What Killed My Fish?

[DocRose]

So I know I’m not going to get a concrete answer, but I’m looking for suggestions. Tank is a 55 gallon. Current (known inhabitants) are 2 clowns, cleaner wrasse, red Firefish, purple Firefish, assorted snails and hermits. I lost a perfectly healthy Lubbock’s Fairy last night. I woke up today to find the hermits feasting on its carcass (was down to the bones). Yesterday it was swimming around fine and eating. I’ve never seen any aggression (except for the cleaner being annoying). All other fish are perfectly health and fine. Any thoughts?

 

[brandon429]

how much quarantine of these fish was done, and fallow of each stocked item/corals/cuc members

I'm going with disease right off the bat. 10% of reefers will qt, and 2% will apply fallow rules to stocked items (lack thereof undoes all the qt work they may have done)

I noticed this is not a tank crash, it's a fish kill thread, that's rather specific losses.

 

[MnFish1]

It would be good for more information to be posted.

How old was the fish - assuming what you meant by perfectly healthy means no symptoms. Any other possible symptoms. additionally - parameters, other fish, QT or not

 

[DocRose]

how much quarantine of these fish was done, and fallow of each stocked item/corals/cuc members

I'm going with disease right off the bat.

Everything that has ever entered this system was QT’d. However, I already mentioned that the fish was perfectly healthy.

 

[brandon429]

gotcha

what about fallow for the stocked corals, you run two reefs at home? one for fallow pass through of the clean up crew too, all corals? that's rare if so

the receiving tank gets all the corals and cuc/things from a pet store for 45-90 days, then those stocks are sent to the display, the receiving tank is sterilized then started over for the next lot until the tank is fully stocked. 1% do that level of biosecurity going off web post trends

disease still got through, when it's a fish kill only /no inverts/ Jay uses that as a big disease troubleshoot marker. something got through is my firm guess.

 

[MnFish1]

How old was the fish - any other inhabitants (aggression)? How was the fish Quarantined?

 

[DocRose]

It would be good for more information to be posted.

How old was the fish - assuming what you meant by perfectly healthy means no symptoms. Any other possible symptoms. additionally - parameters, other fish, QT or not

Not even a year old. Everything in tank went through a QT. Not going to post parameters since they’re not a factor. Everything else in the tank is fine. No symptoms what so ever.

 

[MnFish1]

Brandon please don't derail this persons question. Let people answer.

 

[MnFish1]

Not even a year old. Everything in tank went through a QT. Not going to post parameters since they’re not a factor. Everything else in the tank is fine. No symptoms what so ever.

Great - that is an answer in itself. So the fish has been in your tank for some time - according to your answer? Before I give my opinion, just want to be sure

 

[brandon429]

you did a real effort based on your post history for sure, qt'd the dunans, qt'd the ocean rock. nice effort for sure. I don't know how something got through

 

[MnFish1]

Anything new added recently?
Aggression is often difficult to observe when it's happening - but will assume you're correct and thats not an issue.

 

[MnFish1]

OK - so - given what you have said - and I assume the fish has been in your tank a while - there are a couple possibilities - either - the fish died of something unique to it OR - the fish died from a disease. Again - just based on what you're saying - I'm not sure how to make another decision. If you look at the link on the bottom of my signature - there are some other questions that you could answer that would help - will assume - as you said - that the parameters are 'ok'.

PS - it's rare for a year or so old fish (in a tank) to die overnight based on a disease - especially since quarantined and since no other fish are sick. It leads to the diagnosis of an issue unique to this fish. I would recommend you carefully watch your other fish for any other signs of disease - especially if you've added something within the last couple weeks

 

[jabberwock]

First of all, sorry about your fish, and I am glad it was not fish (plural). I really have no clue what happened, but there are a lot of possibilities.

It could have injured itself, my flasher wrasse flies around the tank and it would not surprise me if one day it smacked the glass hard enough to do significant damage.

I had a piece of aquascape slip the other day while I was trying to stab a gorilla crab, and it accidentally killed one of my porcelain crabs.

Could be an unknown hitchhiker lurking in the rocks.

It might have had a physical deficiency caused by any number of potential issues: ammonia, QT treatment, harsh collection methods, etc. I know from experience that a fish can be permanently diminished by past "trauma".

Just some possibilities.

 

[DocRose]

I know from experience that a fish can be permanently diminished by past "trauma".

Yes. I know this all too well as well. I had a Ruby Longfin Wrasse that ended up with swim bladder because it took a run at the surface and crashed into my cover... Never recovered from it.

 

[DocRose]

Anything new added recently?
Aggression is often difficult to observe when it's happening - but will assume you're correct and thats not an issue.

Nope. Nothing new added... In fact, this particular fish was the last thing added after it came out of QT. I know exactly where this particular fish slept at night, and in that same area I've seen (on two occasions) a worm-like creature slowly sticking itself out from beneath the rock, excreting something (I assume its waste) and then shooting back inside. It's not a bristle worm (I know what those look like)...but it looks far too small to be a bobbit (and even if it was, I think it would be too small of a bobbit to have taken out this 3" long Lubbock's). I'm hesitant to add anything new now though, concerned that there is some predatory hitchhiker lurking.

 

[jda]

Wrasses do not have very long life spans. Some live like three years and others to five or eight. We never know how old they are when they are collected, but if it was larger it just could have died from being old. If it was a real three inches, then this might be possible.

I have watched leopards and melanurus do this, but they usually start to swim weird, lay on the bottom and then they are gone a day or two later. They can go downhill fast.

If a worm killed it, it would have likely tried to drag it into a place where it could feed on it for a long while... you usually see damage.

 

[vetteguy53081]

As these fish startle easily, can be crashing into an object, as mentioned aggression and then weakening but always hard to tell when a fish is devoured by scavengers. As MnFish asked for signs and symptoms, it will be the best avenue in determining Possible cause and educated guesses

 

[DocRose]

As these fish startle easily, can be crashing into an object, as mentioned aggression and then weakening but always hard to tell when a fish is devoured by scavengers. As MnFish asked for signs and symptoms, it will be the best avenue in determining Possible cause and educated guesses

Yep. Showed no signs or symptoms of of any bullying, trauma, or disease. The only thing I could think of is that maybe something startled it in the middle of the night, and it swam into a powerhead...but yeah the carcass was completely gone by the time I saw it today.