Tang death

[Anihiel1]

Apologies for the late night post, and please forgive me if I didn't answer right away. It's been a tough day. I'm mourning the loss of my tang. I raised him from a tiny baby a year ago to the 10" long monsterfish he became. He was eating from my hand last night. Fine, fat, healthy earlier today. Then he was suddenly dead. I got him out immediately but did not witness it happening. No outward signs of any trauma or disease. Everything else in the tank is fine as though nothing happened. One odd thing I found was shrimp stuck on the filter intake. (He ate a wide variety of foods at different intervals, nori, frozen, flakes and freeze dried shrimp.) He had a voracious appetite and often ate the shrimp cubes whole before they even broke up. Could this have killed him?
The other odd thing- On Monday I cleaned out the filter media and added new seeded xport bio blocks, and this is now Friday. I found a broken piece of block somehow in the sand. If he'd eaten that, would it kill him? I'm just at a loss, second guessing, blaming myself, and I suppose i will never know. Very saddened over this.
6ft 125g, Other inhabitants include 4 clownfish, 2 cardinals, 3 purple and 5 blue chromis, starfish, urchins, hermit crabs, horseshoe crab, snails, small clams and oysters, sponges, hermits, various gorgonians and way too many amphipods. Too mentally exhausted to test parameters tonight but everyone appears perfectly normal & unaffected.
Apologies also for such a long post.

 

[i cant think]

It could have been an internal infection or maybe a case of velvet (Thats the worst case), I got told that velvet isn’t often known about until it kills the fish even if the fish is perfectly happy and healthy looking Atleast that’s what my LFS told me

 

[KeepSwimming12]

Apologies for the late night post, and please forgive me if I didn't answer right away. It's been a tough day. I'm mourning the loss of my tang. I raised him from a tiny baby a year ago to the 10" long monsterfish he became. He was eating from my hand last night. Fine, fat, healthy earlier today. Then he was suddenly dead. I got him out immediately but did not witness it happening. No outward signs of any trauma or disease. Everything else in the tank is fine as though nothing happened. One odd thing I found was shrimp stuck on the filter intake. (He ate a wide variety of foods at different intervals, nori, frozen, flakes and freeze dried shrimp.) He had a voracious appetite and often ate the shrimp cubes whole before they even broke up. Could this have killed him?
The other odd thing- On Monday I cleaned out the filter media and added new seeded xport bio blocks, and this is now Friday. I found a broken piece of block somehow in the sand. If he'd eaten that, would it kill him? I'm just at a loss, second guessing, blaming myself, and I suppose i will never know. Very saddened over this.
6ft 125g, Other inhabitants include 4 clownfish, 2 cardinals, 3 purple and 5 blue chromis, starfish, urchins, hermit crabs, horseshoe crab, snails, small clams and oysters, sponges, hermits, various gorgonians and way too many amphipods. Too mentally exhausted to test parameters tonight but everyone appears perfectly normal & unaffected.
Apologies also for such a long post.

I’m sorry for your loss. It’s always hard losing a fish; especially one you’re so attached to. If it’s velvet, I would obviously monitor your fish for symptoms and go from there. Some strains of velvet are far more deadly and quick acting than others and some fish won’t show any symptoms. Was there a recent addition to your tank? If it isn’t velvet, then I’m sorry I wouldn’t know what else it could be if there’s no visual symptoms but hopefully someone else can chime in.

 

[sergifed91]

Had the same thing happen to me. Eating and healthy. Had him in qt. A week of general cure. Then a week of prazi pro. Then the third week of copper. Survived all treatments. Then in a third qt for observation. Swimming fine and eating like a horse. Went away for a few minutes and he was bellyup in my third qt. No signs of being unhealthy or beaten up. Just died.

 

[KeepSwimming12]

Had the same thing happen to me. Eating and healthy. Had him in qt. A week of general cure. Then a week of prazi pro. Then the third week of copper. Survived all treatments. Then in a third qt for observation. Swimming fine and eating like a horse. Went away for a few minutes and he was bellyup in my third qt. No signs of being unhealthy or beaten up. Just died.

i really hate for this to sounds like the “easy route” out but sometimes as reefers we try to find reasons why our fish die despite doing everything right. Sometimes there isn’t a disease or an infection. Sometimes, like us, our fish just die even despite being fed well and acting normal. I’m not necessarily saying that’s the case here but by all means keep that in mind if you see no signs of disease or anything else in the near future. I’m still thinking velvet for this thread but yeah this is definitely a consideration as well.

 

[i cant think]

i really hate for this to sounds like the “easy route” out but sometimes as reefers we try to find reasons why our fish die despite doing everything right. Sometimes there isn’t a disease or an infection. Sometimes, like us, our fish just die even despite being fed well and acting normal. I’m not necessarily saying that’s the case here but by all means keep that in mind if you see no signs of disease or anything else in the near future. I’m still thinking velvet for this thread but yeah this is definitely a consideration as well.

It was only a juvenile by the sounds of it when you got it so I don’t think it would have been old age but it is a possibility since we don’t know how old these fish are when they get brought in from the wild

 

[Anihiel1]

Yes he was a juvenile, perhaps 1/4 the size of my adult foxface. He grew a bit during quarantine but then got huge in the DT. He'd been in the DT for a little shy of a year. Can velvet lie dormant? Should I proactively treat with anything?

 

[KeepSwimming12]

Yes he was a juvenile, perhaps 1/4 the size of my adult foxface. He grew a bit during quarantine but then got huge in the DT. He'd been in the DT for a little shy of a year. Can velvet lie dormant? Should I proactively treat with anything?

When these fish are caught in the wild, cyanide is used to stun them which may kill them once they are in the hands of a reefer. After a year of care I’d say that’s unlikely though. For Velvet, people treat with either copper or chloroquine phosphate in a separate tank with no substrate, corals etc except for pvc pipe for hiding spots. Nothing will work in your tank that won’t kill corals etc which is obviously pretty frustrating. Some may call me irresponsible for saying this but the fact that I’m only guessing that it’s velvet means that you probably shouldn’t treat just yet. By all means if you’re worried then you can and it’ll probably save your other fish if it is there and they have no symptoms but copper is a poison and there is always the chance that your fish won’t tolerate it. I would keep an extremely close eye on all your fish. Monitor all of their behaviours and watch out for abnormalities. I’m currently dealing with velvet myself but it’s a rather weak strain compared to what I’ve dealt with before which is somewhat positive. I currently have my tank empty to starve out the velvet. By all means update this thread with any strange fish behaviour or if you decide to treat your fish.

 

[Reef AquaCult]

Where did you get the “seeded” bio media? It may have come from a tank contaminated with velvet. Or maybe there was some trauma if he was scared and gave itself a head injury

 

[Anihiel1]

They were packaged new dry X-port bio brick from BRS. I seeded myself per the instructions with microbacter xlm.
No signs of any injury aside from an existing superficial rock-scratch which had been healing.
All other tank inhabitants appear fine although it looks like I'm having a bio bloom, understandably so. Light hazing on the walls which scrapes off.
I'm stumped.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Not old age after a year, , , ,, Disheartening it is to watch a fish get this big and then sudden death. There are many contributors to sudden death. You mention eating a lot and cubes whole. I wonder if it gagged on the whole pieces which may have been frozen ?
Other factors will be:
- False test readings whereas ammonia ma be higher than test shows especially with API test kits
- Ammonia and/or nitrate spike
- shock due to sudden large change in water temperature, PH, hardness
- Overfeeding can cause a digestive problem and kill the fish directly
- Vitamin deficiency due to inadequate diet.

Tangs should receive the following diet:
-Spirulina brine shrimp
- LRS Herbivore diet
- mysis shrimp
- small plankton
- Nori seaweed basted with garlic extract
- Hikari Marine cuisine
- Formula 2 flake and frozen
- Hikari veggie marine

Add selcon vitamins to the foods 2-3X per week and on alternating days, garlic extract for stamina and immunity health

 

[Anihiel1]

Check- he got all of the above at varying intervals but the hebivore cubes were SF Bay. I'm wondering if he did suddenly choke. I did not know that fish could do that? But yes he ate the cubes whole and it would explain the shrimp on the intake if he spit them up.
Couldn't stop him from overeating without starving the tank, He'd literally steal food from the mouths of smaller fish and the starfish. He was a chonker.

 

[Jimmyneptune]

I had fish that ate like pigs. Also, if they would get spooked they all darted off in different directions. The one time they got spooked and darted a tile fish impaled himself on an urchin. Game over for the tile fish, one in a million, but it happens.

 

[KeepSwimming12]

Check- he got all of the above at varying intervals but the hebivore cubes were SF Bay. I'm wondering if he did suddenly choke. I did not know that fish could do that? But yes he ate the cubes whole and it would explain the shrimp on the intake if he spit them up.
Couldn't stop him from overeating without starving the tank, He'd literally steal food from the mouths of smaller fish and the starfish. He was a chonker.

I’m not sure about the anatomy of tangs but I had a seahorse where, if he was choking on his food would make it incredibly obvious by trying to vomit the food back up. I’m not saying that it’s an impossibility but I would imagine like other animals, a tang would show visual signs once you’ve fed him if he’s choking.

 

[cancun]

Wow....so sorry for the loss of your Tang. I agree that sometimes we loose a perfectly healthy fish for no apparent reason. Especially if everything else is in check.

What species of Tang was it?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

It could have been an internal infection or maybe a case of velvet (Thats the worst case), I got told that velvet isn’t often known about until it kills the fish even if the fish is perfectly happy and healthy looking Atleast that’s what my LFS told me

Velvet typically tears through a tank and all fish are affected. This seem to be isolated to this one fish, so an internal infection/impaction is more probable.

Jay

 

[i cant think]

Velvet typically tears through a tank and all fish are affected. This seem to be isolated to this one fish, so an internal infection/impaction is more probable.

Jay

Yeah, probably but hey it’s always better to be safe than sorry is what I think, it’s just a shame that they lost a tang they grew from a juvie to “adult”

 

[i cant think]

My bank has been wrecked recently because I had a similar thing happen except it was with a female (grade A) black photon clownfish, I know how it feels to have a fish for over a year then have it die although my clownfish just vanished, no body or anything but I think it’s worse when you find the body because you know you had a connection with a fish and now you have its body in your hands..

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Yes he was a juvenile, perhaps 1/4 the size of my adult foxface. He grew a bit during quarantine but then got huge in the DT. He'd been in the DT for a little shy of a year. Can velvet lie dormant? Should I proactively treat with anything?

Sorry for your loss.

If no other fish in the tank are showing symptoms, it most likely is NOT a communicable infection. Other fish and invertebrates still doing well also points away from water quality issues.

Did I miss it, what species of tang was it?

Sudden death of a 1 year captive is unusual, but not unheard of. Mechanical trauma/blockage certainly is a probable cause here.

Jay

 

[cancun]

My bank has been wrecked recently because I had a similar thing happen except it was with a female (grade A) black photon clownfish, I know how it feels to have a fish for over a year then have it die although my clownfish just vanished, no body or anything but I think it’s worse when you find the body because you know you had a connection with a fish and now you have its body in your hands..

Oh man. Sorry for your loss too. I think if you have been in this hobby long enough we can all relate to the OP!