Guppies + Goldfish - Finrot, Spots On Tail, Bloat? :( Lots Of Pics :)

[Headless]

Hello everyone.
I'm new to the arena of keeping fish (as is obvious by my post in this particular forum, I suppose). Sadly, due to the passing of a family member, my wife and I recently inherited a goldfish that was being kept in a 1 gallon bowl with no aeration. When we found the fish, he had gone over 2 weeks without a water change in that bowl, and was gasping for air while staying otherwise motionless. Of course, we had no idea what we were doing but we wanted to keep the fish and make him happy... so off to the LFS we went, and bought a 10 gallon tetra setup with the whisper 10 and a small 50w heater. Of course, the LHS also said that we should add some more fish to the tank, and being complete newbies, we bought 8 cobra guppies too, thus severely overstocking the tank.
 
I did some reading about acclimating fish to a new tank and carefully drip acclimated him and moved him into the 10 gallon tank along with his new guppyfriends from the fish store. We put some plants in it and thought we had solved the problem of his water quality.
 
After 3 days in the new tank, one of the two front pectoral fins on our goldfish turned black, assumedly because of ammonia burning from the horrific water quality in the bowl he had been kept in. At that time, I did a bunch of in-depth reading about fish keeping and learned about the nitrogen cycle. I bought a master test kit from API and started daily 50% water changes to keep ammonia levels under control. Over the course of the following 2 weeks, 3 things happened.
 
1. One of our guppies died. She/he started hanging around right on the surface all the time and had a very large belly. In our newb-ness, we thought she was pregnant and didn't put the surface-hugging together with distress.
2. Oscelot (goldfish) recovered from the black fin/ammonia burn
3. Oscelot developed tiny little white spots ONLY ON HIS TAIL.
 
Right about this time (but AFTER we noticed the spots on the goldfish tail), we also procured a chunk of filter from a cycled tank that had no infections/infestations as far as we knew - the fish in that tank were healthy and the tank had been running for literally years without incident. We added that chunk of filter to the tank, and my daily water changes of 50% that were still not quite keeping ammonia under control became quite manageable -once-a-week changes. Hooray for seeding a tank.
 
At this point, we started learning about fish diseases, parasites, and medications because the white specks on the goldfish's tail worried us. We also learned that we needed a quarantine tank immediately, because if those white spots were something like culumnaris, all our fish would've caught it and died in a day or two. So we bought a second 10 gallon tank. During this time I also learned that the 10gal tank was not even big enough for the goldfish by himself, so we bought a 55 gallon tank also. The 55 gallon tank, we decided, would be a totally separate system with zero cross contamination from the other 2 tanks.
 
So, we set up the new 10 gallon tank as a quarantine tank with PVC pipes in it for cover and no gravel in it. We moved all of the fish to the quarantine/hospital tank and drained the old 10gallon and sold it to a friend so HE could have a quarantine tank too. So now we had a 10 gallon quarantine tank with the goldfish + 7 guppies, and a 55gallon tank that I began fishless ammonia cycling.
 
 
So we started with a treatment of API General Cure - Praziquantel and Metronidazole. The fish appeared to respond to this stuff; i think they all had worms. They pooped alot of long stringy white poop for a few days. We thought, success! de-wormed! I also thought that perhaps the white spots on the goldfish's tail were some kind of parasite that may have been treated with the general cure...but alas, the white spots on the goldfish were completely unaffected.
 
I did a ton of reading, and since the spots were not spreading quickly, not on his scales, and not growing in size noticeably, i thought it might be a fungus from the previous tank water conditions that was no longer growing in the better water quality of the new tank. So we next dosed the tank with API Fungus Cure - That contains victoria green and Acriflavine. From what I read, this could also help with alot of fungul infections so I thought it would be the best bet. Unfortunately, after dosing with the fungus cure, the goldfish's condition did not change for the better. The spots on his tail were un-changed. However, one of the guppies showed bright red spots on their gills the day after we added the fungus cure dose, they looked like bloody sores (but TINY since the guppies are soooo small). Those red sores cleared up over the next 3-4 days, so we suspect that the guppy had some kind of fungal infection on her gills? But the bad thing was that the goldfish started actually doing WORSE during the second round of anti-fungal. The spots on his tail never changed, but about 3 days into the fungal treatment we noticed that the bottom of his tail right where it joined his body had actually torn/split, so his tail was not completely attached to his body. We finished the anti-fungal treatment (1 more day was left) and did some water changes + carbon to remove it from the tank.
 
