I am not new to Reef Central, just have not been on this site for a really long time and I came into a problem recently on when I got a Brown Powder Tang at a LFS which I have never had a problem in transport, picking fish up and bringing to the house. Long story but here it is: At the store, I seen this BPT that looked healthy and seemed to be a beautiful specimen. The size of it was approximately 4 inches long and about 2 1/2 to 3 inches tall. The girl told me she would bag him up so I could be on my way with an hour drive. In the meantime I was looking at other fish, not really paying attention to her bagging the fish up. Anyway, I walk back over noticing she was almost done. When she handed me the fish in the bag I also noticed it was double bagged, OK....cool...and then she black bagged it by placing a black piece of plastic around that outside bag and taped that together so it would stay put. Ok...took the bag gently and put it in my car on the front seat and made sure that I had something close to it to keep it from tipping. Get home, take it out of the car and set it on the counter and fed the others in the tank, so I could turn out their light to start acclimating this new fish. When I gently grabbed the bag up with the new fish and looked in the top of it for the rubber band I realized, what the heck, that part was on the bottom. Least to say my BPT was dead. I was in total shock and cannot figure out what happened and why. After being disillusioned for a while and really trying to figure it out I started picturing as to what might have killed it. I started picturing when she first started to take the tang out of the small tank it was in it almost flew out of the water with fright I guess. But on the second go she got it and put it into the bag with the water from the tank. At this point the bag is upright, but when she double bagged it....she took the second bag and put it over the rubber banded part she just did and slid it down the bag meaning now the open end she was going to hand to me was at the base instead of the top. Which in order for her to hand it to me, or to sit it back upright to put the black plastic around it she would of had to grab the open end on the base which would have flipped the fish upside down in the process possibly disorienting it and scaring it with such a fright that it died from the stress. Any idea's from anyone? Never seen a fish double bagged that way, they have always had the bags both open ends at the top. I was totally shocked when I couldn't even get into the bag the fish was in from the top. Maybe people have different ways these days of the way fish are bagged up..please clue me in if you have any idea why this fish died. :headwallblue:
Crazy question on transporting fish
- Thread starter Sytje1234
- Start date
gone fishin
New member
I have got many fish bagged in the method you describe. As for cause of death these are just guesses. Maybe not enough oxygen, stressed as you mentioned. FWIW I bring Styrofoam coolers with me.
gone fishin
New member
My thought is on the upside down bag is if the rubber band breaks the water will fill the other bag.
If the bags are inverted a fish can't scoot into the "bottom" corners and get stuck. I'd say your LFS has a better bagging policy thatn I typically see. Unfortunately we are not able to test our fiah like we can our pet cats and dogs. Stress is certainly indicated but we don't know if your fish had a preexsiting condition.
I know. It is so crazy. Hard for figure out. I do know the fish himself was pretty high strung. When they stuck the net in the tank which was pretty small, he tried to whack the net with his barbs by his tail. They did say they would replace him, so that is good. Thanks for all your replies. I know the girl that bagged him up was doing everything she could so he didn't get damaged in the transport. I never had one die in transport, just kind of blew me away. Glad to hear that some of you have had fish in transport that were bagged that way and it was ok. Something new for me. I have had fish flown from Washington to Alaska and then driven from the airport and all were alive. Those were freshwater Discus which aren't hardy fish. Maybe just depends on the fish itself and it's personality.
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