MiniMeg

I just got a little red oranda from the LFS today and he's in a 10g QT. After watching him for a good half hour I was alarmed to find that he has little white balls in his gills. Three on one side one on the other, they are maybe a quarter or a centimeter in diameter, I've never seen or read about anything like this before.

Does anyone have any idea what this might be? And from there what treatments to try?

gremlin

Pictures would help if you can get them. Are the white balls kind of fuzzy or do they look more like pimples? Are they round or patchy or does it look like they have a thread-like tail coming from them?

If it looks like tiny little white pimples, it could be the start of ICH. As they get bigger, they look a little fuzzy. Without pics, it is hard to be sure.

Unfortunately, ich is a big problem with goldfish since they are such high waste producers. The stress of moving from the 'breeder' to the store, being in too small or too crowded tanks, then the stress of moving to their new home and being in a small quarantine tank - it lowers their resistance. Melafix is a fairly good, all around medication for goldfish. Ich Attack is another one that works well with goldies.

MiniMeg

I can't get pictures I tried they look like tiny little balls sprt of like a pimple I supose. It isn't ich I had to treat my tropicals for that before, this is much bigger I think its about the same size as this: o

gremlin

Here is a link that may be able to help you. There are several web sites about goldfish care and diseases that will have pictures that you can compare. If you can find a picture that looks like what your goldfish has, that may help. Do you know if your goldie is a male or a female? The males will sometimes get breeding "bumps" that look like little pimples.

http://www.desktopgoldfish.com/goldfish-diseases.php

http://www.petgoldfish.net/goldfish-diseases.html

http://www.sickgoldfishcare.com/gold-fish-diseases.php

MiniMeg

I'm not sure the gender of the fish, but these do not look like the breeding bumps. None of the diseases on those sites resembled this..I'm not sure what to do with this fish.