Goldfish With Dropsy - Unidentified Illness - Other Fish Infected

Using the sick fish template to help:

Tank
ORIGINAL TANK
What is the water volume of the tank? 55 gallons
How long has the tank been running? Setup January 21st 2019 using established filter and sand
Does it have a filter? 2 aqueon quietflow 75 HOBs, 1 marineland internal canister filter, 1 diy bubbler filter
Does it have a heater? Yes
What is the water temperature? 77F
What is the entire stocking of this tank? (Please list all fish and inverts.) (1 fish moved out into quarantine) 2 oranda (6” head to end of tail) 1 common goldfish (7-8” head to end of tail) 1 Apple snail (about the size of my fist) 2 devil snails, 1 rabbit snail, 10 moss balls, a hefty amount of hornwort
QUARANTINE TANK
What is the water volume of the tank? 10 gallons
How long has the tank been running? 3 hours (used established filter media)
Does it have a filter? Yes an aqueon quietflow 30 HOB
Does it have a heater? Yes
What is the water temperature? 80F
What is the entire stocking of this tank? (Please list all fish and inverts.) 1 black moor (6-7” from head to end of tail)

Maintenance
How often do you change the water? Typically once a week but have been doing water changes every 1-3 days for the past few weeks
How much of the water do you change? 50-60%
What do you use to treat your water? API tap water conditioner (high concentration formula) using aqueon water conditioner in the QT
Do you vacuum the substrate or just the water? Both

*Parameters - Very Important
Did you cycle your tank before adding fish? Fish were transferred from another tank with cycled media and sand substrate
What do you use to test the water? API master test kit and API 5 in one strips as confirmation
What are your parameters? We need to know the exact numbers, not just “fine” or “safe”.

Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 20ppm
pH: 7.6

Feeding
How often do you feed your fish? 2x daily
How much do you feed your fish? 4-5 pinches in the morning, 3-4 at night
What brand of food do you feed your fish?
In the morning: Saki-HikarI fancy goldfish sinking pellets (purple bag)
At night: Saki-HikarI fancy goldfish sinking pellets (green bag)
Blanched zucchinI slices every few days
Do you feed frozen or freeze-dried foods?
Frozen blood worms on the rare occasion (but it has been about two months since I last fed them)

Illness & Symptoms
How long have you had this fish?
Common goldfish: 5yrs (but I personally have been caring for him since August 17th 2018
Both oranda: October 15th 2018
Black moor: December 1st 2018
How long ago did you first notice these symptoms?
Beginning of July 2019
In a few words, can you explain the symptoms?
First: scale damage and weird white film on caudal lobe, appeared to be on other fish’s caudal fins as well
Advancing: white film spread to other lobe and some fin splitting developed
Current: most fish still at “advancing” stage. One oranda developed red streaks in fins during treatment with API fin & body cure, has reduced in severity but is still present. Black moor has developed dropsy (bloated and beginning to pinecone) and has fin splits and now fin rot
Have you started any treatment for the illness?
I have treated with:
Aquarium salt, pimafix and melafix, paraguard, API fin & body cure, API fungus cure, frequent and large water changes.
Was your fish physically ill or injured upon purchase? No
How has its behavior and appearance changed, if at all? Fish exhibit some signs of stress but for the most part act normal. Black moor is bloated and pineconing.

Explain your emergency situation in detail.
I have been trying to treat and diagnose a mystery infection in my goldfish for over a month now. The infection is causing strange white areas to appear on my goldfishs’ caudal lobes. I have made many posts in a goldfish keepers group asking for help identify the issue but have not really received much help. I have tried multiple treatments and have had no luck with treating any of the fish. It’s been about a week since my last treatment. I’ve been doing frequent water changes just trying to see if clean water would help but it has not. This afternoon I came home to find my black moor is beginning to bloat and some of her scales were raised. I had thought previously that her eyes looked a little strange compared to normal (I think now that it may be fluid retention) but wasn’t entirely certain.
I moved her into a quarantine tank so that I can monitor her symptoms and have salted and heated the tank. I will be doing 1 or more water changes daily in hopes that it will help.
She is in quarantine because she is the most severely affected but my other fish are still infected with whatever this is and I fear that I am going to lose all of them if I don’t figure out how to treat it soon.
I am at a complete loss for what to do. If anyone out here has any suggestions at all please telll me anything you can.
I do not know how to treat dropsy or how to treat whatever this mystery illness is.
I don’t want to lose my fish
Attached are pictures of the strange growths on Guinness’ fins (the pictures are a week or two old I think) and Guinness now (bloated with raised scales) as well as suspicious wen pimples on one of my oranda, and a picture of his streaked fins.

 

This afternoon I came home to find my black moor is beginning to bloat and some of her scales were raised. I had thought previously that her eyes looked a little strange compared to normal (I think now that it may be fluid retention) but wasn’t entirely certain.

I don't have experience with goldfish besides keeping one in a 10 gallon as a kid, but I have some thoughts anyway.
Dropsy itself is not contagious, but the cause could be. It sounds like your goldfish does indeed have the beginning of dropsy.

Aquarium salt, pimafix and melafix, paraguard, API fin & body cure, API fungus cure

Can you describe in detail each step you've taken to treat, like what med and how long and what, if anything changed with each? Because with all those, I feel like something should've done something. I'm not surprised Pimafix, which is mostly Bay oil, and Melafix, which is mostly Meleluca tea tree oil, did not work; it sounds like you've got something serious going on, and those are rather weak remedies. However, between Paraguard and the APIs, you've targeted bacteria and fungus, both of which sounds like might be the issue. But, if you didn't do full dosages, they might not have been able to work, or they may be too weak or targeting wrong bacteria.

I'd try Seachem Kanaplex. This is an antibiotic that is also absorbed into the body. Bloat and pineconing means something is going wrong internally, maybe a bacterial infection or liver or kidney failure causing built up fluids inside or some other issue, and the pressure pushes the scales up and out.
So, you're going to want to treat this fish with an antibiotic such as kanamycin (Kanaplex is one brand) or metronidazole. I suggest also doing Epsom salt baths to help reduce swelling and/or draw out fluids.
I'd also treat the main tank with the antibiotic too.
You may want to get both Kanaplex and Metroplex, actually, just in case. And Seachem Focus while you're at it. Focus binds medication to food and Metroplex is especially good with that. This might not be necessary, but at this point, you might want to be prepared just in case. The fish might seem okay, but illness can kill overnight or within hours, and this is especially true with dropsy.

According to 40+ Goldfish Disease Symptoms: The Complete List,

36. Bloody streaks / red spots in tail or fins: This is a sure sign of a serious problem with the water. High ammonia or nitrites can cause blood hemorrhaging (broken blood vessels) of the veins in the tail of the goldfish, resulting in thin red lines or spots of blood appearing in the fins. Water changes and proper room in the tank can help ensure recovery.

It seems like you figured that out yourself.

 

I don't have experience with goldfish besides keeping one in a 10 gallon as a kid, but I have some thoughts anyway.
Dropsy itself is not contagious, but the cause could be. It sounds like your goldfish does indeed have the beginning of dropsy.


Can you describe in detail each step you've taken to treat, like what med and how long and what, if anything changed with each? Because with all those, I feel like something should've done something. I'm not surprised Pimafix, which is mostly Bay oil, and Melafix, which is mostly Meleluca tea tree oil, did not work; it sounds like you've got something serious going on, and those are rather weak remedies. However, between Paraguard and the APIs, you've targeted bacteria and fungus, both of which sounds like might be the issue. But, if you didn't do full dosages, they might not have been able to work, or they may be too weak or targeting wrong bacteria.

I'd try Seachem Kanaplex. This is an antibiotic that is also absorbed into the body. Bloat and pineconing means something is going wrong internally, maybe a bacterial infection or liver or kidney failure causing built up fluids inside or some other issue, and the pressure pushes the scales up and out.
So, you're going to want to treat this fish with an antibiotic such as kanamycin (Kanaplex is one brand) or metronidazole. I suggest also doing Epsom salt baths to help reduce swelling and/or draw out fluids.
I'd also treat the main tank with the antibiotic too.
You may want to get both Kanaplex and Metroplex, actually, just in case. And Seachem Focus while you're at it. Focus binds medication to food and Metroplex is especially good with that. This might not be necessary, but at this point, you might want to be prepared just in case. The fish might seem okay, but illness can kill overnight or within hours, and this is especially true with dropsy.

