New group all dead overnite!

m3h3c3 · Post by **m3h3c3** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 2:55 am

Hi,

Just received a group of eleven 2" wilds Friday. They were drip acclimated for about an hr so the volume of water was doubled. They were shipped in tap water 7.6ph 180ppm and put into tank of soft water 7.0 ph and 20ppm. All of them were dead the next day, some showing redness in the underbelly and fin attachments.

I tested the water and there are no measurable ammonia, nitrite or nitrates. I put a cheap discus in the same tank to see if there was something toxic in the water but the fish has been fine and eating.

Any idea what happened?

dreville · Post by **dreville** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 3:18 pm

Wow, I'm so sorry about your loss.

Just curious, did they show signs of stress while they were being drip-acclimated?

I'm thinking that if after an hour, they still showed signs of stress, I would have extended the drip-acclimation.

I'm not exactly sure, maybe others will chime in, but that's kind of a big difference in dissolved solids too. No? 180ppm vs 20ppm? Do you have a water softener?

m3h3c3 · Post by **m3h3c3** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 3:33 pm

They were all actually calmly sitting at the bottom, moving around every once in a while. I few of them were more faded in striping than others but I attributed to shipping stress. I set up the tank to replicate Xingu conditions as best as possible with temp and hardness. Water was made with RO unit and essential minerals added back in.

Post by **TwoTankAmin** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 7:08 pm

My first guess is that the change in TDS was simply too extreme. In the wild the difference between the dry and rainy season extremes is about 60 ppm give or take. Rainy season low TDS are about 15 ppm and dry season highs about 85ppm. What were the "essential" minerals that were added back?

The next thing that occurs to me is that they were shipped with a chemical in the water intended to calm them down etc. However, you did not mention anything about this.

Finally, since wild caught fish are all illegally obtained and smuggled out of Brazil in contravention of their laws, the fish do not have an easy time of the trip. They are most likeley mistreated most of the way from there to here. So it is also possible the importer never bothered to quarantine them for a sufficient time to insure they were in good condition before they were shipped to you.

m3h3c3 · Post by **m3h3c3** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 7:31 pm

Thank you for the information....it may be the change in TDS but dripped over an hour I thought would be sufficient. Would that cause the redness in the underbellies? I will have to ask the supplier, he is Saul of unungy.com and advised me he had QT'd the fish for almost a month.

I will also ask him about any calming chemicals.

upc239 · Post by **upc239** » Thu Jan 05, 2012 3:36 am

Same thing happened to me, same importer, same symptoms.

Did you test the water for ammonia & nitrites after the incident?

I was devasted...but it must have been something we did wrong. I drip acclimatized them for 4 hours.

Lesson learnt!

jsalas623 · Post by **jsalas623** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:51 am

Wow!! Sorry for your loss

If Saul used tap water with 7.8 ph. I would have probably tried to replicate his water parameters. Going from 7.8 to 7ph would cause more stress to the fish even more so if using only RO water. I usually mix half RO and half tap water n usually that keeps my fish happy. My tap water ph is 7.8 and my RO water is about 7. Maybe there was something else out of ordinary which caused this. Me personally I would LOVE to have a WC zebra but I'd prefer a Zebra that was more acclimated to tap water.

Post by **TwoTankAmin** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 4:23 pm

As I posted earlier- its the tds change- it was simply too much. You can not drip acclimate for that big a change.

I have gotten zebras from Saul. The went through about a 4-5 week Q period and went into my breeder tank and there was a spawn soon after. I know lots of folks who have fish from him and for the most part all his have done well for them.

jsalas623 · Post by **jsalas623** » Fri Feb 10, 2012 1:28 am

Yeah I agree ideal rang is 150ppm.

lzebra · Post by **lzebra** » Fri Feb 10, 2012 4:53 am

wow, keeping fish in low tds is dangerous imo. with tds 20ppm, the ph of 7.0 will drop to 5.0 within a week of having fish in there

Post by **TwoTankAmin** » Sun Feb 12, 2012 2:16 am

zebras are fine in low tds. They do not want to be in acid water. they can take it warm, too. The drop in this case was too extreme at 160 ppm change, imo.

Mr. Johnson · Post by **Mr. Johnson** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 9:07 am

Where they shipped in blue or green water?

Is the selling doing anything for y'all?