Let me start by saying, I’m new to the hobby. With the help of my friends who have had reef tanks for ~2 years, I purchased a used FOWLR 30 gal tank with 10 gal sump last Thursday. Owner reported tank had been up-and-running for 6 months. It came with two large black ocellaris clowns, live rock, and various small snails. We moved the tank in and got it set up without issue. We preserved ~20 gallons of the water already in the tank and topped it off with ~20 gallons of RODI.
On Monday, we made an obligatory trip to our local reef store. I brought home bicolor blenny, yellow watchman goby, banggai cardinal fish, tiger pistol shrimp, various hermit crabs, and various medium sized snails. We introduced without quarantine. All tank mates seemed to acquiesce. I have been feeding the tank a half cube of Hikari frozen mysis shrimp daily since Tuesday.
Fish behavior was normal until last night (Thursday) toward lights-out time, I noticed the blenny seemed to be bothering his tail.
I came to tank this morning (Friday) to discover the blenny lethargic, breathing rapidly, displaying stress colors, with what appears to be whitened mucus around his dorsal fin and possibly upper mouth (not sure if it’s mucus around his mouth or part of his stress coloring). Of note, he did eat this morning when I fed the mysis shrimp.
Alkalinity = 7.7; nitrate = 0.1; Phosphate = 0.02; salinity is high at 1.029 which I was planning to correct with my next water change. I do not have a means to test pH at this time.
I’ve attached 2 photos under bright white light. Any advice and insight is appreciated. Also, since I’m new, I’m not sure which information is relevant to my blenny’s problem, so I’m sorry if I’ve provided any irrelevant details!
On Monday, we made an obligatory trip to our local reef store. I brought home bicolor blenny, yellow watchman goby, banggai cardinal fish, tiger pistol shrimp, various hermit crabs, and various medium sized snails. We introduced without quarantine. All tank mates seemed to acquiesce. I have been feeding the tank a half cube of Hikari frozen mysis shrimp daily since Tuesday.
Fish behavior was normal until last night (Thursday) toward lights-out time, I noticed the blenny seemed to be bothering his tail.
I came to tank this morning (Friday) to discover the blenny lethargic, breathing rapidly, displaying stress colors, with what appears to be whitened mucus around his dorsal fin and possibly upper mouth (not sure if it’s mucus around his mouth or part of his stress coloring). Of note, he did eat this morning when I fed the mysis shrimp.
Alkalinity = 7.7; nitrate = 0.1; Phosphate = 0.02; salinity is high at 1.029 which I was planning to correct with my next water change. I do not have a means to test pH at this time.
I’ve attached 2 photos under bright white light. Any advice and insight is appreciated. Also, since I’m new, I’m not sure which information is relevant to my blenny’s problem, so I’m sorry if I’ve provided any irrelevant details!