Please help

[El Diablo]

OK as you guys know I have been in the hobby for a while. But I have a big problem and was hoping I could get some help.

I have recently lost some expensive fish and this is not like me to lose fish. I'm not for sure if its my carpet and if you guys think it is its gone today.

I lost two of my bi color anthias about a month ago to start and that was about a month after the carpet came in the tank.

I then lost the blue spot jaw-fish.

Then me and the kids were looking in the tank and we found one of my really cool new onyx clowns the were Dalmatian marked. Only thing that was left of this was its head floating behind a coral.

Now to top it off we came home a couple days ago and my pbt was bad looking he was very bad looking. Now yesterday he was gone.


I don't know if it could be a mantis or my feed lobster has gone rogue but I need help. I feed my carpet about every other day shrimp.

 

[twiggyb]

I would think the carpet would have digested the whole clown, but that's just my opinion. Was the skeleton still attached to the clown or was it just the head? It sounds like something chopped it off, but I'm not sure what it would be.

 

[El Diablo]

Just the head

 

[bradleym]

+1 to something else. That carpet is way too big not to take in the whole clownfish and if it had the head would've been stripped of flesh at the very least. More likely unrecognizeable after a day in one of those things.

 

[breutus]

A carpet would rarely leave a little bit behind unless it's a large fish. A mantis also would not really leave a head, If it caught one it would eat it all. A large crab could cut a head off? a fish that died would also be eaten to the head by scavengers in the tank.

Wish I could help more but i do doubt its the carpet or a mantis

 

[GPhiAce]

What are the rest of your inhabitants?? And parameters of the tank? What kind of a setup is it?? Did they go missing overnight?? Over how long of a period did they go missing (4 in 1 month)? Sorry, but I don't know what you have. You may try to peak at your tank at night with a red light to see if there are any hitchhickers that you don't know about, ie another mantis, worm, crabs, etc. I don't believe it is your carpet, but it maybe. Less likely because of the reasons stated above. Did you clowns host it?

I would look at the tank at night. What other fish are in there? Good luck finding the problem

 

[twiggyb]

alright, where can I get one of these red lights everyone talks of? I just use a flashlight, but I'd like to use a red one so I don't freak out the fish and other life. Sorry to go off topic for a second.

 

[ebe]

My anthias just quit eating after a while. Too hard to keep for me. My powder blue caught ich, died, nearly crashed my tank. PBT are too hard for me to keep. Clown fish jump out on me so I cover my tank. etc.... I have a convict tang and yellow tang in my 180 and they are about my speed. I have had a really good run with my current fish but I have yet to figure it all out.

 

[bradleym]

Is it always overight or can you remember a time where one was ok in the AM and dead in the PM?

 

[GPhiAce]

alright, where can I get one of these red lights everyone talks of? I just use a flashlight, but I'd like to use a red one so I don't freak out the fish and other life. Sorry to go off topic for a second.

I have just changed bulbs on a flashlight to a red bulb. Then I broke that flashlight and bulb. So I just used a red filter over my other flashlight. Probably not as much to not scare the fish, but not to scare the other inhabitants. I saw some worm type thing in my tank once with an LED penlight- scared it away without getting a good look at him. You may be surprised as to what you will see if you have LR that you did not check well.

 

[babybull]

my choice would be the lobster, or mantis shrimp. they are scavengers and will eat anything they can catch.

 

[Koddie Doo]

sounds like something is going rogue. I would turn on the lunar lights tonight get a chair and a 6 pack and watch to see what comes out

 

[julie180]

I got a red flash light a HD or Lowes, don't remember for sure. It also has a white light and was less than 10 bucks.

 

[bigcasino]

Highly doubtful had anything to do with carpet not there forteit to leave remains and I have a blue spot jaw and 4 anenomes 150 pretty sure of that, pbt pretty dam hard especially one that was not brought in from another tank wen u bring them in w other tangs options = get a crab critter trap and bait it with silver sides should even draw out that worm i have that trap myself if you need one could possibly help ya pm me

 

[bigcasino]

really should of ask you how long you had each of these fish might help determine whats going on but end all end i would suggest trying the trap i spoke of it s caught a couple of things one worm fromm my tank and two badass crabs from others= one mantis and one unidentifieble crab