What happened to my kole????

[fish clown]

Ugg, idk what happened!!!!!! When I woke up this morning I found this tang dead on the sand. It seemed to be doing well yesterday too. On a side note I'm fourteen years old and have had my tank over a year now my levels have been stable and all seems to be doing better than ever. The indmas frag swap was last weekend and I had corals and this tang reserved from fragswappers but I found out my church had a retreat the same weekend which my mom already had signed me up for. My mom said she could pick the stuff while I was at the retreat. She said the tang looked awesome and healthy at the swap but when she acclimated it it looked kinda bad and was on its side. I showed her how to temp and drip acclimate and she floated it for 20 min and then drip for 45min (I told her to do that for 1hr and a half) but she had to go for my little brothers baseball game. There was one lighter spot under one of its fin after I pulled it out. Here's a pic and the white spots on the fish are sand, not ick

 

[reef80]

It is kind of blury and can't really see the details to it, but when I had have fish die so fast and suddenly...I assume velvet. Litterally like one day eatting and healthy looking and then dead the next morning. Is there a slime coat and/or discoloration to the skin...BTW for being 14 years old and know so much...that is waayyyy cool. You are probably going to be like one of those who have tank trends that everyone drools over...JK, but keep it up.

 

[dunc101]

You really cannot tell anything from the picture, unfortunately. IMO, when a fish usually dies in a day of being introduced in the tank, it is usually acclimation issues whether it be salinity differences or others picking on the weak fish.

If it was marine velvet, you should be seeing other signs on other fish if not have other dead fish by now.

 

[fish clown]

I didn't notice anything different or unusual on the scales. All my other fish are very active right now and I dont notice anything out of the ordinary(. All 6 of the new frags I got are open and seem to be doing well. I told my mom to just leave the coral floating and so I acclimated those. It seems like the acclimating was the problem at this point. One thi g I forgot to mention earlier is that I moved my tank on Thursday because I changed rooms and so that's was two days before the tang went in. I also made surcoat to disturb the sand bed

 

[fish clown]

One more thing I just found out. My mom said the tang was in a bag already at the swap so who knows how long it was in that bag.

 

[dunc101]

Ouch. It definitely sounds like it was the acclimation then. Drip acclimating a fish that has been in a bag is a very bad idea as the ammonia raises very very quickly whenever it is exposed to oxygen =(. Once the bag is opened, you really only have about 30 minutes before the ammonia gets bad. I usually just temp acclimate the fish and as long as the salinity is close, I dump the fish in my QT. I also keep my QT's around 1.020 as it is much easier for a fish to acclimate to a lower salinity than higher salinity water that he resides in. Sorry for the loss.

 

[saltyair]

what other fish are in the tank? IMO sounds like acclimation stress. Did you keep the lights off when adding? this helped me save a fish or two.

 

[MrTuskfish]

Looks like two ich spots on the fish, about half way between the pectoral fin and the caudal peduncle in the pic. It sounds like you don't use a QT. If this is ich, or any similar parasite, all of your fish are in danger. Unfortunatly, IMO, this is almost certainly ich.

 

[fish clown]

Ouch. It definitely sounds like it was the acclimation then. Drip acclimating a fish that has been in a bag is a very bad idea as the ammonia raises very very quickly whenever it is exposed to oxygen =(. Once the bag is opened, you really only have about 30 minutes before the ammonia gets bad. I usually just temp acclimate the fish and as long as the salinity is close, I dump the fish in my QT. I also keep my QT's around 1.020 as it is much easier for a fish to acclimate to a lower salinity than higher salinity water that he resides in. Sorry for the loss.

Dang, I didn't realize it did that and I've read drip is best from almost everyone I know and haven't even heard of this. I'll try the tang again but I'll have premium aquatics order me one for local pickup.

what other fish are in the tank? IMO sounds like acclimation stress. Did you keep the lights off when adding? this helped me save a fish or two.

The other fish are a clown, royal gramma, 2 Banggai, 2 cromis. All were much smaller than the tang. I should have mentions that too my mom but I was rushing to get pached for the retreat at the same time.

Looks like two ich spots on the fish, about half way between the pectoral fin and the caudal peduncle in the pic. It sounds like you don't use a QT. If this is ich, or any similar parasite, all of your fish are in danger. Unfortunatly, IMO, this is almost certainly ich.

I mentioned that in my original post. It was on the sand bed so when I pulled it out those two little sand grains were left on. I touched that spot on the fish and it was definently sand.

 

[dunc101]

Dang, I didn't realize it did that and I've read drip is best from almost everyone I know and haven't even heard of this. I'll try the tang again but I'll have premium aquatics order me one for local pickup.

Do some googleing around and you'll see some good info about this. I believe their is a sticky somewhere talking about this very subject.

BTW, I'm jealous you live close to premium aquatics! That's a great store that has gotten their share of reefing money off of me in the past. lol.

