Help me stop killing new fish!

TimGentry

TimGentry

New member
O.K. here's the deal. We haven't added a new fish for sometime now with the exception of the diamond Goby I got about 2 months ago. the other day the wife and I were out looking at fish and saw some yellow tangs. At one time we did have a yellow tang but he died about a year and a half ago. Anyway, we buy a nice size yellow and he doesn't make it through the night. found him dead in the corner in the morning. I thought maybe I rushed the acclamation and after being mad at myself and checking water parameters, bought another a day later. I took my time and really thought I did everything I could to acclimate this fish and he seemed just fine the first two days. He ate on the seconds day. I wake up this morning and he's in the upside down floating around at the bottom of the tank on the sand position, Otherwise known as dead.

I've checked all the water parameters and they are good. The other fish and corals are fine. HELP!!!
got any ideas?:headwally::spin2:
 
You water may not be well. This happened to me with a bangaii. I rearranged my rock work and did some water changes and now fish seem to be happy. Acclimation is a good start though.
 
I agree with Erik, in the past my issue was the place I purchased my fish. I bought blue tangs in the past from one LFS and had bad luck. I bought one from Steffen in Cruces and that little guy hippo has been going strong and taking control of the other fish. It makes a huge difference.
 
it all depends on the salinity the store keeps their fish compared to your tank. Once you know this then you know how slow and long to acclimate
 
Was that the biggest fish you had? Are you getting enough oxygen exchange in your tank? You can achieve this with skimming and water surface turbulence. Are you sure your temp and salinity are inline? Could be faulty measuring equipment and text kits.
 
well still would need to see what the parameters are, could be the older fish are just used to your tank. and one thing with tangs is that they like more oxygen like ben said. plus being colder out im sure we are not letting fresh air into the house all that much.
 
He Tim I have my Skimmer attached to a hose using outside air. Just be cautious that they don't spray for mosquitos in your area. I use carbon filtering to be safe. That helps increase the O2 in my tank because I have refrigerated air so outside air is not regularly exchanged like a regular vamp cooler.
 
Getting good oxygen exchange via turbulence and skimming. Temp steady at 78.1. Ph is 8.2. No phospates an 10 on nitrates, Largest of two fish was approx 3in and smaller about 2.5in. I do keep salinaty on high side of normal so maybe I just needed to take longer to acclimate them to slowly bring them up to my tanks level.
 
IME I've lost fish like that when I get the fish close to when my lights are going to go off for the day. I've had fish acclimated and ready a few hours before the lights are going off then the next day dead. Might be the stress in addition to pH swings due to lights going out. Etc...

I've had success getting the fish acclimated and ready during the day and way before my lights go off.

Just my two cents.
 
Yellow Tang

Yellow Tang

Well at the risk of killing another Yellow Tang I decided to try again. Did some adjustments on tank salinity, rechecked all water parameters then bought another yellow. did the longest acclimation I have ever done on any fish, waited until lights went to actinics only in evening and about 1 hour before they go to moonglow LED and slowly eased him into the tank. That was wednesday eve. As of this morning(friday) HE'S ALIVE, ALIVE I tell you!!! Looks promising at this point............:spin3:
 
I'm pretty sure it has a lot to do with the Salinity in my case. Mine had been a little on the high side so I worked on bring in down some. when I brought this last tang home the first thing I did was check the Salinity level of the water he was in and it was really low so I took a long time acclimating him. Seems to have paid off so far.
 
Tang

Tang

yep. salinity level seems to be culprit. I think Eric mentioned this first. Never really paid that much attention to it before. I would suggest everyone check the salinity level of the water their newly purchased fish is in and adjust you acclimation time as needed to make sure you have it equal to your tank's level before putting him in your tank. Maybe you won't kill as many fish as I did.:(:headwally:
 
Sg

Sg

I had my Spec Grav was approx down to 1.022 while the LFS water was only 1.017. I had been running as high as 1.023-1.024 on my tank.
 
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