# Goldfish turned white- is this normal??



## hulu

Hi there,

For the last week or so I've been observing my carnival goldfish change from its normal white and orange-gold self to plain white. It started from its head and spread to its body, and now its tail (which was the only orange thing left). It doesn't look like fungus- the pigmentation of its body just changed to white. Is it normal for this to happen? Also, it started to swim a little tilted, is this the beginning of swim-bladder disease? I started feeding it peas again to try to remedy this.

Here are my specs:

1. Size of aquarium : 10 Gallon

2. Is your aquarium setup freshwater or brackish water? Freshwater

3. How long the aquarium has been set up? 1 month and 3 days now

4. What fish and how many are in the aquarium? one fantail goldie and one comet

5. Are there live plants in the aquarium? silk/plastic

6. What temperature is the tank water currently? 80 degrees Fahrenheit

7. What make/model filter are you using? Penguin 100 power filter w/ biowheel, (it's a 20g filter)

8. Are you using a CO2 unit? nope

9. Does your aquarium receive natural sunlight at any given part of the day? Yes

10. When did you perform your last water exchange, and how much water was changed? This morning, 10%

11. How often do you perform water changes? Initially it was once a week, now it is twice a week.

12. How often and what foods do you feed your fish? Aqueon Tropical Flakes 2-3 times a day, hikari freeze-dried brine shrimp and blood worms as a weekly treat, periodic frozen peas & other veggies

13. What type of lighting are you using and how long is it kept on? incandescent, 12 hours

14. What specific concerns bring you here at this time? Comet (carnival?) goldie turned white

15. What are your water parameters? My last test (around 1 week ago) showed pH between 7.6 and 8.0, ammonia between 2.0 and 4.0, nitrite 0 and nitrate 0. I suspect the tank is still cycling.

16. What test kit are you using and is it liquid or test strips? Virbac Mardel 5 in 1 Test Strips and Aquarium Pharmaceuticals Freshwater/Saltwater Ammonia Test Kit (liquid)

17. When was the last time you bought a fish and how did they behave while in the pet store tank? Last time i purchased a fish was back when I first set up the tank.


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## Lupin

Is it doing well? Goldfish can change colors anytime as a result of pigment cells failing to retain themselves for some time. Black is the most unstable color. I keep four black goldfish and three are changing together from black to yellow. Since black is a melanophore albeit melanin for some who don't want to be any more scientific, the lack of exposure to sunlight prevents the fish from retaining its melanin therefore the melanin diminishes to be replaced by other color pigments such as xanthophore (yellow cells).

Edit:
Eeeewww....I personally hate flakes for goldfish! Flakes can expand slowly in the guts of the fish and add up air as the fish ingests them from the surface. I suggest dumping flakes and freeze dried stuffs altogether. Both should not be used with fancy goldfish that are predisposed to buoyancy issues. Gel foods whether homemade or by Mazuri (can be bought in Goldfish Utopia site owned by Ed), sinking pellets such as Hikari Lionhead and frozen foods are about the only ones I would use. Plants and vegetables (not gassy, sugary nor starchy) will work well as nice condiments.


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## JouteiMike

Nicely put lupin. Here's an example with one of my fish. I bought him roughly 4 years ago as a black moor and he was COMPLETELY black, and over time he seems to have transformed into a fan tail! His eyes shrunk, and his black started turning orange, which is now a more yellowish. Amazing fish how they can change...


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## Lupin

Wow! You bought him as a black moor?:shock: He looks completely different from a black moor.:?


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## JouteiMike

Weird isn't it?

He looked like a typical black moor when he was a baby, but now that's how he looks!


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## willow

very pretty he is too.
i've had goldies change colour in the past.


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## hulu

the color changing has pretty much come to a halt. My goldie is more of a pinkish white now... very interesting to observe haha


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## lilyrazen

wow this helped a lot, 2 of my fish did this recently, one red and white comet turning all white and one calico fantail turning just orange (kinda a bummer but oh well)


