Disaster :(((

[jgvergo]

As some of you know, I'm I'm the process of moving. I had to do a "double move", first into an apartment and then into my new place. Rather than move my tank twice, I asked my LFS to fish sit for me. They have all my livestock (fish, inverts, rock and coral).

They were keeping my fish and rock in their invert tank and were hit with something that killed all the fish. The owner is not sure what it was, but he said it happened fast. He froze my fish. The corals are in a different system and are ok.

Sooo, I'll be setting my system up in my new house in a couple of weeks. I have two questions: 1) Is there a way to find out what happened by examining the frozen fish and 2) Is my live rock now contaminated?

I'm so bummed!

 

[Katrina71]

I'm so sorry:(

 

[Dhoggs]

Im so sorry for you loss :(

If I were you, I will not use the live rocks which were on that system due to the unknown cause of death of the fishes. As you said, rocks might have gotten contaminated.

 

[jcdeng]

if its "fast" as in wipe out under 5 days, its velvet. After you get everything back into your new tank, run it fishless for 3 months, should be fine afterwards.

 

[ngoodermuth]

Most likely it was disease (probably velvet), were any of the inverts in the system effected? I would think if it was a contaminant, inverts would have perished as well...

 

[Merlin79]

Sounds like velvet. The rocks being 8 weeks in a fallow tank will kill the parasite.

 

[jgvergo]

So I verified that a) it was fast (under 5 days) and b) none of the inverts in the system were affected. I've asked if there were any visible symptoms, but absent that data it sounds like the concensus is Velvet.