 

[fish clown]

There still is no sign of illness on any other fish so I think it's safe to assume its a combination of being in the bag to long and not being acclimated properly

 

[Fish_Kid99]

Good luck on the new tang! :thumbsup: I am glad to know that i am not the only 14 year old on this website lol :beer:

 

[triggreef]

Ouch. It definitely sounds like it was the acclimation then. Drip acclimating a fish that has been in a bag is a very bad idea as the ammonia raises very very quickly whenever it is exposed to oxygen =(. Once the bag is opened, you really only have about 30 minutes before the ammonia gets bad. I usually just temp acclimate the fish and as long as the salinity is close, I dump the fish in my QT. I also keep my QT's around 1.020 as it is much easier for a fish to acclimate to a lower salinity than higher salinity water that he resides in. Sorry for the loss.

Just for clarification this is close sort of, but ammonia toxicity is most likely what killed it IMO.

What happens is when the fish is in the bag, naturally it produces ammonia. However the Ph drops fairly quick in the bag. Low Ph makes the ammonia not quite so toxic at all. But when you start your drip acclimation, Ph rises (since your tanks Ph is higher). Then the ammonia in the bag becomes lethal. Nothing really to do with oxygen, there is oxygen in the bag already, or the fish would suffocate.

Moral is, LFS purchase and not in a bag too long... sure use a drip acclimation. I never drip acclimate anything and rarely have issues with anything (on the first couple days anyway).

anything in a bag a day or so, temp acclimate only.

 

[fish clown]

Good luck on the new tang! :thumbsup: I am glad to know that i am not the only 14 year old on this website lol :beer:

Thanks

Just for clarification this is close sort of, but ammonia toxicity is most likely what killed it IMO.

What happens is when the fish is in the bag, naturally it produces ammonia. However the Ph drops fairly quick in the bag. Low Ph makes the ammonia not quite so toxic at all. But when you start your drip acclimation, Ph rises (since your tanks Ph is higher). Then the ammonia in the bag becomes lethal. Nothing really to do with oxygen, there is oxygen in the bag already, or the fish would suffocate.

Moral is, LFS purchase and not in a bag too long... sure use a drip acclimation. I never drip acclimate anything and rarely have issues with anything (on the first couple days anyway).

anything in a bag a day or so, temp acclimate only.

Well that would make sense. Would the temp acclimate only also apply to fish that are shipped overnight?

 

[triggreef]

Ya anything more the a few hours I would only temp acclimate, but that is my opinion. The only fact I can offer is that I did test a sample of water from a bag my powder blue came in, from reefs2go, overnight shipping. It had 5 ppm ammonia. Not .5 ppm which would be toxic even.... But 5 ppm. Which for an API test kit = off the chart ammonia.

I would think drip acclimating a fish in that much ammonia would = sure death. Probably not right away, but overnight or next day.

 

[fish clown]

Ya anything more the a few hours I would only temp acclimate, but that is my opinion. The only fact I can offer is that I did test a sample of water from a bag my powder blue came in, from reefs2go, overnight shipping. It had 5 ppm ammonia. Not .5 ppm which would be toxic even.... But 5 ppm. Which for an API test kit = off the chart ammonia.

I would think drip acclimating a fish in that much ammonia would = sure death. Probably not right away, but overnight or next day.

I have ordered I think 4 fish from blue zoo aquatics and I did drip but they also have a blue liquid that they said to put three drops in for every fish or somthing like that. Does that eliminate some ammonia?

 

[triggreef]

Idk really, I did do it that way once, before I realized there was so much ammonia in the over night package.

I think it works by lowering ph, making the ammonia less toxic. But I could be wrong. All I can say is I've preferred about $500 worth off fish from bluezoo & about as much from reefs 2go. I only temp acclimate from them both, & haven't had any issues besides a few doa's.

 

[fish clown]

Idk really, I did do it that way once, before I realized there was so much ammonia in the over night package.

I think it works by lowering ph, making the ammonia less toxic. But I could be wrong. All I can say is I've preferred about $500 worth off fish from bluezoo & about as much from reefs 2go. I only temp acclimate from them both, & haven't had any issues besides a few doa's.

Maybe I should go back to that. When I was new to the hobby my dad bought me two yellow tangs and I floated them and threw them in and they were all good till they fought I realized you can't put two yellow tangs together or even one really In a 75.

 

[fish clown]

So thi varied just happend. When I got home I saw my clown dead!!! I e had it for awhile in my tank and I think there was even some nitrite, nitrate and ammonia in my tank when I got it. I just tested all my levels A d they all checked out becides a very small amount of nitrite, like barely even readable probaly from the clowns death. I didn't see any signs of disease and its fins were frayed. I'm not sure if that's from a cromis or royal gramma messing with it or just the current pushing it around after it died. I e never seen any fish pick on the clown really but the clown will chase away fish mainly cromis that get too close to its anemone.

 

[triggreef]

how long have you had it? been eating and acting healthy?