Green chromis sick

[jfenton954]

Hi I just ordered 12 chromis and 2 purple fire fish and 1 red fairy wrasse. The wrasse and fire fish are doing good the chromis are dying slowly I've lost 4 and one is laying on the bottom now. I just got them Tuesday drip acclimated them 4+ hours to my hypo-salinity qt tank 1.009. They seem to have scales missing an area is pinkish white. Please help.

 

[Kongor]

most likely fighting amongst each other, how big is your QT?

 

[jfenton954]

40 gallon

 

[DaveK]

Konger is correct in that it is often fighting among themselves. This could also be an infection, so be on the lookout for that too. It the wounds seem to get worse, and the chromis are not fighting, consider an antibiotic for treatment.

 

[reefer gladness]

That's a really large number of fish in a 40g. How frequently are you testing for ammonia? 15 fish will foul up the water very fast, I've never heard of anyone QT'ing that many fish at the same time I wouldn't be surprised if you need to do a couple 10g changes each day to keep water quality in check.

 

[DaveK]

... I just got them Tuesday drip acclimated them 4+ hours to my hypo-salinity qt tank 1.009. ...
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Am I reading this correctly?

Are you saying you took newly received fish in water that was about normal SW with a SG of 1.025 or so, and drip acclimated them to SW at 1.009 over only 4 hours?

If I'm reading this correctly, it was a mistake. That is far too fast to make that big a change. A change that large, that fast, puts a lot of stress on the fish. Typically you should make a change like that over at least several days.

At this point, stay with things the way they are. Trying to change things back will cause even more stress.

 

[jfenton954]

Ok thanks guys

 

[hummer41269]

So if You buy a fish from shop and say the lfs has a low sw number and yours are normal then what would tou do

 

[DaveK]

So if You buy a fish from shop and say the lfs has a low sw number and yours are normal then what would tou do

This is another reason you have a quarantine tank. You can dilute the SG down, using ro/DI water, and use the quarantine tank right away. What you can't do is add salt to increase SG, since that takes time to dissolve.

In the case of the OP, the change in SG went from what you'd expect in an LFS, about 1.020 - 1.025, to the op's quarantine tank at 1.009. This is a massive drop, and a major problem.

Now if you don't have a quarantine tank, and then you should be taking the water the fish was shipped in and adjusting it to the SG of your tank. Typically this will only be a small amount, say from 1.022 to 1.025 or so. That change most fish will handle with out too much trouble.

One other point about acclimating livestock. Never add any water the fish was shipped in to your system. Consider it contaminated and discard it. This means you will need at least some premixed SW to make up the water used from the display tank for acclimation process.