Putting goldfish in horse water tank...safe or not?

Question

I heard putting goldfish in stock tanks for horses helps keep it clean....does it? Note I clean the tanks out and add fresh water but I want to know if adding fish would be a benefit.

Answer 1

Definitely NOT goldfish. They are the dirtiest fish. They produce twice as much ammonia as other fish. Do you want your horses drinking and breathing in ammonia? They get enough ammonia in their systems from breathing in ammonia from their urine in their stalls, even in the short time you leave between mucking.

Answer 2

Warning: Gold fish pollute the world just by their waste lol jokin but they do use a lot of waste and need special requirements if living in outdorrs plus birds will eat them. So my answer would be probly not i could do it as an assignment though hmm *thinking thinking*

You could try other breeds like those cleaning fish (sucking fish or something) or perhaps swordtails and guppies they are good small fish.

If you have ltos of burds then i suggest not lol.

Answer 3

It always sounds like a good idea but every one I know who's tried it ends up saying it didn't help.  What they do an excellent job at is eating mosquito larvae and water bugs but if you're cleaning the tank you wouldn't have those anyway.  No one's ever had a problem with the chlorine or waste though.  Animals drink from lakes, rivers and puddles and eat off the ground, if it's clean enough for the fish to stay alive it's clean enough to drink.

Answer 4

nope it is not safe coz i had a friend who had a horse who had a pony and her horse went mad lol

Answer 5

I wouldn't do it. Fish go to the bath Room too. So it is going to end up in the water. Even if you clean it there is still going to be alga. The horse will drink that water and could end uo very sick. I don't think you want that to happen. I don't think it is a benefit.  

Answer 6

We tried this at my family farm and it worked okay.....the horses were fine with it, but we only did it once because we had to deal with the dead fish and stuff...plus the water ended up smelling sorta weird after a while....even with regular cleaning....

Answer 7

I have heard of people putting minnows in troughs to 'keep them clean' but not goldfish.

Personally, I think those people are just looking for an excuse not to clean the horse trough. Dumping it out and cleaning it once a week is going to keep it much cleaner than having fish in it.  

Answer 8

We used fish in our tanks, once upon a time.  I don't think the goldfish did a darn thing but we tried algae eaters (plecos) too and I found them to be quite helpful.

No, horses don't suck them up.  Watch a horse drink sometime--they don't open their teeth up enough to suck a fish down.  Besides, both fish and horses aren't THAT dumb.

Sure fish do have some waste, but it's not all that much.  Besides, around here horses drink from rivers and creeks as their primary water source all the time.  You think that water doesn't have any kind of waste in it?  It's fine, it's not enough to hurt them.

We still had to clean the tanks from time to time, but nearly as often as we did without fish.

The fish had a hard time adjusting so I think we got 10 or 12 of them to start, and only 2 lived.  Those must have been the two tough ones!  We pulled them out for the winter, put them inside, and then put them out next summer and they did just fine.  They are pretty hardy fish.

Answer 9

You would have to clean the trough even more if you put fish in there because of their waste.

Answer 10

I was at a boarding facality and they used goldfish.  I think it would be a hassle to remove them when you want to clean the tank.  My friends use barley straw packs.  They do a great job and are cheap.  Attached is a link to find them.  My friends got it at the tractor supply store.  Check around your area, feed store etc.  Attached is a link to purchase them.

Answer 11

I think its safe, a few people at my boarding stable have fish in their water troughs. One lady has guppies and the other lady has gold fish. I personally would never try it though.

Answer 12

I wouldn't put gold fish in. The easiest thing is just to dump out the tank and clean it. If your really lazy, you can catch a catfish and put it in for a couple of days.

Answer 13

DO NOT PUT A FISH IN YOUR HORSES WATER. Horses suck ther water so it would swallow the fish and the whole thing is is a myth

Answer 14

Yeah it would be fine, we've done it before. We bought 2 algae eaters. They grow huge to the size of their environment. We did at small filters on the trough though to filter the water for the fish, the algae eaters actually didn't die, we had them for about a month then they grew too big so we let them go in a pond nearby. In the store they are called Plecos, just ask the employees. Here is a picture of what they look like, and what is cool, is they are kind of camoflaged to watever environment you plop them in, so the horses can't even see them. http://www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_Commo...

Keep in mind these can grow HUGE so keep an eye on it if you choose it. The store people do say certain temperatures it should live in and that they need certain nutrients, just pop some pellets in there once in a while for it and occasionally some little bits of romaine lettuce just for nutrients, they like that. Otherwise they'll just do their job.

I found it helped alot. Yet of course it is just simpler to just clean the trough yourself, or use a hamless anti-algae formula to minimize the speed, and severity of the algae growth.

Good luck, hpe this helped :)

Answer 15

what if your horse sucked up a fish? haha not a good idea just be a good horseman and put on ur big girl pants and clean the bucket(tank)

Answer 16

I've tried it a couple times and finally gave up. I have 12 horses and thought having goldfish in the water buckets in the pastures would help keep the algae growth down. I think it helped a bit... but I had to feed the fish then the water clouded sooner than it normally would have. The horses didn't seem to care about the fish. The fish didn't make it through the winter cuz it got too cold. I live in So Cal, so it really doesn't get that cold, and still the fish didn't survive. I still had to dump out the water buckets to scrub them, and it was difficult cuz I had to be sure not to dump out the fish and make sure there was still enough water for them. It was just too much work for the benefit.    

Answer 17

WIthout an air pump to oxygenate the water and a good filter to keep it clean, the goldfish will be dead within a week regardless of how much you fresh water you add, especially since goldfish (and every other fish) need treated, de-chlorinated water.. And I'm sure your horses will not appreciate stinky floating fish in their water. =)

Answer 18

I have koi and water gardens.  Without filtration, fish create more problems than they solve.  (Assuming de-chlorinated water) Fish produce waste.  Without beneficial bacteria to break down the waste and no filtration to remove the residue, you will be introducing the probability of serious infectious bacteria to your horse's water source.  As waste accumulates, it contaminates.  Compare your horse drinking fish water to you drinking sewage effluent.  Sound appetizing?  In short, NO FISH.

The easiest method is to shade the water tank.  Algae blooms in sunlight.  Before considering fish, consider a UV filter.  It will require a power source as water must flow through the filter tube to be exposed to the high intensity UV.

I don't like the idea of mixing water, electricity and horses in the same place at the same time.  Maybe just bite the bullet and keep cleaning the water tanks.

<<+>>Horses do drink out of lakes and streams, both are functioning systems, not a tank with no other purpose than holding water.

Note to the answerer who released Plecos into a 'nearby pond', "ILLEGAL !"  You released an imported exotic into our eco system, what were you thinking?  Hopefully you live  where water temps fall below 40 degrees so they will die.