Blue Hippo Tang Dead Please Help!

[Emily3150]

Hello! i need some advice, my blue hippo tank (I got it last Christmas as a juvenile) was eating Well, swimming like normal, and had no itch marks or parasites on him this morning. He seemed perfectly healthy and after writing an exam I went to admire my tank and found him DEAD, completely stiff and pale on one side! So after sobbing for a good 30 minutes I took him out and buried him of course my partner (who does the majority of the maintenance) is out of town what do I do! I am just scared all my other fish are going to parish! I have two black clowns, a juvenile yellow tang, cleaner shrimp, and flaming angel fish! My partner had bought a bubble tip anemone on Facebook marketplace about five days ago, could that have killed my fish? Also my shrim is missing a leg! I have a 70 gallon salt water tank with a sump tank and protein skimmer, the light had gone off yesterday (for heat control) could that have done it? I’ve never done a water change alone should I wait until he is back tomorrow at 1pm?

 

[DaveK]

Sorry to hear about the loos of you hippo tang. It's often not easy to determin the exact cause of death, but if I had to take an educated guess at it, I think it would be the fish blundering into the bubble tip anemone. Another possible cause would be the two tangs getting into a major tank.

Before you do a massive water change carefully look for problems with the other fish, like disease issues, damage to the fish, breathing hard and so on. It is unlikely the light being odd would have caused an issue. Although I would look into lighting that doesn't heat up the water so much.

Other things to check. Test the water for ammonia and nitrites. Look for excessive skimmate production from your skimmer, as this can indicate that something big dies int the tank. Cloudy water or really bad smelling water may also indicate a problem

I would also recommend that you don't get another tang One tang in a 70 gal system is asking a lot of it as is. Two tangs is really too many.

 

[Emily3150]

Sorry to hear about the loos of you hippo tang. It's often not easy to determin the exact cause of death, but if I had to take an educated guess at it, I think it would be the fish blundering into the bubble tip anemone. Another possible cause would be the two tangs getting into a major tank.

Before you do a massive water change carefully look for problems with the other fish, like disease issues, damage to the fish, breathing hard and so on. It is unlikely the light being odd would have caused an issue. Although I would look into lighting that doesn't heat up the water so much.

Other things to check. Test the water for ammonia and nitrites. Look for excessive skimmate production from your skimmer, as this can indicate that something big dies int the tank. Cloudy water or really bad smelling water may also indicate a problem

I would also recommend that you don't get another tang One tang in a 70 gal system is asking a lot of it as is. Two tangs is really too many.

Thank you for this advice I had previously thought that the tangs preferred company and that’s why we got the second tang, I will remember this moving forward! The other fish started breathing heavy and sadly my flamming angelfish died as well I have vacuumed the gavel, done a 10% water change put in new socks and sponges and deep cleaned my protein skimmer. They are doing better now!

 

[PSU4ME]

So are the fish clean looking or do they have salt grains or a mucus type look to them? Wondering if the anemone brought in velvet

 

[kyabolu05]

It does look like it's not the healthiest. I would keep seaweed strips for it to graze on everyday and make sure to feed it a few times a day with some high quality foods possibly enhanced with something like garlic, selcon or something. I got a rabbit from my lfs for cheap that was looking rough and it made it with these steps. Watch for ich spots also because stressed tangs highly at risk for it. Good luck, hopefully all goes well.

 

[DaveK]

It does look like it's not the healthiest. I would keep seaweed strips for it to graze on everyday and make sure to feed it a few times a day with some high quality foods possibly enhanced with something like garlic, selcon or something. I got a rabbit from my lfs for cheap that was looking rough and it made it with these steps. Watch for ich spots also because stressed tangs highly at risk for it. Good luck, hopefully all goes well.

Welcome to RS. Always nice to see new people. However, the original post was from over a year ago, so by now the fish is either fully recovered or gone to "the great aquarium in the sky". Still your advice is quite correct for dealing with tangs that don't look good, so it might help someone else.