Help, Cant Add Fish Without Heavy Casualties

[Buddahbelley1970]

I have an 80 gallon mixed reef which is in series with a 20 gallon grow out tank and 55 gallon refugium which has been established for 20 years. This year I have had trouble introducing new fish. I introduced a small school of fire fish gobies (4) which all died by the next day. I assumed the fish had an issues, later introduced a wrasse (same deal), then 3 more fire fish, 1 made it. I managed to catch the wrasse and put him in the 20 gal. grow out tank just before he died, which is in the same water column and he is thriving. I added a ground to the 80 gal. show tank and increase water turnover to add more air. Still not working. I put the Wrasse I had in 20 gal tank back in the show tank and he tried to die within 4 hours, back in the grow out tank and fine now.
Temperature in Show tank is within 1 degree of grow out and chiller is set at 78 degrees.
Show tank has several fish which have been living there for years, Hippo Tang, Coral Beauty, Mandarin and Citron goby, etc. About 8 fish total and a fire shrimp.
Any ideas on what may be the problem adding fish?
Thanks for any help.

 

[Fish Fan]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

#WelcometoR2R

Interesting that you have unaffected fish for so long, but lose new fish added. I think this might be a good question for the R2R #fishmedic team

Best of luck!

 

[Tahoe61]

Are the fish from the same vendor?
How are you acclimating?
Fire Fish can be really poor shippers.

 

[winxp_man]

If you have any pics or videos under bright white lights when fish where still alive.

Suspect is acclimation I would say. Post details how you go about doing that.

 

[TokenReefer]

Happens in one tank but not the other. Both tanks share the same water. Display tank has long lived residents with no issues. If I have that right the display inhabitants would be on my suspect list. Until proven guilty of course ; all lawful considerations

 

[Nano_Man]

Are there any signs of bullying in the tank because all your old fish will have there own area . Do you drip your fish before release

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I have an 80 gallon mixed reef which is in series with a 20 gallon grow out tank and 55 gallon refugium which has been established for 20 years. This year I have had trouble introducing new fish. I introduced a small school of fire fish gobies (4) which all died by the next day. I assumed the fish had an issues, later introduced a wrasse (same deal), then 3 more fire fish, 1 made it. I managed to catch the wrasse and put him in the 20 gal. grow out tank just before he died, which is in the same water column and he is thriving. I added a ground to the 80 gal. show tank and increase water turnover to add more air. Still not working. I put the Wrasse I had in 20 gal tank back in the show tank and he tried to die within 4 hours, back in the grow out tank and fine now.
Temperature in Show tank is within 1 degree of grow out and chiller is set at 78 degrees.
Show tank has several fish which have been living there for years, Hippo Tang, Coral Beauty, Mandarin and Citron goby, etc. About 8 fish total and a fire shrimp.
Any ideas on what may be the problem adding fish?
Thanks for any help.

This may be a combination of issues -

Many dealers hold their fish in low salinity to help quell disease. Trouble is, that makes it difficult to acclimate them to a higher salinity. If the change is too great, you may need to acclimate the fish to an in-between salinity in a holding tank for a day or so.

Tankmate aggression would explain the issue with the wrasse.

Personally, I think a good quarantine process would help here, as well as evaluate the quality of the fish from your current dealer.

 

[Buddahbelley1970]

Are the fish from the same vendor?
How are you acclimating?
Fire Fish can be really poor shippers.

The two batches of Fire Fish were from different LFS and a Watchman Goby was mail order.

 

[Buddahbelley1970]

If you have any pics or videos under bright white lights when fish where still alive.

Suspect is acclimation I would say. Post details how you go about doing that.

I thought the same, I dripped in a batch of Fire Fish over two hours and introduced after lights out, Next batch just floated in over 2 hours and introduced during the day(1 survived of 3). No tank fish appeared to bother the new guys. The new fish would visible stress, almost trying to get out of the tank. Stayed close to surface and some gulps of air.
Last Watchman Goby I floated in and watched him, he appeared to starts stressing while still in plastic bag after 1/2 hour. That could have been due to new surroundings.

 

[Buddahbelley1970]

This may be a combination of issues -

Many dealers hold their fish in low salinity to help quell disease. Trouble is, that makes it difficult to acclimate them to a higher salinity. If the change is too great, you may need to acclimate the fish to an in-between salinity in a holding tank for a day or so.

Tankmate aggression would explain the issue with the wrasse.

Personally, I think a good quarantine process would help here, as well as evaluate the quality of the fish from your current dealer.

Correct, first batch of Fire Fish were in Hypo salinity and dripped them in over 2-3 hours. I have done this before with fish from the LFS with good luck. I would consider the Flasher Wrasse I saved and put in the Coral grow out tank pretty well QT'd, been there 2-3 months now and still stressed and almost died when re-introduced to the show tank, with no visible aggression from other current tank fish???
3 different vendors used here, all used in the past with good luck.