Fish breathing fast and dying in QT

[sl0th]

I purchased 3 yellow assessor basslets which arrived on Tuesday. I acclimated by temperature matching then drip acclimating for about 40 minutes then they went in the QT tank. In the bags 1 of the assessors looked lethargic while the other two were active. In the tank I noticed all three were breathing heavily and did not eat. Within 6 hours one had died after breathing rapidly (>120 breaths per minute) and lying on the sand bed not moving. I did not notice anything on the body of the fish at the time of removal and forgot to take a photo.

Immediate thought is acclimation, ammonia or oxygen issue. But I also have 3 juvenile engineer gobies in the same QT which were shipped from the same place at the same time and acclimated in the exact same way at the same time. The QT tank does have an air stone, but uses a canister filter so not a huge amount of surface agitation except for the bubbles from the air stone.

On Wednesday, all remaining fish were alive in the morning. Engineer gobies were eating but the remaining assessors were not. In the evening I saw one assessor out swimming and it was still breathing extremely fast and I caught it flashing against pvc. At this point I decided to start copper treatment despite the assessors not eating yet (my thought was that it could be velvet due to the fast breathing and death). I ramped up copper power to 2.3ppm over the course of 5 hours so I didn't overshoot. Copper tested using Hanna high range checker.

Thursday all remaining fish were still alive, gobies eating and assessors still not. Assessors still breathing heavily. I couldn't get out to get a wavemaker to add extra surface agitation so I manually aerated the tank by pouring tank water in from a height every hour or two. In the evening, one assessor was out swimming and I noticed it was purple around the gill area on one side? This had me again worried about ammonia burn but surely the engineer gobies would also be affected by this? I do have an ammonia alert badge on the tank and it was normal. The tank is 125L (~30gal).

It is now Friday morning and the assessor which had the discoloured gills died overnight. I've attached photos. I still have one remaining assessor still breathing fast and all three gobies breathing normally and eating. I can't see the assessor other than front on due to where it's hiding in the tank so can't see if it is also discoloured around the gills.

Can anyone please help me understand what is happening and if I have caused this? #fishmedic

 

[vetteguy53081]

I purchased 3 yellow assessor basslets which arrived on Tuesday. I acclimated by temperature matching then drip acclimating for about 40 minutes then they went in the QT tank. In the bags 1 of the assessors looked lethargic while the other two were active. In the tank I noticed all three were breathing heavily and did not eat. Within 6 hours one had died after breathing rapidly (>120 breaths per minute) and lying on the sand bed not moving. I did not notice anything on the body of the fish at the time of removal and forgot to take a photo.

Immediate thought is acclimation, ammonia or oxygen issue. But I also have 3 juvenile engineer gobies in the same QT which were shipped from the same place at the same time and acclimated in the exact same way at the same time. The QT tank does have an air stone, but uses a canister filter so not a huge amount of surface agitation except for the bubbles from the air stone.

On Wednesday, all remaining fish were alive in the morning. Engineer gobies were eating but the remaining assessors were not. In the evening I saw one assessor out swimming and it was still breathing extremely fast and I caught it flashing against pvc. At this point I decided to start copper treatment despite the assessors not eating yet (my thought was that it could be velvet due to the fast breathing and death). I ramped up copper power to 2.3ppm over the course of 5 hours so I didn't overshoot. Copper tested using Hanna high range checker.

Thursday all remaining fish were still alive, gobies eating and assessors still not. Assessors still breathing heavily. I couldn't get out to get a wavemaker to add extra surface agitation so I manually aerated the tank by pouring tank water in from a height every hour or two. In the evening, one assessor was out swimming and I noticed it was purple around the gill area on one side? This had me again worried about ammonia burn but surely the engineer gobies would also be affected by this? I do have an ammonia alert badge on the tank and it was normal. The tank is 125L (~30gal).

It is now Friday morning and the assessor which had the discoloured gills died overnight. I've attached photos. I still have one remaining assessor still breathing fast and all three gobies breathing normally and eating. I can't see the assessor other than front on due to where it's hiding in the tank so can't see if it is also discoloured around the gills.

