Help: Anthias dying

[nitr8]

I bought a sunburst or fathead anthias 2 weeks ago and when I came home from work today it was very lethargic and taking short breaths. I immediately scooped it out of the tank and put it in the QT tank. All the other fish seem to be doing fine. The only thing I can think of is that it's starving because I only feed one cube of mysis or one cube of cyclopes daily. I tried feeding twice a day but my nitrates started to creep up. I went back to feeding once a day and over the past three days I've done daily 20% water changes to get my nitrates from 4 ppm to 1 ppm. As of now the anthias has been in the QT tank for about 5 hours with some food but it isn't eating. Am I too late or maybe wrong with my assumption all together?

 

[nitr8]

Well, I'm too late. It's dead. Still interested in any ideas or suggestions though.

 

[Megatrev62]

So was it eating at all? You never mentioned it. In the meantime I have a lyretail that has been very finiky regards to eating. Absolutely no pellets or flake. Eating brine and picks bits and pieces of angel formula. At least it's eating but I do have concerns. I don't know about the nitrates you're describing but I think with anthias any feeding is a good thing.

 

[Megatrev62]

Sorry by the way.

 

[TankStudy]

The species of anthias you have generally shouldn't be too hard to entice to eat. However, some species of anthias from my experience aren't very tolerant of certain water parameters, mainly when you have fluctuating parameters. The lyretails and bartletts are more tolerant IME from this but anthias like the dispars, evansi's and fatheads will randomly just one day, flop over dead with no real visible display of poor health conditions. Most the times I find that my salinity, alkalinity or ph may have gone up or down a few numbers that day. After a couple hundred dollars in losses I can say if you keep the tank stable in parameters they like or prefer, they will live easily. Other fish species can easily adapt to the changes but in this case certain types of anthias will not tolerate it at all and just flop over dead one day.

I use to struggle with these beautiful fish but now that I have figured out these things, I have almost have to flush them to get rid of them or give them away of course lol.

 

[nitr8]

So was it eating at all? You never mentioned it. In the meantime I have a lyretail that has been very finiky regards to eating. Absolutely no pellets or flake. Eating brine and picks bits and pieces of angel formula. At least it's eating but I do have concerns. I don't know about the nitrates you're describing but I think with anthias any feeding is a good thing.

Yes, it ate everyday.

 

[nitr8]

The species of anthias you have generally shouldn't be too hard to entice to eat. However, some species of anthias from my experience aren't very tolerant of certain water parameters, mainly when you have fluctuating parameters. The lyretails and bartletts are more tolerant IME from this but anthias like the dispars, evansi's and fatheads will randomly just one day, flop over dead with no real visible display of poor health conditions. Most the times I find that my salinity, alkalinity or ph may have gone up or down a few numbers that day. After a couple hundred dollars in losses I can say if you keep the tank stable in parameters they like or prefer, they will live easily. Other fish species can easily adapt to the changes but in this case certain types of anthias will not tolerate it at all and just flop over dead one day.

I use to struggle with these beautiful fish but now that I have figured out these things, I have almost have to flush them to get rid of them or give them away of course lol.

Here are my test results:

9/27 @ 10:30pm: SG: 1.026 Temp: 78.6 Ammonia: 0 Nitrite: .007 Nitrate: 0 Phosphate: .04 pH: 8.04 Calcium: 521 Alkanity: 9.4 Mag: 1440

10/5 @ 8:00pm: SG: 1.027 Temp: 78.1 Ammonia: 0 Nitrite: .036 Nitrate: 4 Phosphate: .06 pH: 8.08 Calcium: 516 Alkanity: 8.4 Mag: 1360

10/6 @ 5:30pm: SG: 1.026 Temp: 78.1 Ammonia: 0 Nitrite: .027 Nitrate: 4 Phosphate: 0 pH: 8.06 Calcium: 492 Alkanity: 8.9 Mag: 1320