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## reallyreallycoolfish

Right now my goldfish is turning white. She was all orange as a baby, and a few months ago she began to turn white. She stopped turning white after about a month, and became half white and half orange. But recently she has been turning all white. Her fins have remained almost all orange, and she is still orange around her mouth. She seems just as active as ever. I don't know what type of goldfish she is(by the way I'm not sure she's a she) I won her at a carnival but I've had her for over a year now. I would not be so worried if the change was gradual, but it is happening pretty quickly. Her fins are still in perfect form, and her scales seem normal. I don't think the white is fungus, her scales are actually white. She's about 3-4 inches long. Her tank is 2 or 3 gallons, and she is the only thing in it. She has lived in it all of her life. I have not changed the location of her tank, or any decorations in it. I cleaned it about a week ago, and I think I did it the same way as always. I changed her food 2 or 3 months ago, and am currently feeding her Tetrafin goldfish crisps. The room that her tank is in is lit most of the time just by sunlight, but the sun doesn't shine directly into her tank. I do not have a light for the tank. I only have an airstone in her tank, no filter. I was planning on buying her a 5 to 10 gallon tank with a filter soon. Would this help? I love my goldfish, and I don't want anything to happen to her. Should I get her checked out? What should I do? Please answer this if you are certified with fish, or if you work with fish. Also, has this happened to anyone elses goldfish? Please help me!


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## reallyreallycoolfish

*My goldfish is quickly turning white! Help!*

Right now my goldfish is turning white. She was all orange as a baby, and a few months ago she began to turn white. She stopped turning white after about a month, and became half white and half orange. But recently she has been turning all white. Her fins have remained almost all orange, and she is still orange around her mouth. She seems just as active as ever. I don't know what type of goldfish she is(by the way I'm not sure she's a she) I won her at a carnival but I've had her for over a year now. I would not be so worried if the change was gradual, but it is happening pretty quickly. Her fins are still in perfect form, and her scales seem normal. I don't think the white is fungus, her scales are actually white. She's about 3-4 inches long. Her tank is 2 or 3 gallons, and she is the only thing in it. She has lived in it all of her life. I have not changed the location of her tank, or any decorations in it. I cleaned it about a week ago, and I think I did it the same way as always. I changed her food 2 or 3 months ago, and am currently feeding her Tetrafin goldfish crisps. The room that her tank is in is lit most of the time just by sunlight, but the sun doesn't shine directly into her tank. I do not have a light for the tank. I only have an airstone in her tank, no filter. I was planning on buying her a 5 to 10 gallon tank with a filter soon. Would this help? I love my goldfish, and I don't want anything to happen to her. Should I get her checked out? What should I do? Please answer this if you are certified with fish, or if you work with fish. Also, has this happened to anyone elses goldfish? Please help me!


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## CarassiusAuratus

I've gone through a lot of fish I guess you could say. Beta's seem to hate me (except my current one who thankfully has survived past the first month), so because of that I decided I'd just go and try a 'harder-to-kill" fish as my friend put it, which just so happened to be a goldfish. I had a small 2 gallon hexagon tank that needed to be filled, so I purchased two small, hardly 1" fantail goldfish. I had chosen one that was quite healthy and one who even the girl at petco said would probably die shortly . She had turned up been right (RIP Patch), but I couldn't just let the poor thing die in a tank at the store not knowing what it is to be loved. Any who, Fish stick had managed to stay alive and was a very active very bright orange, though seemed lonely so I got her a new friend, Tofu. They soon out grew the 2g. (they were about 2-3") so I set up my 10g. and also got a pleco (approx. 2") after month. Fishstick and Tofu grew up quickly (Fishstick 5" Tofu 4.5ish" Pleco 6"), and it was starting to get to the point where I needed to 'upgrade' my tank. Sadly, Tofu had died a few months before I purchased my 29g. tank. 

I moved Plexo the Pleco and Fishstick into their new home which had plenty of more space. However Fishstick seemed depressed and not nearly quite as active as she had once been with her bf Tofu (they had different 'bits and pieces' and tofu always chased her which is supposedly a type of flirting) so I decided I would go out and buy Fishstick a fishy friend. My baby was hardly 1" and was utterly mortified by Fishstick as she was 5" larger than him/her (they've become bestest friends now). Because I had gotten such a small goldfish and Plexo was 6" (and they can be territorial) I figured I would watch the tank more than usual. This is when I noticed changes in my Fishstick. She was losing her bright colors and they were being replaced with white (i'd seen it before but i just assumed her bit of white under her belly was just growing with her). Over the course of about 7 months my dear Fishstick has gone from being a vibrant orange/gold fish to a basically white goldfish (her face has remained a yellow/orange). It seems awful, like, why is my fish going white...?! But because she was so large at the time, it made it easy to tell that her scales were just changing colors and she wasn't ill. She's not 9" along with Plexo, and my baby is about 3.5". They're all happy and healthy, so sometimes it just happens.


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