Concerned Unhealthy Goldfishes

[LosC]

My g/f's step dad has a 30-35g tank with 3 or 4 goldfish and 2 others of a different kind. I notced his goldfish aren't lookin really gold. They look awful, more like silver fish with spots of orange on em. One goldfish has a black patch covering most of the top of him and his head. His tank looks awful. The walls look like they never been scrubbed. Ibelieve hes running a aquaclear 200 if I remmebr correctly. But the media looks disgusting. I remmebr he had a Betta in their awhile back and it died in 3 days. He doesn't test the water for anything. Maybe does a water change once a month and feeds em twice a day. Hes had these fish and his tank set up for a year now and the other two fish which are not goldfish look fine, in fact one of the others is the largest but he tends to hide in a cave almost always except to eat food scraps, rarely comes up. I'm not sure what kind these other two fish are but I can try to describe them. They look like goldfishes except they have light grey and black coloured thick stripes horizontally on their body. Also I think for the age of the goldfishes they should be more plump but they still grow. They only eat goldfish flakes and the temp of the tank is 77F. I feel really bad for the fish. When I go over their I always feed them even if they ate earlier because I think they should be eating more then twice a day. I don't know much about these fish only their environment. What can I do to make them more healthy and happy?

[Ty]

have you talked to him about it in a respectfull manner that wont make it feel like your just telling him that everything that he is doing is wrong?

try to edjucate him, not just tell him what he is doing wrong.

[jbeining75]

try to get him on the forum and he can look around for himself at others tanks... they may get him encouraged to do more with his!!!!

[Lady Hobbs]

He has several issues going on. Goldfish are cold water fish and the others are warm water fish if they are not goldfish. They are sold separately for a reason but people still try to put them with warm water species for some reason. The temp in the tank is too warm for them but just right for the warm water fish.

Goldfish are dirty fish and need very good filtration and "frequent" water changes.

This is too bad as it's obvious you care about fish and know the conditions of these fish are inadequate. Sure would be nice if he would give them to you.

[LosC]

How are these fish still alive? I'm gonna try talking to him but hes the type that knows everything.

[LosC]

Well buddy never ended up cleaning the tank even though he said he would. I'm cleaning it tommorrow morning. I asked my girlfreind if he would mind at all. She says " He wouldn't mind at all, he'd be real happy, he hates cleaning the tank". I'm gonna test the water for Amm Trite Trate and pH. I'll let you guys know about the readings. He has 2 Convict Cichlids and 3 or 4 common goldfish which look silver and one of them is red in the gills. I researched on both types of fish. The cichlids can tolerate temp's from 68 to 80, currentyl the temp is at 77 so I think I'll lower it a bit for the golfish. The filter sponge is looking terrible so I'll rinse it a bit in luke warm water. Now the algae I dont know what I'm going to do because I don't have a scrubber. Also bringin them some treats of shrimp and bloodworms. BTW that tank hasn't been cleaned in a couple months.

[Roaregg]

any updates? interesting in knowing how everything turned out.

[Rue]

Me too!

Don't overfeed your fish...twice a day is too much IMO...