It has been pretty devastating last couple days. Another shipment from marine collectors came this Tuesday, they're 4 wrasses and a majestic angel.
These are they in bucket for acclimation. The carpenter wrasse was lying on its side not moving much. That got my wife worried. I thought it's normal as wrasse sometimes do that when stressed, like from shipment. But now I think about it, they usually find a corner to crumble up instead of lie down in the open. When it went into the tank, it went straight into rock work. I thought it's normal because of it's scared. But the next day, I found it like this instead ...
The fin of it was totally intact, no evidence of serious fighting.
The yellow wrasse and timor wrasse were doing fine the second day, just didn't came out until 2pm. After they came out, they went around the tank fine. But the rhomboid was still very nervous. It only showed itself for couple hours, and didn't came out to eat anything. The pintail wrasse didn't show any interests at chasing it at all, just continue hanging in the open like it used to.
Then on the third day, the rhomboid wrasse dropped dead as well.
I don't really know how to feel about this whole thing. After losing 4 out of 5 sunburst anthias and a regal angel in quarantine, I decided to buy the bullet and pay the premium (basically $100 additional per fish) to buy quarantined fish that are supposed to be good quality. But the same again they just drop dead at me all the same. 8 fish I got from marine collectors so far, 3 died within the first week. One on the next day, one on the second day, one in day 5.
The guarantee on the fish from marine collectors are also only live arrival. I'm not convinced that the wrasses was my fault. Even they were not dead at arrival, they didn't look in the best shape either. That sounds worse than buying from LA with 14 days guarantee and QT myself. Usually when they pass 14 days in my QT, they do fine after.
I also learned that in marine collectors don't use copper on wrasses, but do TTM with bath every 12 hours. I'm not expert on TTM or wrasse, but I can't imagine handling them every 12 hours and expect them to relax at all.
I have next shipment with Lineatus Wrasse and regal angel coming in 2 weeks. I will be lying if I were not worry about them at this point.
The fantasy of "paying more to buy better quality fish" is kind of dead to me so far. I don't always get what I pay for when buying fish. Maybe I will go back to buy cheap ones locally and take the risk and QT myself. I'm not sure if all pre-QTed fish vendor offer no guarantee beyond live arrival. Even though I understand the work been put at the fish are spent even the fish came out dead, but I think the premium are part to cover those risk. Paying the premium while still taking the risk myself doesn't feel right to me as a buyer.
These are they in bucket for acclimation. The carpenter wrasse was lying on its side not moving much. That got my wife worried. I thought it's normal as wrasse sometimes do that when stressed, like from shipment. But now I think about it, they usually find a corner to crumble up instead of lie down in the open. When it went into the tank, it went straight into rock work. I thought it's normal because of it's scared. But the next day, I found it like this instead ...
The fin of it was totally intact, no evidence of serious fighting.
The yellow wrasse and timor wrasse were doing fine the second day, just didn't came out until 2pm. After they came out, they went around the tank fine. But the rhomboid was still very nervous. It only showed itself for couple hours, and didn't came out to eat anything. The pintail wrasse didn't show any interests at chasing it at all, just continue hanging in the open like it used to.
Then on the third day, the rhomboid wrasse dropped dead as well.
I don't really know how to feel about this whole thing. After losing 4 out of 5 sunburst anthias and a regal angel in quarantine, I decided to buy the bullet and pay the premium (basically $100 additional per fish) to buy quarantined fish that are supposed to be good quality. But the same again they just drop dead at me all the same. 8 fish I got from marine collectors so far, 3 died within the first week. One on the next day, one on the second day, one in day 5.
The guarantee on the fish from marine collectors are also only live arrival. I'm not convinced that the wrasses was my fault. Even they were not dead at arrival, they didn't look in the best shape either. That sounds worse than buying from LA with 14 days guarantee and QT myself. Usually when they pass 14 days in my QT, they do fine after.
I also learned that in marine collectors don't use copper on wrasses, but do TTM with bath every 12 hours. I'm not expert on TTM or wrasse, but I can't imagine handling them every 12 hours and expect them to relax at all.
I have next shipment with Lineatus Wrasse and regal angel coming in 2 weeks. I will be lying if I were not worry about them at this point.
The fantasy of "paying more to buy better quality fish" is kind of dead to me so far. I don't always get what I pay for when buying fish. Maybe I will go back to buy cheap ones locally and take the risk and QT myself. I'm not sure if all pre-QTed fish vendor offer no guarantee beyond live arrival. Even though I understand the work been put at the fish are spent even the fish came out dead, but I think the premium are part to cover those risk. Paying the premium while still taking the risk myself doesn't feel right to me as a buyer.
Last edited: