Ugh! Any ideas?

[AydenLincoln]

I came in to school to check on the fish the clownfish looks better since he had a little red spot which I think is a bite/shipping damage. But I noticed the wrasse was laying in the sand on his side breathing heavily. So I took him out after struggling to get him because he kept trying to swim away. I didn’t see any white spots on him and salinity and ammonia are fine. I called the company who donated them and within minutes the wrasse was dead after taking him out to try and bring him home to treat him. Any idea? No white spots. Maybe swim bladder? He looked fine yesterday. I know it’s hard to diagnose after a fish has died but I’m wondering if anyone has any idea all other fish are fine. It happened extremely quickly and I didn’t add any of the tank water to the tank. As soon as I put the wrasse in yesterday he took a nose dive into the sand and I didn’t see him until today and now he’s dead!

 

[ryanjohn1]

What kind of wrasse

 

[AydenLincoln]

What kind of wrasse

A melanarus wrasse!

 

[ryanjohn1]

Did the clowns maybe beat it up

 

[Stephen8169301]

How did you acclimate the fish to the tank

 

[vetteguy53081]

I came in to school to check on the fish the clownfish looks better since he had a little red spot which I think is a bite/shipping damage. But I noticed the wrasse was laying in the sand on his side breathing heavily. So I took him out after struggling to get him because he kept trying to swim away. I didn’t see any white spots on him and salinity and ammonia are fine. I called the company who donated them and within minutes the wrasse was dead after taking him out to try and bring him home to treat him. Any idea? No white spots. Maybe swim bladder? He looked fine yesterday. I know it’s hard to diagnose after a fish has died but I’m wondering if anyone has any idea all other fish are fine. It happened extremely quickly and I didn’t add any of the tank water to the tank. As soon as I put the wrasse in yesterday he took a nose dive into the sand and I didn’t see him until today and now he’s dead!

This is not an acclimation or aggression from clowns especially with no noticeable damage. Nose diving into sand is quite normal at introduction and you will see them about the next morning.
This if a swim bladder issue, fish would not likely have remained in the sand.
Best possibility is that this fish may have the known neurological issue labeled as UNWD.
Many of these type of wrasses courtesy Of Jay encounter UNWD which shows neurological symptoms where it either cannot swim well, swims tail down or swims with a bent spine and despite all this, the wrasse will still attempt to feed and display no damage such as crashing into objects. Other could be depending where fish is from, cyanide capture which is delayed but the fish ends up in this state

 

[AydenLincoln]

This is not an acclimation or aggression from clowns especially with no noticeable damage. Nose diving into sand is quite normal at introduction and you will see them about the next morning.
This if a swim bladder issue, fish would not likely have remained in the sand.
Best possibility is that this fish may have the known neurological issue labeled as UNWD.
Many of these type of wrasses courtesy Of Jay encounter UNWD which shows neurological symptoms where it either cannot swim well, swims tail down or swims with a bent spine and despite all this, the wrasse will still attempt to feed and display no damage such as crashing into objects. Other could be depending where fish is from, cyanide capture which is delayed but the fish ends up in this state

Thank you.

 

[AydenLincoln]

How did you acclimate the fish to the tank

I floated the bag for around 20-30 minutes.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I floated the bag for around 20-30 minutes.

