reddogf5
Active Member
I am so disappointed with the state of this hobby at the moment, and ready to quit. I have just been getting back in after stopping for a few years, and am beginning to remember why I quit.
Start with fish. I have spent about $500 on fish in the last few months. Started with two from the LFS. They had ich, so in to QT they went while the tank is fallow. Decided while I am QTing them, it would be a good time to get the others we want to add. Ordered 4 from Live Aquaria. Three were essentially DOA, dying the morning after arrival, the next morning, and the next. The two from the LFS and the remaining mail order fish made it through copper, and were in a sperate observation tank. the remaining mail order fish died in observation, and then I THINK the tank got overwhelmed with ammonia, even though it had media and I added Fritz live bacteria to jump start the bio filter. This morning the Tang was dead.
Foolishly thinking things were looking up, we had ordered three replacements from LA for the first batch of fish, arrived late last week. This time I wanted to absolutely minimize stress, so the initial fill on the treatment tank was at a low salinity, which I matched to the bag water, acclimated them for an hour, then introduced them. No copper to start, I just wanted to get them eating and acclimated to the tank. This morning one of the three, a wrasse, is also dead.
So out of 9 fish, 6 are dead before making it through QT. 5 of 7 mail order from LA, and 1 of 2 from the LFS. I have no idea what I can do differently, I followed the QT procedure from humble.fish, slowly ramped up the copper, soaked their food in general cure and focus, and treated the water with Metro. Still all dead.
My bigger gripe is WHY should I have to quarantine the fish in the first place? How is it acceptable that pets should come from the store riddled with disease to the point if you don't treat them, they will infect your home and kill themselves and all your other pets? In what other pets is this acceptable? if someone said "sorry your dog was DOA, we'll send another one out right away, you just have to pay for shipping. And tax", Sarah McLachlan would have el-kabonged them into submission with her guitar ages ago. Yet, here we sit, accepting diseased, unhealthy pets and wonder what WE did wrong to kill them.
We visited three local fish stores, and all of them had signs of ich in their tanks. All of them had bubble and hair algae in their tanks. All of them had aiptasia in their tanks. One had dead fish floating around in some of their tanks. So buying local is no solution, the fish perhaps bypass shipping stress, but still need to be decontaminated and nursed back to health.
And the original issue that caused me to quit is still going strong - hair algae. The tank is overrun with it. The tang and blennie were keeping it in check, until they had to be removed due to the ich. But that isn't really a solution, it is just a band aid masking the problem. And still, no one *knows* how to eliminate it. Sure, people will point to phosphates and nitrates, or suggest growing cheato, or carbon dosing, or scrubbing with peroxide. Tried them all, no bueno. In fact, I will bet there is not a tank that has been up for at least 5 years, gotten hair algae, then had it eliminated for 5 years after without a wholesale change of everything or critters that eat it.
Rant over, thanks for listening, I think I feel a little better now.
Start with fish. I have spent about $500 on fish in the last few months. Started with two from the LFS. They had ich, so in to QT they went while the tank is fallow. Decided while I am QTing them, it would be a good time to get the others we want to add. Ordered 4 from Live Aquaria. Three were essentially DOA, dying the morning after arrival, the next morning, and the next. The two from the LFS and the remaining mail order fish made it through copper, and were in a sperate observation tank. the remaining mail order fish died in observation, and then I THINK the tank got overwhelmed with ammonia, even though it had media and I added Fritz live bacteria to jump start the bio filter. This morning the Tang was dead.
Foolishly thinking things were looking up, we had ordered three replacements from LA for the first batch of fish, arrived late last week. This time I wanted to absolutely minimize stress, so the initial fill on the treatment tank was at a low salinity, which I matched to the bag water, acclimated them for an hour, then introduced them. No copper to start, I just wanted to get them eating and acclimated to the tank. This morning one of the three, a wrasse, is also dead.
So out of 9 fish, 6 are dead before making it through QT. 5 of 7 mail order from LA, and 1 of 2 from the LFS. I have no idea what I can do differently, I followed the QT procedure from humble.fish, slowly ramped up the copper, soaked their food in general cure and focus, and treated the water with Metro. Still all dead.
My bigger gripe is WHY should I have to quarantine the fish in the first place? How is it acceptable that pets should come from the store riddled with disease to the point if you don't treat them, they will infect your home and kill themselves and all your other pets? In what other pets is this acceptable? if someone said "sorry your dog was DOA, we'll send another one out right away, you just have to pay for shipping. And tax", Sarah McLachlan would have el-kabonged them into submission with her guitar ages ago. Yet, here we sit, accepting diseased, unhealthy pets and wonder what WE did wrong to kill them.
We visited three local fish stores, and all of them had signs of ich in their tanks. All of them had bubble and hair algae in their tanks. All of them had aiptasia in their tanks. One had dead fish floating around in some of their tanks. So buying local is no solution, the fish perhaps bypass shipping stress, but still need to be decontaminated and nursed back to health.
And the original issue that caused me to quit is still going strong - hair algae. The tank is overrun with it. The tang and blennie were keeping it in check, until they had to be removed due to the ich. But that isn't really a solution, it is just a band aid masking the problem. And still, no one *knows* how to eliminate it. Sure, people will point to phosphates and nitrates, or suggest growing cheato, or carbon dosing, or scrubbing with peroxide. Tried them all, no bueno. In fact, I will bet there is not a tank that has been up for at least 5 years, gotten hair algae, then had it eliminated for 5 years after without a wholesale change of everything or critters that eat it.
Rant over, thanks for listening, I think I feel a little better now.
