Hello all,
so I just fished a stiff Green Wolf Eel out of my tank. RIP Wolfie (not very original name, chosen by my son).
He died in a 120 gallon FOWLR tank with a 30 gallon sump. Deep sand bed, 120 pounds of live rock, mostly from Marco Rocks (90lbs), some live seed rock (the other 30). The sand bed is mostly sand from Marco (150 lbs maybe?) along with a 5 gallon bucket of sand from an established tank (this had sat in the bucket for about 12 weeks, was still live but the lower layer smelled like rotten eggs so I didn't put it in the tank. There was a snail still living in the sand after months in a sealed bucket).
Water tests from an API kit:
Ammonia - 0
Nitrates - 0
Nitrites - 0
PH - 8.3
Salinity - 1.024 (refractometer)
The tank has been up and running for 9 weeks, and he went in the tank about a month ago. We've had the eel for about two years. Prior to putting him in this tank he was in a 29 gallon biocube, which was too small for him (as I learned as I went along). I became pretty darn good at maintaining water quality and keeping him healthy, until we were able to set up the larger tank and transfer him to his new domain.
The day before yesterday I put two new Koralia 1500 powerheads in the tank. Yesterday I went to feed him (every two days, shrimp and/or halibut pieces, last feeding time he had done his usual hunter act, like an arrow from a bow towards the prey.). He was on the bottom of the tank, looking in distress, breathing very heavily, with what looked to be an injury to his tail. A hermit crab was picking at the injury, and he wasn't stopping it. He didn't eat. I moved the crab away and turned off the new powerheads thinking some sort of electrical problem may be the issue.
He had a prior injury to his tail from a bite from a chainlink eel, so this fresh injury may have been that re-opening due to ill health.
At various points during the afternoon and evening he moved around a little, but not his usual manner, and at some points he was upside down. Googling at this point led me to believe it may have been something he ate? Other than him the tank has some hermits, some limpets and a very elusive larger snail (from the sand bucket mentioned above). I don't see any signs of him snacking on anything.
He was dead this morning.
He liked to hang from things draping himself over the water return pipe, the powerhead that was already in there, and even the small heater in the display tank. The smaller powerhead was from the biocube, a 750 Koralia I think.
I'm left wondering if:
his tail got sucked into the more powerful powerhead and caused his injury. I was preparing saltwater to do a change - I've gone to daily water changes in the biocube in the past to maintain quality, in this case it was just something to try despite the good test data.
The powerheads had some sort of electrical leak.
The powerheads stirred up something from the rock that harmed him. I positioned them to send flow towards the rocks, and there was some detritus/grains of sand being moved, but not from the sand bed and not enough to cloud the water.
The end of his life cycle? This seems unlikely, after two years (of course, no idea how old he was at the LFS). He's about 8.5 inches long, I just measured him much more accurately than the estimates when he was alive. Liveaquaria lists 18" as the upper range of size.
My plan was to set up the biocube as the quarantine tank and introduce a couple more fish later on. I'd like to figure out, as much as possible, what happened to Wolfie before putting any other fish or eels in the tank.
Thanks.
so I just fished a stiff Green Wolf Eel out of my tank. RIP Wolfie (not very original name, chosen by my son).
He died in a 120 gallon FOWLR tank with a 30 gallon sump. Deep sand bed, 120 pounds of live rock, mostly from Marco Rocks (90lbs), some live seed rock (the other 30). The sand bed is mostly sand from Marco (150 lbs maybe?) along with a 5 gallon bucket of sand from an established tank (this had sat in the bucket for about 12 weeks, was still live but the lower layer smelled like rotten eggs so I didn't put it in the tank. There was a snail still living in the sand after months in a sealed bucket).
Water tests from an API kit:
Ammonia - 0
Nitrates - 0
Nitrites - 0
PH - 8.3
Salinity - 1.024 (refractometer)
The tank has been up and running for 9 weeks, and he went in the tank about a month ago. We've had the eel for about two years. Prior to putting him in this tank he was in a 29 gallon biocube, which was too small for him (as I learned as I went along). I became pretty darn good at maintaining water quality and keeping him healthy, until we were able to set up the larger tank and transfer him to his new domain.
The day before yesterday I put two new Koralia 1500 powerheads in the tank. Yesterday I went to feed him (every two days, shrimp and/or halibut pieces, last feeding time he had done his usual hunter act, like an arrow from a bow towards the prey.). He was on the bottom of the tank, looking in distress, breathing very heavily, with what looked to be an injury to his tail. A hermit crab was picking at the injury, and he wasn't stopping it. He didn't eat. I moved the crab away and turned off the new powerheads thinking some sort of electrical problem may be the issue.
He had a prior injury to his tail from a bite from a chainlink eel, so this fresh injury may have been that re-opening due to ill health.
At various points during the afternoon and evening he moved around a little, but not his usual manner, and at some points he was upside down. Googling at this point led me to believe it may have been something he ate? Other than him the tank has some hermits, some limpets and a very elusive larger snail (from the sand bucket mentioned above). I don't see any signs of him snacking on anything.
He was dead this morning.
He liked to hang from things draping himself over the water return pipe, the powerhead that was already in there, and even the small heater in the display tank. The smaller powerhead was from the biocube, a 750 Koralia I think.
I'm left wondering if:
his tail got sucked into the more powerful powerhead and caused his injury. I was preparing saltwater to do a change - I've gone to daily water changes in the biocube in the past to maintain quality, in this case it was just something to try despite the good test data.
The powerheads had some sort of electrical leak.
The powerheads stirred up something from the rock that harmed him. I positioned them to send flow towards the rocks, and there was some detritus/grains of sand being moved, but not from the sand bed and not enough to cloud the water.
The end of his life cycle? This seems unlikely, after two years (of course, no idea how old he was at the LFS). He's about 8.5 inches long, I just measured him much more accurately than the estimates when he was alive. Liveaquaria lists 18" as the upper range of size.
My plan was to set up the biocube as the quarantine tank and introduce a couple more fish later on. I'd like to figure out, as much as possible, what happened to Wolfie before putting any other fish or eels in the tank.
Thanks.