According to 40+ Goldfish Disease Symptoms: The Complete List,

It seems like you figured that out yourself.

Please excuse the fact that my timeline is a bit off, I’ve been trying to figure this illness out in the middle of my first semester of college and while working so my memory of exact dates is a bit jumbled.
All carbon was removed from the aquarium and aquarium salt + pimafix + melafix was the first treatment combination.
This ran for 7 days. I did several large water changes over the course of a few days to remove excess medication. I then noticed that the white filmy growths on the black moor had spread from one caudal lobe to both, and decided to treat with paraguard. I started treating with paraguard around the 21st/22nd and treated for 7 days. I saw zero change in the appearance of the growths and decided to try something I believed would be stronger.
I had a box of API fin and body cure on hand so I started with that and ordered a second box (1 box = 2 doses for my tank) as well as a box of API fungus cure.
This treatment schedule lined up as: big water changes before hand to remove remaining paraguard, add 1 dose of F&B. Wait 24 hrs and add 2nd dose. Wait 24 hrs, change water, add 3rd dose and add 1st dose of apI fungus cure. Then 24 hours later add 4th dose of F&B, and 24 hours after that do a water change and add 2nd dose of fungus cure.

On the day that I did the first water change and added dose 3 of F&B and dose 1 of fungus cure, I noticed (before, not after) that my male oranda had developed bright red streaks in his fins. As this had not happened before I wondered if it was the medication and asked around to see if I should continue treatment. I was told that it could be due to stress and to just continue treating so I added dose 3/4 and 1/2. The next day I added dose 4 of F&B. The day after he had developed a massive red blood spot on one of his fins and I decided at this point that I needed to remove the Fin & Body cure from the water since the treatment time was up and nobody was showing signs of improvement. I did large water changes and added carbon but did not add the 2nd dose of fungus cure. (So in short: all medications received the full dosage amount except for fungus cure which got 1/2)

I ordered kanaplex and metroplex earlier this evening, no fist stores nearby me carry it. Monday was the earliest I could get it so I am hoping that my black moor does okay in her quarantine with extra clean water.
I will have to treat my main tank as well, because if I don’t I think they may all end up in as bad of shape as my black moor. She seems to be getting worse quickly.

Edit to add: the big blood spot went away about a day or two after the medication was removed, so I have been worried about treating the tank with more and causing him to become even more ill. Since that I have just been doing water changes somewhere between every day or every 2-3 days in hopes that it would help

 

She seems to be getting worse quickly.

Yes, by the time pineconing starts, the fish can quickly go down hill.
Does the congested fins sound like what that one fish might have?

 

Yes, by the time pineconing starts, the fish can quickly go down hill.
Does the congested fins sound like what that one fish might have?

Could you explain what you mean by congested fins?

 

In my first, longer post, I included links at the bottom of my post. I found a couple things that seemed to match and wanted to know what you thought.

 

In my first, longer post, I included links at the bottom of my post. I found a couple things that seemed to match and wanted to know what you thought.

Ah I see. It seems somewhat similar. I am seeing a lot of fin splitting with all of the fish. However the starting point for all of these is the strange white filmy spots that show up on their fins. My second oranda has these patches as well but no redness

In my first, longer post, I included links at the bottom of my post. I found a couple things that seemed to match and wanted to know what you thought.

The red streaks on my male oranda were very odd too. They are a symptom of hemorrhagic septicemia, but the fin and body cure supposedly would have treated it, not caused it

 

the fin and body cure supposedly would have treated it, not caused it

The site says "Poor water conditions, incorrect feeding, anything that causes the fish to be weakened will bring on the condition." So the stress from the medications might have weakened it and made it susceptible. Kind of ironic and counterproductive.
At this point, just let the fish rest and keep up with the frequent water changes until you get the meds. As soon as possible, though, start treating the dropsy goldfish with Epsom salt baths. Get a container or something, put QT water in it, dissolve a tablespoon of epsom salt per gallon, and put the fish in for no more than 15 minutes. Do this 2, maybe 3 times a day.

 

definitely fin rot on the black moor.

agree with the internal infection. Kanaplex has been reported to work better in conjunction with Metroplex.