Good news; the Webmaster has been doing the "Seasonal Advice" on this page for more than a year and a half. Clearly, he has been approaching "tipped out" as these have become progressively more lame. To help, Gary Hater (former GFSA chair and goldfish keeper extraordinaire) has volunteered to dip into his cache of wisdom to help. Gary's first two submissions are below.
Contribute something to the Goldfish Report! Please provide any articles, news items, photos, comments and requests to the editor, Vince McCarty, for inclusion in the Report. Vince has offered a set of topics for future issues, to try and get all of you to dig back in your trove of experiences and create a contribution for the Report. Below is a list of topics due for the next issue:
Gary Hater has some words of wisdom for us all:
Ponds:
It's been a mild winter for most of us. The tulips are up in the Midwest, further south the redbuds are in bloom. The fish that wintered over in the ponds are starting to swim and look for food. On sunny days, they hang at the surface. Perfect spring setting, right? Not always! Watch for the occasional fish death, followed by more and more fish listing at the surface. First one, then another, soon two or even three. Dirty water, flukes, poison leaves? Experience suggests that a protozoan called Chilodonella generally causes spring death. It can kill every fish in a pond in four weeks. While the pond needs to be cleaned, this is a dire emergency. Catch the listing fish, place them in a 5 gallon bucket of pond water with two cups of salt in it. Watch the fish, if they flip over or get stressed, grab them and put them back in the pond. Next salt or permanganate the pond, after doing a 30% water change or purge. More details on this fatal malady and proper treatment can be found on pages 34 and 35 of the recent Johnson and Hess publication, Fancy Goldfish.
Aquariums:
Cleaning the plastic walls of a fish tank can be tricky. To avoid scratches, use filter floss to wipe off the inside of the tank. Cleaning sponge filters can be really unpleasant, collect all the sponges, put them in the washing machine, wash without soap or bleach (ed. note: works really well, don't let your wife find out you are doing this). Glass walled tanks can be cleaned with a razor blade or a coarse green pot scrubber. When you wash the filter pads in a power filter, check and make sure the bottom of the power filter is not full of sludge, the bigger the filter the more likely this is the case.