Just Moved My 3 Orandas In To A Bigger Tank And ..........

HI guys, newbie goldfish keeper here..... a month back I bought 3 orandas and had a small tank for them with 2 filters and they are happy and fine.

Today I decided to buy a bigger tank, it's a 20 gallon tank. Height16inch, length 24inch and 12inch width.

What I did was fill up the new tank with brand new water and added declorinator. I then took one of the filter pumps from the smaller tank and added it to the new tank. I let this run for about an hour and after that I moved all 3 orandas from the small to the new bigger tank.

One of the orandas now is gasping for air at the top eventhough both filter oxygen pumps are now in the new tank.

I hear the good bacteria will transfer as my 2 original filters are now in the new tank. What shall I do with my one oranda that is gasping for air at the top?

 

Really depends on how different the chemistry is between the two tanks water is. Have you done a water test?
I would've used some of the old tanks water to fill the new one. water can be a funny thing hope your fish is ok

 

Yea I should have added some water from the older tank to the newer but I didn't. And I haven't done any water testing. Also my old tank had gravel in it. But I decided not to use any gravel for the newer tank. Is that fine ? Eventhough the gravel from the older tank would have had good bacteria already in it

 

Yes it should be fine without gravel.
Considering you just bought the fish a little over a month ago, I'm sure they are still juveniles. However, they grow to 6 - 8 inches. If you don't already have plans to upgrade the tank again, you will probably want to look in to that. Typically, the rule for fancy goldfish is 20 gallons for the first one, and 10 gallons for each additional fish minimum. So 40 gallons would do, but if you can go bigger, go for it.

 

It's fine I suppose but bare in mind goldfish like sifting through gravel. I can't stress how important water chemistry is. I had to research it when I started out due to bad experiences.

 

I'd get your water tested as soon as possible. It would be better to buy your own test kit though instead of relying on the store to test as they may be using strips which are inaccurate. Most of us use the API master test kit.

I agree the tank is still too small to house 3 orandas. They are very messy fish! If possible, I'd upgrade to a 55 gallon min in the near future. You'd have more stable water parameters as well. Petco is having their dollar per gallon sale til the 25th I believe.

 

Yea I plan to take a sample of my tank water and head to the store tomorrow... it's 10pm for me here now in Asia . Thanks for the tips. I was tempted to get 2 ranchus as well. I might just keep things the way there are for now......then upgrade to a bigger tank maybe 7-9 months from now. I definitely wanna get a stronger filter immediately as well though.

What the heck am I gonna do with the existing tanks if I upgrade to a 55-60 gl tank? The curse of 1st world problems. Lol

 

Ah ok. Didn't realize you were in Asia.

Haha! More tanks is a good problem to have!