I feel you, lost 6/6 of the fish that I've been trying to get. Been attempting to stock my 120 gallon for about five months now, my LFS has a QT system that they run all of their livestock through before sale. Been placing these orders through and so far 5 have died through QT and 1 a week within me getting it. Though all of the other fish make it through QT just fine, just the ones I order. And I'm not choosing difficult fish either, ive had one china wrasse (the only one that made it through QT is the difficult one of course, never swam and died on the sandbed in my tank) one fairy wrasse, one flasher wrasse and a handful of anthias. The only thing i can suspect is that the region I'm ordering from is collected with Cyanide as only my fish are from there... Been getting kind of depressing, having a fish go from eating well and active to mysteriously disappearing the next time I ask about it.. Been trying to get out of a different region but it's not nearly as easy.I originally got into this hobby about 20 years ago, and it was very different then.
Fish sometimes collected with dynamite or cyanide. Nobody quarantined anything. And reckless animal options like sharks, octopus, or large morays were not uncommon.
Got back into it 2 years ago, and I've been trying to do everything right.
Trying to avoid overstocking, QT'ing everything. Careful drip acclimation. Only buying things I'm sure I can care for.
I track everything I do in this hobby in a lot of detail, so I have statistics for a lot of things. And even as a person who I like to think is acting pretty responsibly, I have a lot of fish losses.
In the last 2 years, I have bought 98 fish:
A roughly 50% death rate seems not great.
- 47 are still with me
- 11 have gone missing (presumed dead)
- Most of these are chromis, anthias, and damsels that likely killed each other off.
- 4 I've traded/donated
- 35 dead
- 6 to disease. Mostly mystery diseases
- 10 jumped to their death
- 4 refused to eat
- 8 murdered by another fish
- 4 accidental deaths (pump turned off, ammonia spike in QT, etc)
- 3 acclimation deaths
Let's try again if I filter out high-mortality stuff like Chromis, Anthias and Damsels.
That leaves 57 total:
So about the same really.
- 25 still with me
- 3 traded/donated
- 28 dead
- 5 disease
- 10 jumped
- 3 starved
- 5 murdered
- 3 accidental
- 2 acclimation
-----
I bring this up because I just got two Bluethroat Triggers yesterday, and while they looked good initially, I can already see that the male is not likely going to make it through QT. Probably my fault, might be something about the accilimation, but not sure.
I have literally been looking forward to buying this pair for 2 years, and I will probably lose one almost immediately.
It's getting sad/depressing.
There are so many variables involved before they even get to me. And even once I have them, it seems almost a roll of the dice if they make it a month.
How do you all handle this? What do you do to minimize the negative impact/death rate?
I haven't personally kept many fish in the past, mainy just corals. Anyway they do have a very high success rate with almost every other fish, and when I was discussing it they said that my fish have been the most challenging ones they ever had to QT.. I've been getting all of mine out of melanesia while their normal fish are from southeast Asia. Waiting for more imports from Australia to be available as they have much stricter regulations with fish
Ive lost like 7 or 8 blonde nasos in the past year. Not sure if its the travel distance from sri lanka to the US, or if theyre still being collected with cyanide. 3 or 4 didnt eat and passed. The other 3 or 4 literally made it several weeks to several months, eating, happy, no aggression, then just dead.I originally got into this hobby about 20 years ago, and it was very different then.
Fish sometimes collected with dynamite or cyanide. Nobody quarantined anything. And reckless animal options like sharks, octopus, or large morays were not uncommon.
Got back into it 2 years ago, and I've been trying to do everything right.
Trying to avoid overstocking, QT'ing everything. Careful drip acclimation. Only buying things I'm sure I can care for.
I track everything I do in this hobby in a lot of detail, so I have statistics for a lot of things. And even as a person who I like to think is acting pretty responsibly, I have a lot of fish losses.
In the last 2 years, I have bought 98 fish:
A roughly 50% death rate seems not great.
- 47 are still with me
- 11 have gone missing (presumed dead)
- Most of these are chromis, anthias, and damsels that likely killed each other off.
- 4 I've traded/donated
- 35 dead
- 6 to disease. Mostly mystery diseases
- 10 jumped to their death
- 4 refused to eat
- 8 murdered by another fish
- 4 accidental deaths (pump turned off, ammonia spike in QT, etc)
- 3 acclimation deaths
Let's try again if I filter out high-mortality stuff like Chromis, Anthias and Damsels.