Can anyone please help me understand what is happening and if I have caused this? #fishmedic

Thanks for pics. The red gills are inflammation and can be from Lack of oxygen seeing mouth open, flukes (maybe) or from shipping bag, in which if acclimation is not done correctly, makes residual ammonia which is toxic to the fish

 

[sl0th]

Thanks for pics. The red gills are inflammation and can be from Lack of oxygen seeing mouth open, flukes (maybe) or from shipping bag, in which if acclimation is not done correctly, makes residual ammonia which is toxic to the fish

Could this be ammonia from shipping if only the assessors have been affected? The gobies were shipped at the same time and acclimated the same way.

Is there anything I should do to help the remaining assessor? I'm running the copper now because I thought it could be velvet - should I stop this to alleviate stress on the fish?

Thanks for the help

 

[vetteguy53081]

Could this be ammonia from shipping if only the assessors have been affected? The gobies were shipped at the same time and acclimated the same way.

Is there anything I should do to help the remaining assessor? I'm running the copper now because I thought it could be velvet - should I stop this to alleviate stress on the fish?

Thanks for the help

If its coppersafe, its a safe form chelated version and run at 2.15 - 2.25ppm.
Ammonia from shipping is possible

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Could this be ammonia from shipping if only the assessors have been affected? The gobies were shipped at the same time and acclimated the same way.

Is there anything I should do to help the remaining assessor? I'm running the copper now because I thought it could be velvet - should I stop this to alleviate stress on the fish?

Thanks for the help

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

This well could be ammonia damage during shipping, combined with the acclimation technique (drip acclimation is tricky for shipped fish - they arrive with a low pH, which makes the ammonia less toxic, but then, the pH rises during the drip, which makes the ammonia highly toxic). Different species have different ammonia tolerances, and engineer gobies are a LOT hardier than assessors.

The assessors could have gill flukes, copper won't help with that, but if they had flukes so bad that they began dying right away, they were shipped to you in poor condition - I'd ask the shipper about that.

One other thing to check - do you know the salinity of the water the fish arrived in compared to your tank? If shipped in low salinity, and then acclimated to a higher salinity, that is very stressful. Generally, a rise in more than .003 SG units needs to be handled by lowering the salinity of the receiving tank.

Here is an article I posted on proper acclimation methods:

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/acclimation-methods.903/

 

[sl0th]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

This well could be ammonia damage during shipping, combined with the acclimation technique (drip acclimation is tricky for shipped fish - they arrive with a low pH, which makes the ammonia less toxic, but then, the pH rises during the drip, which makes the ammonia highly toxic). Different species have different ammonia tolerances, and engineer gobies are a LOT hardier than assessors.

The assessors could have gill flukes, copper won't help with that, but if they had flukes so bad that they began dying right away, they were shipped to you in poor condition - I'd ask the shipper about that.

One other thing to check - do you know the salinity of the water the fish arrived in compared to your tank? If shipped in low salinity, and then acclimated to a higher salinity, that is very stressful. Generally, a rise in more than .003 SG units needs to be handled by lowering the salinity of the receiving tank.

Here is an article I posted on proper acclimation methods:

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/acclimation-methods.903/

Thanks for the response. I had heard about the ammonia during shipping but was told that I should drip acclimate them from the shipper as their journey was not very long. I will avoid dripping shipped fish in the future.


I did reach out to the shipper and they said the fish were healthy so should likely have been an acclimation issue (although they think I should have dripped longer).


Yeah the salinity in the bag was 1.025 which is what I run my QT at. So definitely not a salinity issue.


Looking like it has been my incorrect acclimation method. I'm thankful at least one assessor is still alive (and all gobies) but yeah gutted it was me that caused this. Thanks for the advice guys I appreciate it

 

[sl0th]

Sorry only one other question I have - one of the assessors didn't look good in the bag before it was even opened (lethargic, fins clamped). Is that likely just a stress response? I read into that as disease/parasite but don't want to make mistakes like this in the future

 

[winxp_man]

How big of a bag did they ship the fish in? And one other thing that could be asked by the shipper is, if they put O2 in the bag before shipping.

The pics almost looks like uronema, and mouth gapping like that… unless that was an injury mark.