Now I was concerned that the problem was a fin-rot-ish problem caused by bacterial infection. So we went and bought maracyn 2 and dosed the tank with Maracyn 2 the next day. On day 3 of maracyn 2 treatment, the bottom of the goldfish's tail suddenly seemed to begin disintegrating and now the bottom fin shows obvious fin rot that wasn't even there until midway through the maracyn 2 treatment! What the !
 
We finished the maracyn 2 treatment, and by now the spots on his tail were concerning us because nothing thus far had affected them, and his torn tail + fin rot indicated his condition was actually worsening. Even though there was no indication that the problem was Ick (no spots on his actual scales), we read that Ick doesn't always show white spots on scales, so we decided to try ParaGuard.
 
Which brings us to today. We adopted this fish at the beginning of April.
 
We are now on day 10 of Paraguard treatment. His torn tail appears to be healing slowly, and has re-joined with his body at least, though there is a white spot where it is re-attaching that I assume is simply scar tissue. The spots on his tail are unchanged.
 
2 of our guppies are now looking bloated, and we have since learned that all of our guppies are male guppies, so they can't be pregnant.
 
We bought, so have in hand, pimafix, melafix, cupramine, paraguard, API fungal cure, API general cure, API super ICK cure, tetracycline, maracyn 2, maracyn oxy and Prazipro. Right now, I am frustrated and confused about what to do next. The spots on his tail don't look natural but they aren't getting bigger or apparently spreading to other fish. The last time we assumed a guppy was pregnant they just died and apparently was infested with parasites, not pregnant; we're not positive that guppy was even a female.
 
So now that I've written a book of text that probably doesn't make sense to anyone but myself, I am going to ask for advice. What should we do now? We are considering doing either a prazipro treatment, or another round of API general cure, to see if the bloated 2 guppies shrink down after de-worm treatment. However, we're going on over a month in quarantine now and we've treated them with every class of drug except copper as far as I can tell, and we don't want to keep treating them if there's nothing to treat.
 
 
1. Is there a way to tell if these guppies are infested with worms?  We don't want to keep treating the guppies unless they need it, as we've read it stresses the fish to medicate them and shortens their lives, but 2 of the 7 are acting lethargic, lying on the bottom of the tank during the middle of the day and peaking out at me even while all 5 of the rest are schooling together near the surface, and they look much larger in the belly than the rest of the guppies.
 
 
2. Can anyone look at the pictures attached of the goldfish and tell us what the spots on his tail are? They just don't seem to respond to ANYTHING. We're almost to the point of just putting them into the display tank and saying 'well, heck with it!'... what do you do when everything you attempt has no effect on the 'problem'? Are we making a problem out of nothing? Maybe the spots are just stress cracks from bending his tail too much? Since we are newbies, we are worried that we may be overreacting about the spots AND the bloated bellies. Maybe the fish are just fine after their various treatments and we should go ahead and put them into the display?
 
Any input would be much appreciated. Please be gentle; we started this hobby against our will (inherited a fish) basically, but are now dedicated to keeping our fish healthy and happy. I want to get 3 YoYo loaches when we move these fish to the main/new 55 gallon tank, so our eventual stocking is planned to be:
 
1 Goldfish (Oscelot)
7 Cobra Guppies
3 YoYo Loaches
 
And if they are OK with non-brackish water, we'd also like a Silver Lyretail Molly and a Black Molly.
 
Thanks again for any input. Pictures of the fish are below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
And this is the new 55gal we can't wait to get them into

 One happy picture for many sad

 

 
Note my shotglass of ammonia.  That tank like to get sloppy drunk every night, 5ML+
OH YEAH.

