How to Take Care of Goldfish for Beginners – Goldfish Koki or commonly called Koki fish is a cute fish and easy to care for. In all aquarium shops, they must sell fish from China, along with the equipment.
In the previous post, misterhidayat discussed the goldfish cultivation guide for beginners. If you haven’t read it, please follow the steps via the following link,
Read Also: Complete Guide to Cultivating Goldfish for Beginners
Now we continue how to take care of this goldfish,
Speaking of care, fish that have a Latin name Carassius auratus This is actually not too difficult and does not need special handling. However, as a living being, he also needs to have his needs met.
How to Take Care of Goldfish for Beginners
What is Needed and How to Take Care of a Goldfish
Then how and what is needed in how to take care of this goldfish? Let’s break it down one by one!
1. Place
The first way to care for goldfish is that you need a place or container. This fish can actually be cared for in a pond or aquarium, but if you want to see its beauty, goldfish is better kept in an aquarium.
Goldfish Koki does not need a large enough space in its maintenance, it is enough with an aquarium bowl (fish bowl) with a diameter of 30 cm, he can live. But if you have enough space, an aquarium measuring 60x30x30 cm seems preferable. It aims to make the goldfish cook more freely and avoid stress on the fish.
2. Water Quality
How to care for goldfish next by paying attention to water quality. Water quality is very decisive in maintaining goldfish. Actually, it’s not just goldfish that need good water quality, most other ornamental fish need good water quality for optimal growth.
Optimal water quality in the care of goldfish is to have an acidity level of pH between 7.0 to 8.0, do not let the water acidity level below 5.0 or above 10.0.
You can use well water that has been deposited or RO (Reverse Osmosis) water, some people even use mineral water for better water quality. If you are a beginner, you should just use well water in your home, but first leave it overnight, then give the starter bacteria for initial bacterial growth in the water.
Don’t forget to add coarse fish salt to kill harmful bacteria and fungi, as well as warm the water a little.
3. Aerators
Goldfish are not fish that can live without the help of an aerator (if kept in an aquarium). Even if you keep them in a large aquarium, you should use an aerator to enrich and promote oxygen circulation in the water.
4. Filtration
To maintain the quality of clean water, then you need a filtering system or a good enough filtration. No need to be too complicated, just use a cotton swab as a coarse dirt filter. For a biological filter, you need a starter bacteria to lower the ammonia level in the water caused by the fish droppings.
5. Decoration
To beautify a chef’s fish aquarium, you also need an adequate lighting system and pebbles as a base. You can also add water toys for decoration if you like.
For the lighting system, you can use special aquarium lights that are widely sold in fish shops near your home. Usually this special lamp can be immersed in water, because it has a special protection to make it waterproof. However, it is not recommended to use this submersible lamp if you keep goldfish in a small aquarium, because this lamp can change the temperature of the water to be warmer, due to the heat delivered by the lamp. But you can use it if the lamp uses LEDs, because LED lamps do not cause excessive heat.
If you have just bought aquarium decorations such as houses and others, make it a habit to soak the decorations first. Usually, the decorations are painted colorfully, sometimes the smell of paint still lingers. Therefore, it is best to soak it for a few days to make sure you don’t smell the paint smell, so that later the decoration doesn’t contaminate the water which is harmful to the Koki fish.
6. Food
It is important to pay attention to your goldfish’s food intake. Please note, this goldfish is one of the greedy fish, whatever is in front of him he will eat. Therefore, it is important to pay attention to their feed as well as the dosage.
This goldfish feed can be of various kinds, such as pellets, frozen worms, silk worms or dried worms. For beginners who don’t want to bother, just choose the type of pellet-shaped feed. Besides being easy, pellets are also equipped with various kinds of vitamins needed by your favorite ornamental fish.
Preparation Stage for Fish Entering New Aquarium and Fish Care
Before the fish enter the aquarium, special handling is needed so that goldfish can grow optimally in the aquarium. Here are some steps:
1. Recycling
For new aquariums, aquarium manufacturers usually connect glass or form elbows with special glue. After buying a new aquarium, you can fully fill the entire aquarium, leave it for 2-3 days. After that, you drain until the aquarium is empty, then check whether the glue still smells or not. Because the smell of this glue is quite strong, it is not good for the water, including for future residents. You can repeat the method above if the smell of glue has not gone away.
Once the glue smell is completely gone, you can refill the entire tank again, then turn on the aerator and other filtration systems. Don’t forget to add salt and starter bacteria, leave for 2 to 3 days. This process is called “recycling.” The goal is to create an ecosystem of good bacteria in the water, which will later be useful for the inhabitants of the aquarium.
2. Acclimation
One way to care for a newly purchased goldfish is the acclimation method. Acclimation is the process of introducing new advertisements to the conditions and temperature of the water in the aquarium.
Before the fish enter completely in the aquarium, adapt the fish by floating the fish still wrapped in plastic over the water, leaving it for 1 to 2 hours. After that, open the plastic bag, but don’t let the fish come off the plastic. Slowly add a little aquarium water into the plastic containing the goldfish, let stand for a few minutes, so that the fish adapt to real water conditions.
Repeat the process of adding water little by little. If it is enough, you can release the fish slowly to the main aquarium. This acclimation applies to all newly purchased fish.
3. Water change process
To drain the aquarium water, it can be done once a month or once every two weeks. Do not let you drain the water as a whole, just throw away at most half the volume of the aquarium water, then replace it with water that has been precipitated (leaved overnight / better if given oxygen) first.
If you are forced to replace all the water in the aquarium, you can repeat the recycling method as in the first point. Don’t forget to add starter bacteria and salt.
4. Feeding
Feeding the chef fish is a fun and most awaited process. Goldfish are voracious fish, so it’s nice to see fish voraciously eating what we give them.
But, don’t let this pleasure make you complacent, don’t overdo it in feeding. Just a little, just a pinch for a few fish. You can do 2-3 times a day maximum.
If you feed too much, the impact of goldfish excrement will become ammonia which will contaminate water quality, which in turn can kill the fish itself.
5. Changing the Filtration Media Periodically
This filtration media is not what you buy once in a lifetime, it needs to be replaced periodically if it feels dirty. Our example uses cotton, you can replace the cotton if it is black or dirty.
That’s a guide and how to care for goldfish for beginners. Hope it is useful!
