First fish died on first night

[FishyFishFish]

Ok, so at the risk of being ridiculed I want to try to prevent this again.

I bought my first fish from a fish store that is a 2 hour drive from my house. I think I may have messed up the acclimatisation but I'm not sure. I have had a reef tank before and never had an issue with introducing new fish. Straight away, after introduction to my QT, my new Green Coral Goby didn't look great and it was dead by the following morning.

Once I got home I floated the bag in the QT. I had some dinner, which probably took about half an hour, and I then opened the bag and drip acclimated it for about an hour. I then tipped everything (water and fish) into my QT. Post mortem water tests did show a small amount of ammonia on the API test, but I also have a Seachem Ammonia Alert badge on that tank that was showing nothing. The tank has been running for a few weeks with bio-media (that had been in my cycled DT for a few weeks before that) in a HOB filter.

I have read about the problems with ammonia build-up with shipped fish, but is 3 hours in the bag long enough for this to cause an issue? I have also now seen threads with people salinity matching but I had thought that drip acclimation would have that covered and, as I said, I have had marine fish before and never had a problem,

The first sign that something was wrong (other than the fact it looked petrified) was it leaning slightly to one side. It was near a plastic T and I thought it was trapped so I moved the T and the fish sat upright again and darted briefly across the tank. Over the next few hours it stayed upright.

I then went to bed and left it in peace for the night but it was laying on its side on the bottom by the following morning.

What can I do better next time and do you think this fish should have got through this arrival, or was it likely to be doomed from the start?

 

[mehaffydr]

Sorry for your loss.
I don't think this has anything to do with the death of this fish but above you stated that you " I then tipped everything (water and fish) into my QT." I would NEVER put water from a fish store in my tank. Many of them use copper to prevent outbreaks and also you are putting water that has basically been in contact with potentially hundreds of fish.
I think with that long of drive did the fish store put oxygen in the bag or just the air it trapped when rubberbanding? This could have stressed the fish.
I think that with the long drive I would work to get the fish in clean water ASAP.

 

[Reef.]

I doubt it was the acclimation, could not have helped if the fish was in poor health already or the qt wasn’t ready for live animals.

Hard to say as they are so many variables, acclimation just doesn’t need to be slow but needs to make sure you match the main parameters, you could go 2 hours and not match the parameters if your drip is too slow.

My guess without knowing more if we assume the fish was in fairly good shape when you bought it (I’m guessing you saw it swimming and it looked good),was the acclimation maybe didn’t match ph, alk or salinity and your qt isn’t set up correctly, I would double your qt as a stressed fish from travelling going into a not so great qt can be too much for the fish to cope with.

 

[FishyFishFish]

I will try to minimise the LFS water transfer next time. My thinking was that as this was a QT, and none of that water would end up in my DT anyway, that keeping the water that the fish was in might minimise the shock of differing parameters, but maybe getting it into cleaner water may have been preferable.

I didn't see the LFS use oxygen in the bag but can't be sure exactly what they did. To be fair they wouldn't have know how far I had to drive (although I'm not sure if that would have changed things either).

I also didn't see the exact fish when I bought it. The one I pointed out darted off when they tried to net it, so I was asked if I wanted the bigger one, to which I said that I don't mind as long as it is healthy.

I never matched salinity, ph, alk etc before (other than mixing tank water with the LFS water) and have never had a problem, although I may have just been lucky in the past. That same QT currently has a Torch coral in in it that I am monitoring for hitchhikers, in the same water that the fish was in, and that still looks ok (although I accept that their requirements are different).

 

[Tamberav]

If this is a QT tank, next time test salinity of the bag water and match the QT to the bag and put it in. That is one of the huge bonus of having a QT. I keep extra RODI on hand.

 

[Theulli]

Osmotic shock should normally kill a fish in days, so I would be skeptical of that. I would 100% though ask the LFS what salinity they keep their fish in, because going from 1.020 of a fish only tank to 1.024 of a reed even in an hour isn’t good. Made this mistake with liveaquaria shipments, but even then it was a slow crash, not overnight.

Did the LFS put any ammonia treatments in the bag when they bagged the fish? I have seen what I think is oxygen deprivation when they put too much of that stuff in. I actually saw a fish not make it out of the store once because of this. Other possibility might be that 2.5 hours in the bag was enough to build up ammonia in the water, then when you opened it and drip acclimated that toxified things when the ammonia reacts with oxygen (not a chemist, I only know this stuff because I read it here). That is why for mailed fish you pre match the S.G in a DT, temperature acclimate, then stick em in, then slooowly bring that salinity up.

 

[sfin52]

I just transfred a clown two hours to my house and 5 hours to another reefers home the next day. Than it was in the bag for another 2 hours

This was the process. I had a bag with a fish and an empty bag with water from the same source. I floated both bags in my tank overnight. In the morning removed the clown and placed in clean water that was floating in tank in spare bag. Packed all coral and the fish drove the 5 hours to friends house. Temp acclimated for a couple of hours and acclimated to new tank water. All turned out fine.