 

[attibones]

First the goldfish:

I don't see anything wrong with the tail. Usually fin fraying occurs due to stress and poor water conditions. Because you are overstocked, keeping the goldfish in warm water, and treating with medication, the fish is very stressed, meaning the stress coat is thinning which makes the fish more prone to issues like fin rot.

Guppies:

How much do you feed them everyday? I would try one or two peas (frozen or canned--thaw them and shell them, then mash them up a bit) at the next feeding, then fast the fish for a few days. Do an extra water change a week. You should be doing three a week (two for your stocking, one for helping both guppy and goldfish).

Now for your stocking:

Simply put, you need another tank. The goldfish itself can live in a 55. Most LFS will say that one goldfish can live in a 29 gallon for its whole life, but these guys can be huge. I used to breed them. The average size was twelve inches. We had a very large pond. If you want to put the guppies in this tank with the yoyo loaches, that would be fine (but add more loaches as they are social fish) and consider a few mid-level fish. The mollies should do fine in this case. It is something of a misconception that they need brackish water. The goldfish does not need to be in with these fish, though, because they require much warmer waters than a goldfish which will expect seasonal water changes. Don't keep a heater with goldfish. They are cold water fish, which is why they do so well in ponds.

If you wish to keep the goldfish, I'd stick it in about a thirty gallon and let it live by itself, OR build a pond, OR buy a second large tank (50+ gallons) specifically for goldfish.

 

[snazy]

We bought, so have in hand, pimafix, melafix, cupramine, paraguard, API fungal cure, API general cure, API super ICK cure, tetracycline, maracyn 2, maracyn oxy and Prazipro.
 

 
This is way too many meds. Keep in mind that a fish tank is a closed enviroment and any medication will drastically change the bio balance. Carbon doesn't remove all the effects of medication and overmedicating is way worse than not medicating at all, especially in a such short period of time. Meds can also cause long term side effects on fish. And not all are effective against what it says on the bottle, simply because there are so many pathogens that are immune to meds.
 
I stabalized fish tank has a big bio diversity. Those pathogens affecting the fish have their own micro enemies inside a tank that keep them under control. When you add meds in the tank, it doesn't magically kill what you want, but it may affect the good guys too. Then the fish get worse.
 
I probably missed it from your thread, but is the tank cycled? Your fish maybe constantly poisoned with ammonia and nitrItes and you may need to be doing 60%+ water changes daily until it cycles.
 
As for the guppies, if they are young males they can have "bellies". They grow out of it, or you are overfeeding.
If they've got parasites, the fish will flash/scratch themselves of objects more than likely.

 

[attibones]

I believe OP stated that they has added some mature media, this nearly completing their fish-in cycle.

 

[snazy]

Thanks atti. But adding mature media may not instantly complete the cycle depending from what tank the media was taken from and the bioload it has to support in the future. I'd be surprised if after so much medication there's any beneficial bacs left in there.
 
The initial problems started from an overstocked,uncycled tank, so one should first make sure the condition they are in now isn't as bad anymore. The fish may not be sick at all, just having side effects of being in bad water quality.

 

[Headless]

Thanks attibones, we'll need to get another tank stand to move the goldfish into before we can buy another tank.  Will a 29 gallon be sufficient or are we going to be cruel to put him in one that small? It is difficult to find space and the amount of weight becomes worrisome if we look at 2 55gallon tanks, since our house is older and the foundation is raised, not concrete...
 
Regarding the list of drugs - I listed out in my post which we've actually given the fish.  The list you quoted is everything we have on hand, though i doubt we need all of them and we're not just dumping them in there willy nilly... this has been ongoing since early april, with breaks between treatments to observe the fish.
 
