nikki's gold 3 Posted July 27, 2017 (edited) Hello! I'm excited to be part of this family. I mostly in need of help raising my goldfish babies since there's not a visible community of goldfish hobbyist in my area. My fish fam consist of 2 red cap oranda (Pula and Kami), 2 sakura ranchu (Chuchu and Lychee), 1 black oranda (Kujo), and 1 calico oranda (Strawberry). They live in a 75 gal tank. My main concern is that my red cap orandas love to swim on the surface of the water. They're not gasping for air, they just simply float on the top sort of playing god-like and watching the other fish swim below them. They only do this when I'm not watching them! So I've observed this for a month now and they still do it. Whenever they see me and when I come closer to the tank, they swim back down with the rest of the fish fam. I also don't think it's a swim bladder problem because they're not swimming upside down. They also perfectly swim fine when they join the others closer to the substrate. Is this a common behavior? if not, then why does this happen? Edited July 27, 2017 by nikki's gold 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
shakaho 6,312 Posted July 27, 2017 Welcome to Kokos! That doesn't sound like a problem. Please show us a picture if you can. Please read our guidelines for healthy goldfish. 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DawnMichele 6,045 Posted July 27, 2017 Welcome to Kokos Nikki!!! 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nikki's gold 3 Posted July 28, 2017 Hello Sharon, here I have a picture of Kami, one of my red cap, caught in the act of being on the surface! His dorsal fin also sticks out of the water but sometimes it doesn't. And thank you, Dawn! I'm glad to be here and to have found this community! Cheers, Nikki 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
shakaho 6,312 Posted July 28, 2017 How tall is your tank? Please test your tank for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nikki's gold 3 Posted July 29, 2017 Hi Sharon, My tank is a little over 21 inches, just the standard 75 gal. tank. I tested my tank water today: Ammonia: 0-0.25ppm Nitrite: 0ppm Nitrate: 80ppm!!! I did a 25% water change after testing. 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
shakaho 6,312 Posted July 30, 2017 Please do at least a 75% water change. High nitrate can cause buoyancy issues, you have really high nitrate, and a dorsal fin out of the water indicates a buoyancy problem. A 25% water change will lower 80 ppm nitrate to 60 ppm, which will begin rising immediately since you have a lot of fish in that tank. What do you feed your fish and how much do you feed? The 75% water change should lower the nitrate to 20ppm. After the large water change, please do 25% daily water changes for a week. Then do 75% changes weekly. If you have read the guidelines for healthy goldfish you know that we recommend a minimum water change of 50% weekly if you have 20 gallons of water per fish. You can compensate for the small tank by increasing the weekly water change to 75%, or if you prefer smaller changes, do 50% changes twice a week. 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DawnMichele 6,045 Posted July 31, 2017 How's everything going Nikki? 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nikki's gold 3 Posted August 1, 2017 Hello Sharon, i saw your response yesterday and so i did the 75% water change. I did a 25% wc today. I routinely do only 50% wc per week but I'll change that to a 75% once per week and a daily 25% wc until my nitrate goes down. Thank you so much for your help! I feed my fish hikari pellets and hikari frozen brine shrimp, approx. 20 pellets twice a day on weekdays and brine shrimp on weekends. I often give them shrimp pellets (one pellet per fish) as treats because they love to swim up and beg for food once they see in the room. Thanks, Nikki 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nikki's gold 3 Posted August 1, 2017 Hello Dawn, I took Sharon's advice but haven't notice any changes with my red caps' behavior yet. I'll continue to do a weekly 75% wc and daily 25% wc for my routine until the nitrate goes down. Thanks, Nikki 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mjfromga 1,784 Posted August 1, 2017 (edited) This is a pellet meal for about 14 fish. Half oily/heavy pellets and the other half are dry/light pellets. If I fed all pellets, this would be 3-4x a day for them in summer. Pellets are 4 mm. Some fish are small, most medium, two semi large. Mine are outside BTW. There are no benefits to feeding a fish a ton in the long run. So, if you're seeing water quality issues, it's always a good idea to cut back feeding. It'll help the water quality, won't hurt the fish. In addition, Hikari is full of fillers and garbage and MANY people report floating issues with their pellets. Compact bodied red capped Orandas seem highly float prone as it stands. You might wish to consider a different food if you don't notice any improvement, or even if you do notice improvement. Edited August 1, 2017 by mjfromga 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nikki's gold 3 Posted August 9, 2017 I didn't do my research about Hikari pellets, it was the one that was recommended to me in my local pet store. My fish are picky eaters, I fed them New Life Spectrum pellets before and they just ignored it so I had to siphon it out. The attached picture is what I feed them for a week now. It's a mixture of Hikari, Omega One, and New Life Spectrum pellets. I've been doing the water changes as advised but my red caps still does the same behavior. I do think it could be their diet as you say. So I'm going to make a change on their food too. What do you prefer? What kind of pellets do you use and do they sink or float? Thank you! -Nikki 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mjfromga 1,784 Posted August 9, 2017 The pellets you see in my photo are half Blackwater Creek Max Growth pellets and half Ken's Krill Pellets. I don't feed them a lot of pellets. The Krill pellets sink but the Blackwater pellets float. Both 4 mm in size. They get treats of Hikari Seaweed Extreme (NOT THEIR GOLDFISH FOODS WHICH SUCK) and Azoo Plus Ultra Fresh mini pellets. They eat mostly Repashy gel food. They also get Zoo Meds canned Bloodworms and Shrimp. Sometimes egg and tuna fish. Sometimes other stuff too. I feed my fish all sorts of foods. I don't think dry pellets all the time are a truly natural diet and the fish clearly love having different foods. My fish live outside so it's a tad different but still a variety is nice. 0 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites