Two Fish, 3 Different Salinities

[Aaron-A2]

I just bought 2 fish from my LFS.

-Fish 1: Salinity 1.016
-Fish 2: Salinity 1.025
-QT Tank: Salinity 1.20

Fish 1 came directly from their vendor, unopened (so vendor water). Fish 2 was in the LFS system.

What's the best course of action to acclimate them to the correct salinity?

 

[Brad Miller]

Depends on the fish, whether they are fragile or not too
You could just slowly float and add a bit of your QT water if that's where they're going

 

[joec]

I just bought 2 fish from my LFS.

-Fish 1: Salinity 1.016
-Fish 2: Salinity 1.025
-QT Tank: Salinity 1.20

Fish 1 came directly from their vendor, unopened (so vendor water). Fish 2 was in the LFS system.

What's the best course of action to acclimate them to the correct salinity?

Expert humblefish provided info on this same question to me last week

Set qt tank at 1.017. Just temp acclimate the 1.016 fish and dump in qt. You will then have to drip acclimate the 1.025 fish with Qt water for at least 2 hours, longer if possible

 

[Aaron-A2]

@joec I already have both dripping individually. I can drip for 2+ hours if needed. Is this going to kill the fish?

 

[EmdeReef]

@joec I already have both dripping individually. I can drip for 2+ hours if needed. Is this going to kill the fish?

They should be fine over 2-3hrs. After an hour you can discard about half the water in the acclimation box. Basically you want to make the change as gradual as possible.

 

[joec]

Going down is easier on fish than going up. The 1.016 fish should be dripped longer. You might consider starting again. Remeasure salinity for each and then set qt tank .001 higher than the lower salinity fish and then drip the higher salinity fish for 2 plus hours. Dump lower salinity fish in qt when the salinity in qt is .001 higher than the lower salinity fish

 

[Aaron-A2]

They should be fine over 2-3hrs. After an hour you can discard about half the water in the acclimation box. Basically you want to make the change as gradual as possible.

Understood. I'm dripping slow.. probably 1 drop/second. Won't temperature be an issue?

 

[Brad Miller]

yes
When I had to do a long drip period I put them in an ice chest with lamps on it and wrapped up with a temp probe on the outside

 

[Aaron-A2]

Quick update, I ended up dripping the high salinity fish for 2 hours and the low salinity fish for 4 hours.

As of this morning, both fish are still alive. They are hiding/nervous, but they came out to feed for a short while (Frozen mysis).

 

[Maritimer]

For what it's worth, any time that I have to drip-acclimate a fish (such as Black-Friday shopping at two different LFS), I'll get the water to the appropriate salinity, re-bag the fish, and temperature-acclimate before releasing.

The exception would be if it's very warm outside, and both the tank and the bucket on the floor are at room (and backyard!) temperature.

~Bruce

 

[Aaron-A2]

It's now 2 days after and both fish are doing well. Thanks all for your support and suggestions.

 

[jsvand5]

Fish can go down in salinity with no acclimation. I put all of my fish straight into 1.009 regardless of what salinity they are coming from. I just Temp acclimate and release them into the QT. They never have an issue at all.