.w]

@Bfos812
I'm thinking your fish were shocked badly by the clean out. Always leave the nice coating of carpet algae on the sides, bottom and rocks and don't remove all the water. No scrubbing of the filter either! The only things I ever do is to net the gunk off the bottom once in awhile, rinse out the filters, maybe do a slow water in and slow water out of well water if the water does not clear up well w/my not too good filters. Test your well water also or maybe you did? I hope your fish can survive but you have a lot and this may not turn out well as you are going to be starting out all over from the beginning cycling your pond. Your ph that you tested from the pond water is fine. You will have to keep testing your water to make sure things are stable and adjust when necessary. The ammonia, nitrites etc. might start going up like crazy w/all those fish together in the pond. Doing slow water in slow water out may be what you will need to do for awhile. Plenty of oxygen/aeration and good filtration will help also. If you did not scrub out your filter there will be good bacteria left that might help get some good cycling going faster. Or anything that was in the old water of the pond might have some good bacteria on it so place it in the pond. Hope this turns out better than I think it will.

 

[Bfos812]

Thanks

 

[Mmathis]

About a month ago I clean my pond bought some aerator to put more air at night. I test the water lvl. PH 7.6 high range is 7.4 0 for ammonia 0 nitrite 2- and 0 for nitrite 3-. some of the goldfish have big belly.

Do you have goldfish or koi? Your topic title said GF, but further down, you mention koi.

 

[Bfos812]

I have both never had issue with both in there. Just after I decided to clean my pond and took everything out rocks and dirt and sludge too. I want do a deep cleaning like I did before. Thanks for the help

 

[poconojoe]

You stated they started dying after you cleaned the pond. A lot of people make this mistake. They want a sparkling clean pond, but that's not how mother nature does it. I personally like the natural look. Plenty of moss on the rocks, a layer of growth covering the liner, etc. Besides, who wants to see an unnatural looking rubber liner? Not me.

Either something was wrong with the water you added or maybe you returned the fish to the pond too soon. They could have been shocked due to differences in water temperature or water parameters. This is why many of us here recommend never to do a "cleaning". It's too stressful on the fish and now your pond's natural cycle has to start all over. Starting over doesn't happen overnight. It can take weeks.

It also sounds like you have too many fish. Remember, they keep growing and they also multiply, so every year there's new ones and the older ones get bigger. Koi grow pretty fast and get huge. Basically what I'm saying is it's more the size of the fish that matters. You could have 4 big koi and they might produce more waste than 20 small goldfish. That's not exact science, I'm just making a point.

 

[addy1]

Have you checked your well water? Ours is extremely soft and very acidic, 5.4. If I cleaned our pond, refilled it and put the fish back in they would all die.
I killed off the first fish I put in due to the ph of the water, they all died within a hour of putting them in. I learned the hard way what our well water ph was.

I let the pond sit empty for a year while I balanced the ph and the hardness of the water. The next fish survived.

 

[callingcolleen1]

I NEVER CLEAN MY PONDS, THEY RUN YEAR ROUND, JUST CLEAN FILTERS AND TAKE NET TO BOTTOM OF POND IS EXCESS WASTE IS DOWN THERE. I ADD FRESH WATER SLOWLY SO NOT TO DESTOY THE BALANCE. MY PONDS DO NOT GET MUCH WASTE AS THEY ALL FLOW LIKE CREEK DOWN AND WASH AWAY EVERYTHING. I DO ADD WATER EVERY DAY A LITTLE BIT TO KEEP LARGE SYSTEM FRESH. I HAVE FOUR CONNECTING PONDS.... REMEMBER TO DECLOR THE WATER ALWAYS