With that said I don't think it was because you left it in a the bag for 3 plus hours. Its a gcg. Not that much waste is produced.

 

[Gtinnel]

Post mortem water tests did show a small amount of ammonia on the API test, but I also have a Seachem Ammonia Alert badge on that tank that was showing nothing.

The API ammonia test is notorious for showing small amounts of ammonia when there isn't any, so I wouldn't worry about that.

I often buy fish and travel about 7-8 hours home, and in that amount of time if I try to drip acclimate, the water from the bag will have ammonia in it according to my test kit.

As already mentioned salinity matching the qt is best, but not an option if you have coral in the qt. My guess would be the fish wasn't the healthiest specimen to start with.

@sfin52 that is a great idea having a spare bag of water. I may start asking the lfs that I get most of my fish from to give me an extra bag of water to transfer into.

 

[sfin52]

that is a great idea having a spare bag of water. I may start asking the lfs that I get most of my fish from to give me an extra bag of water to transfer into.

That wasn't my idea. That was @fishguy242 idea.

 

[davidcalgary29]

Ok, so at the risk of being ridiculed

This should never happen to you, or anyone else, on this site. Ever.

You've already been given some good advice, but keep this in mind, too: unless you're very lucky, or very diligent, there's often no way to know what the history of a fish is before you bring it home. That fish could have been on death's door with multiple underlying pathologies, and it might have been the move, and the stress of the move, that did it in. This is one of the reasons I buy my fish either from other reefers or from the one store in my area that gets in captive-bred fish from ORA. The one time I deviated from that plan, my coral beauty died very suddenly within two hours in quarantine. No signs of disease (or anything else) until it started to swim upside down.

 

[RobB'z Reef]

I think sometimes bad things happen to good fish (and people).. Unless it's some exotic and/or super deep fragile breed, I've never put much stock into the elaborate aclimation some do. It's likely the fish was super stressed already or had an underlying condition.

 

[FishyFishFish]

So, I have heard back from the LFS. They said that their water was 1.020; mine was a little lower than my DT at 1.023 so not too different.

They told me that some clown gobies just don't ship well and that it appears I did everything right. They have given me store credit for the loss but now I don't know whether I should try another one (which I really would like) or try something else.

If they are really that delicate then how do any of them survive mail order?

 

[mehaffydr]

So, I have heard back from the LFS. They said that their water was 1.020; mine was a little lower than my DT at 1.023 so not too different.

They told me that some clown gobies just don't ship well and that it appears I did everything right. They have given me store credit for the loss but now I don't know whether I should try another one (which I really would like) or try something else.

If they are really that delicate then how do any of them survive mail order?

I would ask if they have any that have been in stock for a few days to a week. If so I would get another and just follow what your doing just get the salt a little closer to match.

 

[FishyFishFish]

Unfortunately the Torch that I put in this same QT has now also died.

The background behind this is that I bought some corals to put in my DT. I was going to dip them when they arrived but the coral vendor said to put them straight into the DT to avoid stress and then dip them 24 hours later. I didn't want to do this so I went to my local Petco and set up a quick QT for them.

The shipment of corals was delayed so they arrived in not great shape. They therefore ended up spending a couple of weeks in this QT before I was content that they were strong enough to be dipped and moved. The Torch was put into my DT and was doing really well.

I then went away for a week and on my way back I bought the Green Clown Goby. When I got home I saw that there were unknown hitchhikers on the Torch skeleton that I wanted to identify before they spread. I moved the Torch out of the DT back into the QT that it had previously been happy in for 2 weeks. I then added the fish to that same QT as my third tank (DT, fish QT and coral QT) wasn't set up yet.

The fish died immediately and then almost immediately the coral started to deteriorate. I can't be sure what caused this deterioration, it could have been the temp/salinity/lighting variations but the learning point for me is never to mix your nice clean water with LFS water (which, in hindsight, was pretty filthy). I hadn't considered the possibility that the LFS water might have had copper in it and, even if it didn't, it could have had who knows what else in it.

I'm now about to strip that tank down, clean it, re-cycle it and try again. My new coral QT tank should arrive later this week and I'll get that up and running to replace the Torch.

 

[Jekyl]

I would wait to try any corals until you've had fish in the tank for a month. Even then start with easier ones. GSP, zoas, xenia, leathers. I'd wait on LPS for a few months. Make sure the others are doing well first.

 

[FishyFishFish]

In the same shipment I have Zoas, Ricordeas, Candy Cane, Star Polyps, that are all doing fine.

The only coral that has died in my care is the Torch, which was (temporarily) in with the new fish that died (that the LFS has said likely wasn't my fault). It appeared to be doing fine in my DT and didn't show any signs of problems until I had to remove it and put it into the QT.