EggShappedFish

Perfect. I will get a gram weight later today and start treatment in a treatment tank. I do have multiple filters, but they all run 1000lit/hour. I will find a way though. I think that I can build a filter and re-use some of the filter cycled media Just to be clear, you would only treat with Funox - does this mean no salt?

Thanks! 3 follow up questions The active ingrediends of the Funox powder that I have are (p.g.) 0,33g Nitrofurantoine (is this equivalent to nitrofurazone?) and 0,33g Oxytetracycline. How do i weigh 1gr of the powder? I have a mini scoop for some test set that require powders. Would that be 1 gr? When treating with antibiotics, do they also kill the benneficial bacteria of the filter? I ask, in order to adjust accordingly when setting up a treatment tank. Does it need a cycled filter or is an airstone enough, and do dailly water changes?

Does this look like bacterial or fungus infection? It seems to be getting worse. I can treat with Funox (although i'd need to donse 0,7gr so it could be an issue. I also have methylene blue but thats about what I have access to at this point!

Diatoms grows on surfaces. This looks like it just lays on top of it. More/better circulation should help the mechanical filtration to pick it up

I can not tell you why, or the reason why. I can only guess that it is because the EU wants better control with anibiotics and maybe also with what gets poured into the sewage. Practically, to legally buy fish medications here, you need a prescription from a vet. This in itself is difficult, because partly very few no vets know much about fish treatment (3 in the whole country and they don't take consultations they work in zoos). The reason they won't prescribe medication is that they can be charged for wrongfull medication if they prescribe something that was not needed. Now, even if you can get a prescription from a vet, for treating your fish, you can't buy the well known fish medications because manufacturers haven't gotten their medications approved by the national authorities. This means that the best a vet can do, is find similar substanses in medications for dogs or cats, and prescribe them in the appropriate dosages. Luckily, it is possible to import medications from other EU countries as long as it is for personal use (no selling to others). How are they available in other EU countries you ask? This is the weird part. The EU is, as far as I know, not targeting home fish keeping. They are after the fish industrry who breed fish in large scale for consumption. Therefore, the EU has allowed member countries to exclude aquarium fish keeping from these regulations (we could once buy medication off the shelf at pet stores). Each country decides if the want to use the exception or not. So the country where I live, has chosen not to, but the neighboring country has, so I can order them from there, online and have it shipped. By the time the right medication arrives though, most fish that are in need of more treatment than salt, have already passed the point of recovery. I am sorry for the long rant, but I have been quite involved in this, even talking with politicians, local authorities, and even manufacturers and EU representatives. There is not much to be done really and it frustrates me that fish are being differentiated so much compared to other pets. Imagine a vet only being able to suggest treating an infected dog wound, with salt or let it die. We had a similar situation with pet rabbits/bunnies, as they practically also can be bred for consuming. Medications were being regulated so much that vets were not allowed to prescribe them to pet rabbit and guinea pig owners. This has been overturned though, and is not a bit more relaxed. I personally think EU has done some great things, and this seems great too. It is my country's implementation of them that is terrible.

All fish medications are out of bounds here. I live in EU and in my country I can't buy fish medications at all. I can import it from Germany though. I already have a stock of methylene blue, some Potassium permanganate and some yellow powder that i am not quite sure of what it is right now.

I won't be able to check before tomorrow but usually ammonia and nitrites are at 0 and I dont let nitrates get over 20. Its quite hard water and a high ph of around 8 but i figured they are better off with that, than fluctuating values of me trying to lower them. I have removed a lot of the stuff that they could get hurt on but it seems that goldfish are experts at it nontheless! I dont see how she should have cut herself but i guess if some food was stuck in an anubias rhizome, she may have gotten a bit too enthusiastic and got hurt

The private fish market in Europe is quite challenging, mainly because of shipping. If you can quarantee safe transportation, and have qood quality and/or good quantity, you may be able to sell to the larger fish distributors in your country or maybe even in central distributions in Germany. That said, I have multiple times considering setting up a European community for fishenthusiasts, because we do have very different requirements and products than the (mostly) American based communities

Yesterday I noticed that Wendy had gotten an injury just bellow her right eye. I have previously lost fish to similar injuries, but in a different tank setup where it might have gotten infected (not that I don't believe that this one can!) I am not too nervous about it, but still a bit concerned. I understand that sometimes trying to help, can do more damage than help, so I am planning to leave it as is, and see where it goes. I gave her a salt bath/dip that might have been too tough on her, but she recovered within 5-10 minutes although slightly stressed Do you think I should be concerned? Any advice? I have no access to medications other methylene blue, and salt Here is a link to a short video that may show the injury better: https://i.imgur.com/rSHyGsq.mp4

That is interesting! To me it looks like something that has dropped from outside. Like dust or pollen

Today, my very effective and highly appreciated DIY filter, fell apart! 😱 It turns out that Acrylic does not stick very well to glass. At least not using silicone! The good news is, that I run multiple filters, so losing this one, is no as catastrophic as it could have been. The bad news is, that I have one more of these that seems to be slowly breaking apart. I am actually quite sad that they didn't hold, because I was really happy with the way they had turned out, and how effective they were! Here is a short animation that I made, showing how one of them works: And here are a few pictures from when I was putting it together: Arguably, it took me longer to make the video than the filters...

Ah - the quarantine tank maneuver. "I can't risk infesting my tank, but this could take some time" Then proceed to make it look really pretty and be very happy with the way it looks "What a shame that it has to go down once the fish are safe"

It's a tricky question to answer I am sure! I also expect that there are many types too! I was looking at this type that has some decent length, and seems to be pretty soft so it won't hurt the fish if they try to find food in it. It seems like it has some rubber underside, that I also am not sure how suitable it would be, to use in fish tanks. Don't people use these for edges of ponds too though? The info on the site mentions: grass material: 100% polyethylene back side: polypropylene, latex Free of lead & cadmium free

It's interesting, because most of the ones that I have looked at say that they are pet safe. The ones who have replied to my questions though, can't promise that their product won't affect water chemistry in the tank. This of course does not mean that the product will, but rather that they haven't researched it.

I remember back when I was young, and worked in a LFS, that the manager had modified a large canister filter, to be used as a gravel vacuum cleaner. They basically just mounted a gravel vacuumer on the inlet, and used a valve to regulate suction. This was of course most useful for cleaning hundreds of tanks, but if you have an old canister filter laying around, maybe it could be an option. As far as I remember, it only had sponges in it, in varying PPI.