 
Those we have actually tried are:
1. A dose of API general cure - this is praziquantel + metronodizole - the fish reacted positively after this medication and lost alot of bloat; several of the guppies looked pregnant and we thought half of them were females.  We saw worms and lots of white string poop come from the guppies during this treatment.  Afterwards they stopped clamping their fins and swam around the tank more freely; 2 that seemed lethargic started schooling with the rest.  Since one guppy died with a very large distended belly, we thought they had worms.  I think they did.  At about this time we saw the white spots on the goldfish's tail.  I thought it might be ick, but there were NO spots on his scale, so I thought it was unlikely.  Since the spots didn't spread and seemed to grow only slightly over time, I suspected it was fungus.
 
2. So we then tried a dose of API Fungus cure - this is victoria green + acriflavine - one of the guppies responded to this; it had a red sore on it's gill area that appeared the day after we dosed the anti-fungal.  The sore healed over the following 3-4 days; we believe there was some fungus there that came off, showing the wound underneath it?    Unfortunately, it didn't effect the spots on the goldfish's tail.  By now it was apparent that it wasn't ick and apparently not fungus since victoria green should do the trick on the fungus and appeared to do so on one of the guppies.
 
3. So then, we attempted a dose of Maracyn 2; the previous not having any effect on the goldfish's tail, we read that maracyn 2 can combat bacterial infections in fin+tail rot situations and tried this, and that sometimes bacterial fin rot can present itself as spots on the tail, then finrot.  At about this time the goldfish's tail tore right at the base of the fin where it attached to his body, and had a huge white tuft there.  I was worried about infection, and his lower fins were looking thin and splitting.  That's why we tried the maracyn 2.  Unfortunately, it didn't help with the fin rot either.
 
4. We are now dosing paraguard due to the 2 guppies with large bellies - but have learned in recent research, this may be the wrong thing for internal parasites; perhaps if we suspect internal parasites we should do another dose of General Cure?  From what I understand it is fairly common to dose a second time with praziquantel in the event of known worm parasite infestation.
 
 
Thanks for your advice in this regard - we have been feeding peas every 4-5 days and use Hikari micro pellets for feeding each day.  We'll try feeding them nothing but pea tommorrow and fast them 2-3 days to see if their bellys get smaller.  Only 2 of the fish are showing the enlarged bellies; all the others are small + slim with no bulging stomachs.  The 2 with large stomachs are lying on the bottom of the tank often, even during the middle of the day, and only come out for feeding, whereas the other 5 guppies school together all day all around the tank.  This is why we suspected parasites; all of the guppies eat the same amount during feeding yet only 2 are showing large stomachs..
 
 
Is it possible that even with 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and <20 nitrates at all times in the tank that the fish are suffering from a water quality related malady?  We'd really love to hear that we should just put them in the 55gal tank, but we've been scared of contaminating the larger display tank,we were trying to get to a point where we'd treated them all, eliminated any symptoms like bloating/fin rot, then transfer them all to 55gal.
 
I do take your statements about over medicating to heart and do NOT want to subject our fish to undue stress without cause.  If the symptoms from the sluggish+bloated guppies and the fin rot on the goldfish don't merit medication, then we'll move them into the new tank and see what happens; our main goal was to use the quarantine tank to eliminate any symptoms before moving them into the larger tank.
 
 
The quarantine tank is cycled; I test it every day/other day depending, and have an ammonia alert in the tank that never reads anything other than 0 ppm.  When I test ammonia, it always tests 0ppm.  When i test nitrites, it always tests 0ppm.  When nitrates read 20ppm, i do a 50% water change - that is generally every 2-3 days.  None of the medications we have used thus far have effected the biofilter enough to allow any buildup at all of ammonia or nitrite; when i dosed each medication i tested all 3 water parameters daily and never saw spikes.  I do also test my new 55gal tank that is fishless cycling with the same test kit in the same methodology and receive accurate results so I don't believe my testing procedure is inaccurate.
 
 
The main 55gallon tank is ready for fish, i think.  I dosed last night with 5ml of ammonia 10%, and today ~4pm it was 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, ~15ppm nitrates.  My nitrite spike's been gone for over a week and we've just been maintaining with ammonia while waiting for the fish's condition to improve.
 
