Help!

**Vbtrfly416** · 04-02-2012, 05:42 PM

I've had my ten gallon tank for almost a month now. I'm starting to notice my tank is a little cloudy.

Before this It also had a strong smell and one of my fish was losing its scales. I went ahead and went to th nearest pet store and got some advice. I ended up buying something called prazipro which is supposed to eliminate bad bacteria. I decided that I wanted to start fresh and transferred the fish into a large container with oxygen and the correct water (I use distilled.is this ok?) I then proceeded to wash everything inside with distilled water.I let the gravel sit in some of the water in one bucket and the decorations in another bucket with some water as well I took some of the medicine and poured a tiny bit into some fresh water and cleaned all my tubing just in case. My goldfish is getting better after the complete water change and all but now the water is getting cloudy.

Of theirs anything I should be doing on the regular please let me know so I can start doing ut. I feel terrible cause I don't want their little world to suffer. :(
Any advice?

**magicmed** · 04-02-2012, 06:12 PM

sounds to me like an uncycled tank and you didnt keep up with weekly water changes. start doing about 50% water change weekly (dont wash off the gravel though, it contains helpful bacteria to the ecosystem) and always use de-chlorinator when adding water. if you have a test kit post water parameters for more in depth answer

**kurly** · 04-02-2012, 06:50 PM

How many fish do you have in your tank? Goldfish need a much larger tank. A 10 gallon tank is too small for goldfish, even if there's only one in there.

**pjaldave** · 04-02-2012, 07:39 PM

Goldfish is a no no in a 10G, you could keep one in a minimum of 55G. Reason being, they grow quite large and have a HUGE bioload.

As stated above, sounds like an uncycled tank. Read on cycling with fish (but I strongly recommend return the goldfish and start fishless) and go on from there. Also, your goldfish might have dropsy, i ain't sure but i think losing scales is one of its symptoms.

**Joonkun** · 04-02-2012, 07:56 PM

most common goldfish can easily grow to be 9-10+ inches. it also doesnt sound like you cycled your tank. RO/distilled water is fine. "washing" with distilled water doesnt do anything, adding more water to an aquatic type bacteria/parasite obviously wouldnt. if you need to clean i would use an alcohol/vinegar/bleach kinda of cleaner, that is then throughly rinsed and AIR dried to allow the remaining chemicals to evaporate.

hope all is well but goldies have a huge bioload. either do like 50% water changes maybe even 2 times a day or return the gold fish and start fishless.
either way you need to get some test kits.