What to Do About Goldfish Floating In Your Tank
A goldfish floating in your tank or swimming with no course or direction, is sign of what could be a serious problem. There are only two reasons that can cause your goldfish to act this strange. It could be…- Your goldfish has a problem with their buoyancy or swim bladder, or
- It could be because of where they were raised and how they were fed.
The swim bladder is the gas filled sac in their dorsal area that is responsible for their buoyancy. If your goldfish’s swim bladder is infected, they tend to swim abnormally. Often times your goldfish might be having a hard time rising or you will see them trying to wedge themselves from the decorations just to stop themselves from floating freely on top of your tank.
There are two factors that can contribute to this problem. One is because your goldfish might be overfed or constipated. If they are overfed, their stomach tends to swell and thus putting pressure on their swim bladder. The same thing can be applied to a constipated goldfish. When a goldfish is constipated, its causes its digestive tract to clog and putting pressure on the swim bladder.
If this is the case of your goldfish then what you have to do is to have your goldfish on a fast for a few days. You don’t have to worry if your precious goldfish will be starved because these fish can live without eating for a few days. This is known to solve both the overeating and the constipation problem.
After the few days fasting of your goldfish, it is advisable that you give them a variety of different foods. You can start by giving them spinach, lettuce, peas, and cucumber. If you are also going to give pellets or fish flakes to your goldfish, you need to soak it first so that the flakes or the pellets will not lay on the surface of the water. Your goldfish have the tendency to take in too much air if they will come out to the surface to get their food and thus causing the bladder to be defective.
Another factor that may have caused your goldfish to float in their tank is related to their origin. If they are raised in farms, there is a tendency that their source of food is vegetation. These are the type of food that are composted on the ground and are natural. When the goldfish is already used to foods like such, there is a big chance that they will have a very hard time to adapt to commercial foods and thus, resulting to blockage of their intestines and will cause the goldfish to float.
Avoiding this problem is very easy. You just need to be more aware about the goldfish that you want to get. It is very important to talk to the store owners or the goldfish seller and ask them about the origin and the breed of your goldfish. You also need to know that if you want to get a more sensitive breed of goldfish, you have to realize that they will need twice or thrice the care than the normal or the common breed.