Fish Technical References
Below are links to some articles that I think are excellent, some useful calculators, and some discussion threads that are particularly good on various topics related to fishkeeping. Links to information outside of this website will open in a new browser window.
Topic Index:
Discussion Forums
Oklahoma City Aquarium Club - Check out our newly redesigned website!
Goldfish and Aquarium Board - Come join us! :) and check out our new website and forum!
Diseases: Fish Pathogens and Treatment Information
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Quick Reference: Goldfish Illness - An overview of the most common illnesses affecting goldfish and how to treat them.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Fish Medicine Cabinet Recommendations - Like kids, fish usually get sick on weekends. Here are some things you'll may want to have on hand in your fishie medicine cabinet.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Quick Reference: Medications - The following list explains how to use the most commonly recommended cures/medications.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Medicated Food: Explained and Explored - This article outlines the available common medications, discusses the ingredients and attempts to narrow down which medicated drug may be better for our needs.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's How to: Sedate a Fish with Finquel or Clove Oil - Sometimes it's necessary to sedate a fish to perform a proceedure such as cleaning an ulcer or finrot. You can sedate larger fish with either clove oil or Finquel (MS-222).
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's How to: Clean an Ulcer or Fin Rot - Treating an ulcer or finrot can often be done without having to resort to using water antibiotics.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's How to give a goldfish an injection - The greatest advancement in koi and goldfish healthcare is the use of injectable medicines. Injections allow administering a known dose of medication into the fish (where it's needed) and can be used even if a fish has stopped eating.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Euthanasia - Perhaps the kindest thing you can do for a pet fish that is extremely ill or severely injured is to induce its death humanely through euthanasia.
Goldfish Nutrition and Gel Food Information.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Goldfish Nutrition Part 1: The natural diet and digestive processes - One of the keys to healthy and long lived goldfish is their diet. To understand what constitues a healthy diet, one has to understand what goldfish have evolved to eat and how they digest their food.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Goldfish Nutrition Part 2: Food and Nutrition - Information on the nutritional content of foods and recommendations for a healthy diet.
Goldfish care.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Goldfish Basics - An overview of what it takes to make a good home for goldfish.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Water Quality - Happy water is the key to happy fish. Just because your water looks clear doesn't mean it's happy!
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Quarantine Recommendations for New Goldfish - New goldfish may come to you with bacterial infections or parasites, so it's important to quarantine and nip problems in the bud, so that you don't take the chance of making your other goldfish sick by adding unquarantined goldfish.
Growing Aquatic Plants.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Goldfish and Plants: The Low-Tech Approach - How Liv set up her planted goldfish tank.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's How to: Pot Aquarium Plants in Topsoil - If you want a nice planted tank but do not want to have to worry about high lighting, CO2 and dosing with liquid fertilizers you can pot your aquatic plants in topsoil.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Setting up a Walstad Natural Planted Tank - A Walstad-type natural planted tank is low maintenance requiring only pruning of plants and infrequent partial water changes.
Water Quality
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Water Quality: The First 30 Days (Cycling your tank) - An overview of what it takes to keep your water from getting toxic while your biofilter bacteria get up to speed.
Goldfish and Aquarium Board's Water Quality - Happy water is the key to happy fish. Just because your water looks clear doesn't mean it's happy!
A compilation of information on water quality from Dr. Tim's Library
Fishless Cycling Revisited by Chris Cow. A good how-to on fishless cycling from the guy who came up with the idea.
Koivet Discussion: Salt and nitrIte and partial water changes. 1 teaspoon of salt per gallon should protect against brown blood disease without having to do frequent partial water changes.
Koivet Discussion: Source Water Issues - Roddy discusses how your source water can affect what you do to keep your water happy. The 50% kill in 48 hours for carp for chloroform (TriHaloMethanes or THMs)is 162 ppm. LC50 for copper for carp is listed in the toxicity literature at 0.14 ppm. If pH and hardness are kept high, copper is less toxic. You can use add calcium chloride and magnesium sulfate (Epsom salt) to increase GH. trickle towers combined with koi clay gas out nitrIte and nitrAte. 1ppm arsenic is worrisome.
Koivet Discussion: Heavy metals. These are the Metal Safe Limit levels as defined in the Textbook of Fish Health: Copper 0.014mg/l More toxic in soft water; Zinc exacerbates toxicity; Combined both are dangerous; Zinc 0.01mg/l Synergistic with copper; 0.15mg/l In hard Water; Cadmium 0.03mg/l; Chromium 0.10mg/l; Lead 0.01mg/l In soft Water; 4.00mg/l In hard Water; Silver 0.03mg/l (mg/l is the same as ppm).
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