Freshwater Goldfish Feeding/maintenance

[linux44]

Hi all,
i am new to the fish hobby and so far have bought a 20 litre aquarium which has 3 gold fish,
they are

Black Moor (small, 3-4 cm )

Bubble Eye ( medium, around 10 cm )

the third one i think is a normal goldfish (3-4 cm)

it is white on stomach and orange on top

my questions are:

1. does the pump has to be on all the time?

2. the filter is covered by a rock and is under a plastic rock shape, how would it absorb stuff?

3.the most important is how often should i feed them ?

4.does the specifies i have get on well with each other?

5. how do i know if the filter works?

6. how often would it take for them to grow big in size?

7. do my species get on well. the 2 small ones normally hide from the bubble eye, any advise why that could be .

i am sorry if this is a list and may sound rude but really wanted to get advice and appreciate all replies.

 

[fluttermoth]

Hi Linux, to the forum

I'm afraid I have very bad news for you... you cannot keep even one goldfish in a 20l tank You need to take them back to where you bought them ASAP.

Goldfish are very messy fish, and grow very large. If you want to keep the the two 'fancy' goldies (ie the moor and the bubble eye) you'd have to have a tank that was at least 100l.

Normal, common goldfish shouldn't be in tanks at all, unless the tank is very large indeed; somewhere in the region of 3 or 400l, as they can grow to over a foot long.

I'm guessing this is also a new tank, so whatever kind of filter you have, it won't have any of the beneficial bacteria living in it that eat the fish's wastes and stop them poisoning themselves. You'll have to change all of the water every day, using a dechlorinator until you can arrange to take the fish back.

I wouldn't feed them at all in that time; fish can easily go without food for a week, and any food you add will just add to the pollution problems you're going to be having.

Sorry to be so negative to your first post

 

[BigbruiserAl]

Backing up flutter here not what you want to hear but please listen to the adivce for the sake of the fish. Hope you stick around

 

[linux44]

well ,
i appreciate the replies. I had a chat with the fish shop sales person and he mentioned that having 3 of them should be ok and i used his recommendation.

my tank is the one below
http/www.aa-aquarium.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=365

I have already started to love my fish and the bubble eye one is so cute and you just want to get it out of the water and play with him/her , ( of course that is no good)

For meantime i will keep them but am also planning to buy some marine fish and a new auqrium so maybe in a few month time buy 70-100l auqarium and place the freshwater fishes in there and put the marine fish in my small aquarium

what i am planning to do is to check the ammonia level every week to ensure they are all good.
my tank with a filter which is housed under a rock shaped plastic which has an air stone in it as well. i can not work out how it would clean the ammonia as it has no access to the water to absorb debris and ... so i am actively looking at buying a proper filter, any suggestion will be appreciated

in addition answer to my questions above will be appreciated again

 

[Gilli]

If you dont want your fish to die you are going to have to buy a liquid water testing kit (not paper strips which are useless) asap and read up on cycling a tank with fish in - read this thread in the forum

cycling with fish

Be prepared for huge daily water changes and a lot of hard work!

 

[BigbruiserAl]

In a few months your goldfish will have suffered a great deal, there internal organs will have been damaged in a 20L let alone the other problems that will surface.

I say this with respect so please dont take it any other way. Your doing what alot of new people do, asking for advise then ignoring saying the lfs said blah blah. Without being big headed just the of 3 us flutter, gilli and myself have a huge amount of experince in fish keeping and we are trying to help, the shop is trying to make money from you plain a simple.

 

[linux44]

thanks,
well i really didn't mean to ignore you guys. if i was i wouldn't have posted a question here.
I really take them into consideration but the issue i have is i love them and don't want to return any of them

i will try to buy a bigger aquarium to avoid such issue.
considering that two of them are really small, and one mid size, why the 20 liter is small for them, is it because of the ammonium that they produce or not having enough oxygen to breath ?

what will be the absoulte minimum size to look for?

if i keep my current tank, can i set it up for marine and have 2-3 clowfish and the dory in the nemo cartoon( not sure of its species, have to google it)
do marine grow as cold fresh water fish do?>

 

[fluttermoth]

I understand that you're fond of your fish; goldfish are very loveable creatures!

But if you love them, you should want to keep them happy and healthy, and for that, there's no two ways about it, you need a bigger tank.

The reason is that the fish you've bought are babies; they have a lot of growing to do. Just to illustrate my point, here's some pics of some different kinds of fancy goldfish showing how large they grow;

If you keep them in a tank that's too small, they won't be able to grow properly and will get sick and die.

You need to be testing for ammonia every day; once a week is not going to be often enough; three goldfish in a 20l could produce enough toxic ammonia to kill them in a day, easily. You might well have to change the water two or three times a day to keep them safe.

Like most animals, fish do most of their growth when they're young; I'm afraid planning a new tank in a few months time is of no use; I don't want to sound too blunt, but your fish will be dead by then.

If you want to keep the common goldfish, then you're looking at a minimum tank size of 240l, but even that probably wouldn't be big enough, long term; they really are pond fish. For the two fancies, a three foot/100l would be the minimum size you'd be looking at.

If you wanted to convert to marine, you wouldn't be able to keep any fish in a 20l; it would only be suitable for inverts. certainly not 'Dory', or Paracanthurus hepatus to give it it's real name, as that fish can grow to 30 cms long (and marines need even more space per cm than freshwater fish!)

Again, I'm sorry to sound so negative, but what you're trying to do is a bit like keeping a Great Dane in your downstairs toilet, or a shire horse on your lawn It's just not going to work.

Edit; resizing pic!