ok yesterday while eating supper my brother noticed one of my smaller gold fish floating bellied side up in my 40 gallons or so tub and i left him in there to make sure he was dead or if he was just having swim bladder problems and it was 8 pm and i didnt want to go bury him the next day i had school and when i got back he was dead lying on the bottom so i scooped him out put him in a plastic bag and brought him out to the corn field behind my house and while i was digging a hole i looked inside and there was a puddle of blood around him. my setup is a 40 gallon tub a pond filter that runs 5 hours a day 4 gold fish 2 about 4 inches long and 2 now 1 2 inches long and i feed them every day at night around 9pm he looked like he had a few scales missing in fact  i think all of my fish have a few scales missing and one of the 4 inchers i think may have the same problem as the one that just died laying at the bottom for a few days and when feeding moving around very slowly. could you please tell me what happend and what i can do to prevent my other fishes from dieing.

First of all, it's a good idea to keep the filter on 24/7. Or else the ecology in the tank will be screwed up, resulting in sick (or most likely DEAD) fish.
5 hours a day isn't going to do it! ESPECIALLY NOT WITH GOLDFISH.
Your fish probably has swim bladder disorders because of the polluted tank!! (I'd tell you to buy a test kit, but honestly, I don't think you'll bother)

Shape up mister. Do a 50% water change, clean the gravel with a gravel cleaner/siphon and TURN THE FILTER ON. NEVER, EVER turn it off again unless you're doing maintenance. Never clean it under tank water, and never empty the tank completely.

oh my! wait till you guys see the 3 comets in a bowl on the fish ID forum! sometimes its hard to hold back what needs to be said... karma to you all. > Ron

Nossie, I probably just misread your advice but, when you clean the filter, you should clean it with tank water, right?  Or no?  I am going to be needing to clean my filter in the coming weeks, just want to make sure I do it correctly

its all good anyway fantailer, apparently it was only a temporary thing to get pics of the fish... and Ireiden I thought I mis-read that too, I think you do clean it a little bit in the old tankwater? but never ever clean it out totally otherwise it will upset the tanks biological filter and cause a mini-cycle... hopefully Nossie will let us know whats right... cheers > Ron

cheers Nossie, another problem solved... Thanks > Ron