That leaves 57 total:
So about the same really.
- 25 still with me
- 3 traded/donated
- 28 dead
- 5 disease
- 10 jumped
- 3 starved
- 5 murdered
- 3 accidental
- 2 acclimation
-----
I bring this up because I just got two Bluethroat Triggers yesterday, and while they looked good initially, I can already see that the male is not likely going to make it through QT. Probably my fault, might be something about the accilimation, but not sure.
I have literally been looking forward to buying this pair for 2 years, and I will probably lose one almost immediately.
It's getting sad/depressing.
There are so many variables involved before they even get to me. And even once I have them, it seems almost a roll of the dice if they make it a month.
How do you all handle this? What do you do to minimize the negative impact/death rate?
This was arguably true in the 65gal. And have scaled things back in the move to the 160gal.
Not sure how this could possibly be true. I'd rather lose a few fish individually in quarantine than everything in my tank at once.
That's pretty slick! I do pretty much the same thing, but in a spreadsheet. What software are you using for that?I have a detailed log of every animal, coral, and invert.
- Where I got it, when, and what it cost. When it died, the general and specific causes.
- When it went into QT and when it left (been slacking there a bit)
- Any behavioral issues, or conflicts with other animals.
Also track all of my hardware purchases, sales, and maintenance.
Every water test for every tank, with up to 12 parameters, though 80% of the time it's just Salinity, Alk, Phos and Nitrate. Typicaly 3-5 times a week. Linked to any ICP results that happened at the same time so I can compare accuracy.
What I've dosed, in what volume, and when.
Used to track water changes and saltwater batches, but waterchanges are automatic now, so it's pointless.
It all automatically rolls up into a running history by date. Below is the events across all logs for the last two weeks.
I use Airtable, just a bit easier to work with (in my opinion) than a spreadsheet because it's more like a database.
Great breakdown. Within this problem lies the solution snd drive to do better. You looking at the hobby like this proves your doing the best you can. My opinion. Patience . . .preparation and pampering. Stay positive. Keep up the good work.I originally got into this hobby about 20 years ago, and it was very different then.
Fish sometimes collected with dynamite or cyanide. Nobody quarantined anything. And reckless animal options like sharks, octopus, or large morays were not uncommon.
Got back into it 2 years ago, and I've been trying to do everything right.
Trying to avoid overstocking, QT'ing everything. Careful drip acclimation. Only buying things I'm sure I can care for.
I track everything I do in this hobby in a lot of detail, so I have statistics for a lot of things. And even as a person who I like to think is acting pretty responsibly, I have a lot of fish losses.
In the last 2 years, I have bought 98 fish:
A roughly 50% death rate seems not great.
- 47 are still with me
- 11 have gone missing (presumed dead)
- Most of these are chromis, anthias, and damsels that likely killed each other off.
- 4 I've traded/donated
- 35 dead
- 6 to disease. Mostly mystery diseases
- 10 jumped to their death
- 4 refused to eat
- 8 murdered by another fish
- 4 accidental deaths (pump turned off, ammonia spike in QT, etc)
- 3 acclimation deaths
Let's try again if I filter out high-mortality stuff like Chromis, Anthias and Damsels.
That leaves 57 total:
So about the same really.
- 25 still with me
- 3 traded/donated
- 28 dead
- 5 disease
- 10 jumped
- 3 starved
- 5 murdered
- 3 accidental
- 2 acclimation
-----
I bring this up because I just got two Bluethroat Triggers yesterday, and while they looked good initially, I can already see that the male is not likely going to make it through QT. Probably my fault, might be something about the accilimation, but not sure.
I have literally been looking forward to buying this pair for 2 years, and I will probably lose one almost immediately.
It's getting sad/depressing.
There are so many variables involved before they even get to me. And even once I have them, it seems almost a roll of the dice if they make it a month.
How do you all handle this? What do you do to minimize the negative impact/death rate?
I also think the velocity with which I'm making changes and trying things is magnifying the problems at times.
I get mine through a fish store that orders direct from quality marine… I grab them before they hit the tanks in my lfs.. I’m not sure about Canada…
