Question
    I was hoping maybe you could help with some advice.  My boyfriend and I are from Pennsylvania and we put in a new 270 gallon pond this past April.  We decided to keep Orandas and Pond Snails in it.  We currently have 6 Orandas that range from 3-5 inches long from head to tail.  

    1 of them is not doing so well.  He is around 5 inches long and we got him about a month ago.  About a week after we got him in the pond we noticed that his lips were lined with what looked like white fungus.  We also noticed a white spot on the base of his tail.  After a week went by the white areas remained the same but we purchased and treated the pond with Melafix which uses the active ingredient Tea Tree Oil.  The white areas remained the same after a week of treatment and when treatment was done we noticed his lips were moving funny.  

    My boyfriend then purchased a pond fungicide for fish diseases and then treated the water with it.  We began noticing the fish has been having problems with eating.  For a few days he didn't seem to do well with flakes but ok with singing granuals but now he seems to have a problem with both.  

    We took him out of the pond 2 days ago to examine him and saw there was a big clump of fungus or bacteria that was hanging from his mouth that we brushed off.  His mouth which used to move doesn't anymore, instead it is stiff and kind of puffy but does not have any white fungus or bacteria growing on it anymore.  We can see that his lip was cut but has healed back to normal looking tissue.  But now what looks like a V-shaped open wound on his throat opens and closes for breathing.

    We are afraid that although he is healing, he won't be able to eat anymore.  His mouth doesn't seem functional anymore, just this abnormal slit on his throat.

    It is a shot in the dark sending you this e-mail but if you have had any experience in this sort of matter or can send us to a site online that may help then we'd greatly appreciate it.  Thanks for your time.

Grace, Scott & Hallow

Answer
Well it sounds like you've tried some good treatments for the fish.  I use MelaFix and have used fungal treatments a few times in aquariums.  Do you add pond salt to the pond?  If not, this will also help the goldfish, especially healing for the sick fish.  It sounds like he had a major physical injury which may have permanantly disabled him.  I don't know how you'd fix that abnormality.  I would treat the infection with MelaFix, salt, and antibiotics.  I say antibiotics and not antifungals because you already tried that.  Some bacteria may look like fungus.  Fungus is more fuzzy, like cotton but some bacteria can be fuzzy too.  Both bacteria and funguses will take advantage of an open wound.  Do not use antibiotics in the pond as it's very costly and can risk killing your good bacteria.  Treat the fish in a quarantine tank of 10 or 20 gallons.  I hope he gets better.  Here are some sites that might help:

http://www.koivet.com (not just koi but goldfish too)
http://userpages.umbc.edu/~rrhudy1/health.htm (my fish health page)

Robyn
fishpondinfo.com