Greetings to all leopard wrasse lovers!!!
I have recently joined your group but just lost my little Macropharyngodon meleagris last night. Had her for six days. She had just came into the fish store the day before I picked her up and that was watching her eat some frozen brine. She looked really good - inquisitive, actively swimming around, well proportioned. I brought her home, temperature and water aclimated her for over one and a half hours and set her in my 225 gallon reef tank with 315 lbs of live sand, 280 lbs live rock, 26 gallon refugium with 15 lb live rock and 25 lbs live sand. She was swimming around for 2 hours before diving into the sand. No problems. Came out around 11:30 AM and going to "bed" around 10 PM for the next four days was eating only live but showed interest in frozen for the three or four times I would feed, other times picking things from rocks and sand Two days ago stopped coming out and last evening, poor little thing, she was half way out of the sand and breathing rapidly. My parameters were good Nitrate/Nitrite 0, pH 8.4, Phosphate 0.5. She tried to swim a little but died 4 hours later. I was wondering if it was because my tank temperature dropped to 72 degrees (we forgot to close the window that night) but learned that they tolerate temperatures between 72 and 78 degrees and then I am guessing that something was already wrong when she did well for several days before she stayed in the sand. No one in the tank was bothering her or paying much attention to her at all (Powder Blue Tang, Kole Tang, Atlantic Blue Tang, Clown Fairy wrasse, Filament Flasher Wrasse, LUbbock's Wrasse, Bluestreak Cleaner Wrasse, and Flame Angel)
I absolutely LOVE the Leopard Wrasses and was planning on getting an assortment of them in my tank, but this was really really disappointing because they are so beautiful and you get attached to them so quickly...
I want to try again!
I bought her at a LFS that I've done more than $8000 dollars of business with over the past two years but they only guarantee their fish's lives for ONE day. Now, I don't know about you but when you've been a dedicated customer for so long and for goodness sake, they KNOW me and KNOW how I run my tanks, you'd think they would be more understanding...
Well, now I'm looking on line for these little guys! The places that guarantees them for 14 days - well, I'm guessing that I would be out of the woods by then and what happens after that would my issues.
Please let me know if you know of a particular web store that have been successful for the Leopard Wrasses and are M.A.C. certified.
Thanks to everyone and best wishes for our fishes!
BlennieLove