Clown fish emergency!

I am new to saltwater.

I bought a 1 inch clown fish 6 days ago. He appeared healthy and was swimming all over my tank. My tank is brand new. Dead rock became live with bacteria when tank cycled. Its 37 gallon tank and he is the only fish in there.

He never seemed to eat all that much. I fed him once a day in the evening. Fish flake food. Usually 1 large flake crumbled into smaller pieces. The second day I had him I tried feeding him 1/4 cube of frozen mysis shrimp (waiting for it to melt before introducing it to the tank) but he didn't seem to eat much of that at all. He seemed to prefer the flake food.

Last night I fed him some flake and he ate some. This morning I saw him swimming at the bottom corner of the tank. 20 minutes later I saw him floating through all around the tank including hanging out next to my mp10 powerhead. I noticed one of his gills seems purplish and he appears to have a little slime on him but not much. Now he is sitting at the bottom of the tank. What do I do?!?!

-Capt. Ron

Is he actually sitting on the bottom? Like laying on the substrate? Or his he swimming (hovering) near the bottom?

Do you have test kits to test for:

pH
ammonia
nitrite
nitrate

And what is your tank's temperature and salinity?

How did you acclimate the fish?

everything measured in last 20 minutes

ammonia not detectable
nitrite not detectable
nitrate 10-15
ph 8.0
temperature 77
salinity 1.026

While I don't measure every day, I don't think anything strayed from these parameters over the last few days other than maybe salinity going from 1.025 to 1.026 but I've had very little evaporation.

Right now he is hidding upright (proper fish orientation) at bottom back of the tank where the rock meets the gravel and not moving. It seems before he was always moving his fins 24/7.

Picture attached but its poor quality.

Bifferwine said:

Is he actually sitting on the bottom? Like laying on the substrate? Or his he swimming (hovering) near the bottom?

Do you have test kits to test for:

pH
ammonia
nitrite
nitrate

And what is your tank's temperature and salinity?

How did you acclimate the fish?

Click to expand...

I acclimated via drip over about 40 minutes I think. drip 4-7 drops/sec. wait til water doubles, dump half, repeat, net, and introduce into tank. I acclimated 3 snail seperately after that and they appear to be okay.

Also,

I don't know if its related, but I've had a film/particulates on the surface of the water for awhile. I just moved the MP10 within 1 inch of the water line to break it up a bit. Photos attached. I'm looking into ordering a skimmer (maybe a tunze 9002) to help with that.

All your parameters are fine and your acclimation procedure seems fine too. I don't know what to say... It may be normal clown behavior (they act weird a lot of times). I doubt that film has anything to do with it -- that will happen if you don't have enough surface agitation in the tank.

Well he hasn't moved since I took the picture. I think he may be dead :sniffles:

How long should I wait before I try and extract him from the tank? I hope my wife isn't too upset. She really liked the fish.

I found this site: FAQs on Marine Velvet, Amyloodiniumiasis, Diagnosis/Symptomology But who knows. I don't have a microscope.

Could I have stressed the fish to death some how?

He may not be dead. Can you take a chopstick (or something) and poke at him and see if he moves?

It doesn't sound like you did anything wrong. I am assuming this is the first fish? If so, then I can understand how you think it's your fault or something is wrong with the tank. But that's not always the case. I doubt it was velvet -- you would have probably seen signs of the disease.

A one-inch clownfish is very small. The smaller they are, the lower the chances of survival (for almost all fish, not just clowns). If the fish is dead, I'd wait a few days (to make sure your ammonia and nitrites don't spike), then try again. But this time try with a bigger (more mature) fish.

Sometimes it just happens, and we don't know why. It may have been stress, the fish may have been unhealthy to begin with -- who knows?

Bifferwine said:

He may not be dead. Can you take a chopstick (or something) and poke at him and see if he moves?

It doesn't sound like you did anything wrong. I am assuming this is the first fish? If so, then I can understand how you think it's your fault or something is wrong with the tank. But that's not always the case. I doubt it was velvet -- you would have probably seen signs of the disease.

A one-inch clownfish is very small. The smaller they are, the lower the chances of survival (for almost all fish, not just clowns). If the fish is dead, I'd wait a few days (to make sure your ammonia and nitrites don't spike), then try again. But this time try with a bigger (more mature) fish.

Sometimes it just happens, and we don't know why. It may have been stress, the fish may have been unhealthy to begin with -- who knows?

Click to expand...

It is my first fish. I flipped him upside down, his head is slightly violet/purplish and he is unmoving.

I'll measure him when I remove him from the water this afternoon. He may be 1.5 or 1.75 inches, definitely less than 2 from end to end. If I try another clown how big should he be?

In the mean time I'll google search for tips on minimizing stress to fish.

If he let you touch him, then he's a goner. Sorry. :( If you can find a 2 inch clown that would be good. But the bigger the better.

+1 everyone....sounds like you did everything right, but sometimes, fish die from the stress of the move. He may have already been sick at the store. Did you see him eat at the store?

Definitely wait a while before adding another fish. Before you get a fish, make sure to have the lfs feed them in front of you to make sure they eat. And switch to frozen instead of flake food. Flakes are high in phosphates and they're just not that healthy.

And definitely try to get a bigger clownfish to increase their survival chances.

wontonflip said:

+1 everyone....sounds like you did everything right, but sometimes, fish die from the stress of the move. He may have already been sick at the store. Did you see him eat at the store?

Definitely wait a while before adding another fish. Before you get a fish, make sure to have the lfs feed them in front of you to make sure they eat. And switch to frozen instead of flake food. Flakes are high in phosphates and they're just not that healthy.

And definitely try to get a bigger clownfish to increase their survival chances.

Click to expand...

Yeah I had them feed him at the store. They squirted in what I think was brine shrimp. He was all over that. My wife thinks maybe he didn't get enough oxygen. I'm going to buy another powerhead (been thinking about that before) and maybe a test kit for dissolved oxygen. Any recommendation for frozen food? The fish was 1.5 inches. Next time I'll find a 2+ inch fish. I think I have more reading ahead of me before another fish.

Oooooh...didn't know you had no powerheads. They're definitely a must. It should make ripples on the surface to promote proper oxygenation.

Brine shrimp is not healthy as a daily food. It's like candy to fish...they love it but not exactly healthy ;) I use Hikari or Emerald Entree mixes. Rod's food is also great, but also more expensive and harder to find.

An MP10 in a 37g should be fine to oxygenate the water, especially now that you've moved it closer to the surface. I agree with everyone else - sounds like you did everything right, and for whatever reason he just didn't adjust well. When you removed him, did you see any sign of tiny white spots on him? If not, then I think you are pretty safe from it being marine velvet. I agree the maroon coloring is a bit odd, but fish change colors when they die - the first one I had that died turned almost black in a very short period of time. Also, for what its worth, I recently lost all of the fish in my 10g tank to some unknown aggressive bacterial infection - they were fine one day, and dead the next with flesh rotting off. One of the pieces of advice I got was to run my tank water through a UV sterlizer to kill off any potential remaining bacteria. I borrowed one and ran it through and just added a fish tonight to test out the tank. If you try another fish and find something similar happen with the next one, then it might be worth thinking more about a potential disease in your tank, otherwise I think its a safe bet that your little guy just didn't adjust well, and its not something you did!