Osmotic shock may have occurred.
For the future, your acclimation is simply not long enough. Just alone, you would have floated bag to equalize temperature and you want to empty bag and fish into a CLEAN bucket and then add tank water until AT MINIMUM you matched the salinity in the bucket with that of the tank. I add a cup of water every 15 mins until you have assured salinity, ph have been equalized
My acclimation method (not the only one out there):
I generally:
Float for 20-30 minutes
Transfer fish and water into a clean bucket
Then . . . .
Measure the Ph, salinity and temperature of the bag water. If you can, make up some water in a container that has exactly the same measurements as the bag readings and move the fish right over, then you can add a cup of tank water to bucket every 15 mins 6 times (almost 1.5 hours)
Then check salinity in bucket and compare to tank. If no match or very close, add a cup of water every few mins until youve reached salinity and trap fish in same cup and pour off water and release into display. Release under LOW light before lights out.
Not that this happened to your wrasse, but fish in bags produce carbon dioxide and ammonia. The carbon dioxide lowers the pH of the water in the bag, That in turn makes the ammonia non-toxic to the fish. When you acclimate them, if not done just right, you drive off the carbon dioxide faster than you are diluting the ammonia. That raises the pH of the water in the bag, and that in turn, makes the residual ammonia very toxic to the fish.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I came in to school to check on the fish the clownfish looks better since he had a little red spot which I think is a bite/shipping damage. But I noticed the wrasse was laying in the sand on his side breathing heavily. So I took him out after struggling to get him because he kept trying to swim away. I didn’t see any white spots on him and salinity and ammonia are fine. I called the company who donated them and within minutes the wrasse was dead after taking him out to try and bring him home to treat him. Any idea? No white spots. Maybe swim bladder? He looked fine yesterday. I know it’s hard to diagnose after a fish has died but I’m wondering if anyone has any idea all other fish are fine. It happened extremely quickly and I didn’t add any of the tank water to the tank. As soon as I put the wrasse in yesterday he took a nose dive into the sand and I didn’t see him until today and now he’s dead!

I guess I hadn’t seen the prelude to all this, but how long had the wrasse been in this tank?
The heavy breathing doesn’t line up with the UNWD issue, points more to water quality or gill disease….
Jay

 

[Dom]

I guess I hadn’t seen the prelude to all this, but how long had the wrasse been in this tank?
The heavy breathing doesn’t line up with the UNWD issue, points more to water quality or gill disease….
Jay

Ok... I'm going to ask... "UNWD"?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Ok... I'm going to ask... "UNWD"?

Aren’t acronyms fun?

I can’t spell neurological, so I came up with the UNWD (grin)

Here is a link:

Unknown Neurological Wrasse Disease (UNWD)

Unknown Neurological Wrasse disease (UNWD) There is a disease that afflicts newly acquired wrasses, usually Cirrhilabrus fairy wrasses or flasher wrasses, Pseudocheilinus, but occasionally other species as well. The gross visual symptoms are always the same; the fish shows a rapid onset of...

www.reef2reef.com

Jay

 

[AydenLincoln]

I guess I hadn’t seen the prelude to all this, but how long had the wrasse been in this tank?
The heavy breathing doesn’t line up with the UNWD issue, points more to water quality or gill disease….
Jay

A day! No spots and all other fish are acting fine. Parameters are fine as well no ammonia and salinity/temperature are normal. What about swim bladder? Although he looked normal and no visible signs of illness he died within minutes of me removing him. He did have trouble swimming and was laying on his side.

 

[Goaway]

How big of a tank was the wrasse in?

 

[AydenLincoln]

How big of a tank was the wrasse in?

120

 

[Jay Hemdal]

A day! No spots and all other fish are acting fine. Parameters are fine as well no ammonia and salinity/temperature are normal. What about swim bladder? Although he looked normal and no visible signs of illness he died within minutes of me removing him. He did have trouble swimming and was laying on his side.

Swim bladder issues are not acutely fatal - fish can live for days/months with issues. Also, most swim bladder issues cause positive buoyancy. All fish are slightly negatively buoyant, so a fish on the bottom is just a sign that it isn't swimming normally, a dying fish will lay on the bottom. A fish with a (rare) negative buoyancy issue will try to swim off the bottom, but hop along, sinking very fast back to the bottom each time.

Where I was going with this was to try and determine if the fish had recently been acclimated from low salinity water to higher.....we see that and shipping stress as the highest causes of death in new fish in the first 24 hours. Say a fish was in 1.018 SG water and your tank was at 1.025. That is too much of a rise for many fish to tolerate, even with acclimation.

Jay