It's pretty funny, we thought they were pregnant.  Turns out that they are all males.  We actually just figured that out tonight. It's rough because we named them Echo, Medusa, Whisper, Notchy, Flamey, Dubya and Torpedo. The 3 males were Flamey, Dubya and Torpedo. Now we have to tell poor Medusa, Whisper, Echo and Notchy that they're actually dudes. And we have to tell poor dubya that he's been chasing Echo's gonopodium all this time LOL. Oh man, the horror. LOL...
 
 
Thanks again for all of your advice and attention...

 

[snazy]

Is it possible that even with 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and <20 nitrates at all times in the tank that the fish are suffering from a water quality related malady?
 

 
Most tests are not sensitive enough to show you low/trace amounts of ammonia/nitrIte by which the fish are still affected but your tests are useless to show you.
Do you still have them in a 10G tank? Stress of any kind, like overcrowding, can be the issue too. 
Ammonia, nitrItes and nitrAte aren't the only things that can cause a problem although the first two are the most dangerous. The tank can have high dissolved organics, low oxygen, etc..that can't be tested easily. With such a bioload in a 10G I'd be doing daily water changes even in an older established tank. Your filter may not be capable of keeping the levels as low as it should, but they can be low enough for your tests to fool you.
 
What's the temperature you are keeping them at?
 
For parasites, prazuquantel is only good against some, not all.  If you want to repeat, try a med that covers the rest of the possibilities, like levimasole.

 

[Headless]

I'm using the seachem ammonia alert to monitor ammonia levels - i've never even seen it read 0.02ppm of ammonia.  I test all 3 parameters with an API master test kit; the lowest the API kit is readable for nitrite is maybe 0.1ppm, but it never reads anything other than totally blue, no purple hue at all.  They are still in the 10g quarantine tank, yes.  We've been hoping to eliminate any symptoms before moving them into the 55g tank, because the 55g is a totally closed system with nothing from our other tanks involved with it; we wanted to make sure there was no contamination.  We've got a whisper 10 in the quarantine tank on 2 stones at full blast; the water in there is very turbulent and bubbly, and they haven't been showing any signs of labored/fast breathing or hugging the surface.  I was doing daily water changes until the 10g was seeded with mature material from another tank - at that time i started doing them every 2-3 days because ammonia, nitrite stayed at 0.  I'll start doing daily water changes again, thanks for the heads up.
 
I had read that the metronodizole was effective for the parasites that praziquantel doesn't effect along with alot of other stuff including bacterial issues - the API general cure I have contains both praziquantel and metronodizole.  Do you think it is worth trying to source Levamisole instead?  I looked around but it doesn't seem as common as some others.    Our current plan is to dose them with General Cure (that takes 4 days), then move them to the 55gal one way or the other.
 
Thanks again for your insight and info.

 

[snazy]

I'd still do daily water changes. It will help. 10G is way too little water to be stable so soon, not with that stock.
The ammonia alerts are not accurate at all. The API ammonia test is hard to tell whether its 0 or 0.25ppm. One thing I'd advise in regards to that, when you see fish being unhappy, do water changes no matter what the tests are showing you. They aren't as reliable as we want them to be.
Fast/labouried breathing at the surface happens when the problem has accelerated. So it's not something you want to go by when trying to prevent a problem.
 
Levamisole is probably hard to find. The reason I suggested it, is because between treating with praziquantel and levamisole you pretty much cover all possible parasitic infections. I have never used API general cure but reading that it treats these below(quoted), leads me to believe it's only effective against external parasites. Do your fish exhibit any of those below? If yours have parasites, they are internal..
 
"Helps treat a wide variety of parasitic diseases, including velvet, anchor worm, fish lice, hold-in-the-head disease, and gill and skin flukes"
 
 
Metronidazole is not as effective when dosed to the water. It's better in food. Try soaking their food with the meds, then feed them with it for at leat a week.
 
Here is a nice link explaining how to treat with levamisole if you are able to find it.
http/www.loaches.com/Members/shari2/levamisole-hydrochloride-1