Horribly sick golfish

[Parrot lady]

She is swelled to bursting her find are sticking out real bad and she's getting large dark spots on her back. I've been treating her for two weeks, with ick clear then methylene blue, changed water and used life guard for a week until yesterday. She was with my other fish in the tank and I wanna know if I need to treat the tank? It started with her eye bulging

 

[Parrot lady]

This is the sick fish

 

[Tula]

From this picture, this is a gravely sick fish....with advanced symptoms of Dropsey. It may be a kindness to humanely euthanize it. I'm so sorry.

 

[Parrot lady]

Thank you How can I euthanize it? And should I treat the fish in the tank she came out of?

 

[WaterGardener]

Dropsy is a result of her kidneys not functioning well enough to remove water from her body, so it builds up. It can be caused by an infection or kidney failure.

Clove oil is recommended as the most humane way of putting fish to sleep. You should be able to find it in pharmacies, grocery stores, or supermarkets. Catch the fish and put it in a bucket of your pond water. A few drops of clove oil will put the fish to sleep, then you can add more. Be sure to leave the fish in the clove oil water for a while, even a couple of hours.

Very sorry about your fish.

 

[Parrot lady]

Thanks for your help. She's quantined but I noticed today 2 more of them have eyes that are looking alittle swelled. I've got them in a 5 gal tank with 5 tsp Epsom salt. I drained most of the water out of the 600 gal tank and added fresh and put new sponges in the bucket filter. I hated to do that because now the whole thing has to start over. What can I treat these two with and treat the tank?

 

[WaterGardener]

You should never, ever throw out old filter material. If you want to replace it, that's fine, but keep the old media in the pond so that you don't lose all of your beneficial bacteria. As you said, now your cycle will have to start completely over and that will stress you fish even more.

If you still have those sponges, put them in a mesh bag and tie the bag somewhere that water can flow through the the bag and sponges. That way, you will preserve the bacteria. Leave them there for a couple of months to give the new sponges time to grow their own bacteria. You can still take them out and rinse them when needed.

 

[Parrot lady]

You should never, ever throw out old filter material. If you want to replace it, that's fine, but keep the old media in the pond so that you don't lose all of your beneficial bacteria. As you said, now your cycle will have to start completely over and that will stress you fish even more.

If you still have those sponges, put them in a mesh bag and tie the bag somewhere that water can flow through the the bag and sponges. That way, you will preserve the bacteria. Leave them there for a couple of months to give the new sponges time to grow their own bacteria. You can still take them out and rinse them when needed.

I put a piece of filter foam from out of the separate pond. It's old.