Lee
Member
So I'm a little concerned about this, and I wanted to get other people's input.
Until this point, I had purchased all of my fish from local fish stores. When I put them into quarantine, they are usually spooked for a little while, and like to hide a lot, but they otherwise act the way you'd expect a marine fish to act.
On Friday, I ordered a fish from an online retailer only because they are very rare and I haven't been able to find one elsewhere. Before I tell you about this, I'll say that I've helped a friend who used to run a LFS unload shipments in the past. The fish arrive in boxes marked LIVESTOCK, LIVE FISH, FRAGILE, etc. The boxes even had PICTURES of fish on the box, so that people of any nationality could recognize that this box should be handled extremely gently. The fish were in bags with lots of water and room to move around, like when you buy a fish from a store. When loading these fish into their holding tanks at the LFS, they were usually very spooked, but nothing out of the ordinary. They were typically very actively swimming for cover when removed from their bags.
So I get this fish overnighted from Florida, and the FedEx driver hands me an unmarked cardboard box with Saturday delivery stickers all over it. Absolutely no mention of the fragility of the contents. The box had a shipping label, and 5 stickers saying "Saturday Delivery." It was otherwise blank. This woman could have picked up a freakin black magic marker and written FRAGILE on the box and it would have taken her six seconds. Instead she did nothing. My level of concern/skepticism rose about 8 notches.
:down:
I cut open the Styrofoam container, remove some newspaper padding, and find a bag approximately 5" wide filled with roughly 20oz of water, and a 4" long fish laying sideways, flattened from the weight of the unfilled plastic bag crushing him, unable to move, clinging to life with every last breath. He was almost completely white. (which is not his native color) Imagine picking up a fish at a LFS, then draining out about 75% of the water in the bag and setting the bag down. The bag would flatten due to the lack of water. This is what I was looking at, only with a big beautiful fish wedged in it.
:down: :down:
So I cut open the bag and floated it in the QT and watched in horror as he laid on his side flapping his fins and breathing heavy. Out of fear for his life, I had to skip the drip-acclimation process and just added some tank water to his bag after a few minutes of floating it, simply because there was no water in his bag! When I finally let him out after 15 minutes or so, he fell to the bottom of the tank and laid there on his side for about 3-4 hours. Due to the nature of his packaging, I was very concerned that he had sustained some injuries, and thats why he was laying flat on his side. I've never seen a fish arrive in this condition before at the LFS. Probably because those shippers actually MARK THEIR PACKAGES so as to avoid the FedEx factory workers from punting your box across their warehouse.
:down: :down: :down:
At this point, I got a delivery confirmation email, signaling to the seller that I had received the fish, and the DOA guarantee was fulfilled unless I called them ASAP. Meanwhile, I have a super-rare, $100 fish going comatose in my quarantine tank. My concern for the fish's health FAR outweighed my concern for the potentially wasted money, but regardless, what could I do? If I call her and say he's DOA, what if he survives? Then I have two fish who can't co-exist peacefully and I would be doing them a disservice, or I wait and possibly lose the fish and go to battle with the seller later on...
:down: :down: :down: :down:
So I'd like to hear your opinions on this, as well as your experiences with having fish delivered to you. Again, my main concerns were: 1) lack of markings on box, 2) small bag for largish fish, and 3) lack of water in the bag, 4) Exotic beauty arriving shocked, frightened, near comatose. I'm probably going to write this woman a letter to address my concerns, and the TONE of said letter will depend on the input I get here...
Until this point, I had purchased all of my fish from local fish stores. When I put them into quarantine, they are usually spooked for a little while, and like to hide a lot, but they otherwise act the way you'd expect a marine fish to act.
On Friday, I ordered a fish from an online retailer only because they are very rare and I haven't been able to find one elsewhere. Before I tell you about this, I'll say that I've helped a friend who used to run a LFS unload shipments in the past. The fish arrive in boxes marked LIVESTOCK, LIVE FISH, FRAGILE, etc. The boxes even had PICTURES of fish on the box, so that people of any nationality could recognize that this box should be handled extremely gently. The fish were in bags with lots of water and room to move around, like when you buy a fish from a store. When loading these fish into their holding tanks at the LFS, they were usually very spooked, but nothing out of the ordinary. They were typically very actively swimming for cover when removed from their bags.
So I get this fish overnighted from Florida, and the FedEx driver hands me an unmarked cardboard box with Saturday delivery stickers all over it. Absolutely no mention of the fragility of the contents. The box had a shipping label, and 5 stickers saying "Saturday Delivery." It was otherwise blank. This woman could have picked up a freakin black magic marker and written FRAGILE on the box and it would have taken her six seconds. Instead she did nothing. My level of concern/skepticism rose about 8 notches.
:down:
I cut open the Styrofoam container, remove some newspaper padding, and find a bag approximately 5" wide filled with roughly 20oz of water, and a 4" long fish laying sideways, flattened from the weight of the unfilled plastic bag crushing him, unable to move, clinging to life with every last breath. He was almost completely white. (which is not his native color) Imagine picking up a fish at a LFS, then draining out about 75% of the water in the bag and setting the bag down. The bag would flatten due to the lack of water. This is what I was looking at, only with a big beautiful fish wedged in it.
:down: :down:
So I cut open the bag and floated it in the QT and watched in horror as he laid on his side flapping his fins and breathing heavy. Out of fear for his life, I had to skip the drip-acclimation process and just added some tank water to his bag after a few minutes of floating it, simply because there was no water in his bag! When I finally let him out after 15 minutes or so, he fell to the bottom of the tank and laid there on his side for about 3-4 hours. Due to the nature of his packaging, I was very concerned that he had sustained some injuries, and thats why he was laying flat on his side. I've never seen a fish arrive in this condition before at the LFS. Probably because those shippers actually MARK THEIR PACKAGES so as to avoid the FedEx factory workers from punting your box across their warehouse.
:down: :down: :down:
At this point, I got a delivery confirmation email, signaling to the seller that I had received the fish, and the DOA guarantee was fulfilled unless I called them ASAP. Meanwhile, I have a super-rare, $100 fish going comatose in my quarantine tank. My concern for the fish's health FAR outweighed my concern for the potentially wasted money, but regardless, what could I do? If I call her and say he's DOA, what if he survives? Then I have two fish who can't co-exist peacefully and I would be doing them a disservice, or I wait and possibly lose the fish and go to battle with the seller later on...
:down: :down: :down: :down:
So I'd like to hear your opinions on this, as well as your experiences with having fish delivered to you. Again, my main concerns were: 1) lack of markings on box, 2) small bag for largish fish, and 3) lack of water in the bag, 4) Exotic beauty arriving shocked, frightened, near comatose. I'm probably going to write this woman a letter to address my concerns, and the TONE of said letter will depend on the input I get here...
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