BellaOnline Forums Home and Garden Fish goldfish with "worms"

Hey everyone,
In past week my fantail goldfish have what look like "worms". There are several affected spots on the body, fin joints and near the gills where there is hemeraging, swelling, and a thin splinter like white "worm" poking out of the spot.

Unfortunatly I think I know what caused this which was that the tank needed cleaned and water changed and it wasn't done because I was hospitalized for 3 weeks and now 2 months following I am finally strong enough to clean the tank and this is what I found. The water was pretty clear, but there were tan/brown dirt spot develpoing and spreading on the rock and shell, the filter insert desperatly needed changed and the amonia was very high.

At this point I would like comformation that I have taken the right steps to help my babies get well again or for some instructions on what I should be doing.

So far I have: cleaned the tank!, with a new filter insert (new carbon), and treated it for copper safe. The risky thing I did -which I read about someone else doing on this forum years and years ago- is that while gently supporting the fish in a net (letting both gills be in water) I removed some of the "worms" with tweezers. Although it really stressed them out both of the fish I removed them from seemed to act as though they felt alot better. The coppersafe did cloud the water making it look milky so I did a 1/5 water change and treated those 4 gallons with coppersafe.

I also called Soldan's -the best pet store I have ever come across and asked what they thought and their treatment advice. They confirmed that I have done all that I can do and have chosen the right course of treatment. They did tell me that they aren't worms but floogers? or something like that.

Has anyone delt with these things before? What did you do? What worked? Did your fish survive?

Thanks for the help everyone. I'm honestly very worried about my fish surviving this paracite.

Fantails and Betas

It could be anchor worms - they are white and can be in the fin joint and are known to attack goldfish. You could try this product called "Dimilin" that you can purchase from watergarden.com and on that page you can read about this disease and see a photo of it so you can maybe tell if it's the same thing your poor fish have.
Are you o.k. now? 3 weeks is a long time to be in the hospital!
Did you have someone feed your fish while you were gone?
Next time, could you have a relative or a friend well-trained in advance to clean your fish tank for you, also, while you are gone? Maybe make friends at a petstore that has a great fish department! : )