Dwarf Angelfish trouble - everyone has died!

[robin623]

I am new to saltwater aquariums and this forum (My display tank has only been running about 4 months.) I have done my homework in terms of water chemistry etc. I use only deionized water adjusted to 1.022-1.023. I currently have 2 Tomato Clownfish, 1 Valentini Toby, a Bluehead Wrasse and 2 Peppermint shrimp and they are all doing well. But I have trouble keeping Dwarf Angelfish alive. My first one (Coral Beauty from LFS) lasted 3 weeks, my second one (also Coral Beauty from an online supplier) lasted 3 days. The last one (Flame Angel from a different online supplier) died today during the last 15 minutes of the acclimation process. In other words he did not even make it to the quarantine tank! I am determined to have a Flame Angelfish in my 90 Gallon FOWLR tank but I am clueless about what is going wrong. Maybe I am not applying some step in the introduction process that is crucial to Dwarf Angelfish or just have bad luck and circumstances beyond my control have caused the deaths. Please help!

 

[SarahSmile]

I am so sorry to hear of your troubles Robin. I am glad to hear that your other livestock are doing well though. I added a flame angel a while ago and he died within 48 hours of being in my tnak and he took quite a few fish with him. I never determined if he had a disease or what. They special ordered him in for me so he was only at the LFS for half a day and part of me thought it was shipping stress. My next go round I made sure to keep an eye on an existing flame angel at my LFS, after he was there a month I figured, well, he survived here, surely he will survive in my tank. I've had him for months now. I can only advise, try to get your next dwarf angel after he has been at the shop for a while.
I personally won't order fish or buy a fish that has just come in, I think a lot of them can't deal with the shipping.
Just my opinion.

 

[Kelz88]

Had a flame angel die on me and i believe it took out my cardinals as well. To this day im not sure what got him.

I put a pair of clowns, then a hawkfish, then a bi color angel in the tank and that time the angel faired better. I would love another flame angel, but i dont have 90$ to throw away on something ive managed kill once already.

I used a used tank for them, and it may have been old copper treatment, or bacteria that managed to survive from the freshwater set up. Or it could be as sarah mentioned, shipping. Mine took a 5 hour bus trip to me, and 5 hours on a bus is enough to stress anyone.

Edit: Also what are your water params?

 

[wontonflip]

Yes, more water paremeters would help.

But sometimes, it's just bad luck :( Is it possible the coral beauty was bullied to death? Are you sure you don't have anything in the tank that might've attacked it, like a mantis?

The one that died w/i 15 min sounds more like a fish in poor health. H ow are you acclimating? The best way to acclimate is the drip method. I've had no fish deaths after a nice long 2-3 hour drip acclimation.

https://www.livingreefs.com/acclimation-t440.html

 

[Kelz88]

lol i remember i left a fishy to drip acclimate, and i forgot to make the knot. I ended up just throwing him in, and he made it ok lol. Big puddle of water i had to clean though. :/

 

[Northstar24]

We need water parameters, and a run down of any and all equipment that you have on the setup, as well as the acclimation process that you're using

You've said that you've done your homework, but assuming a 6 week cycle, you've probably added fish too fast to our system

 

[SarahSmile]

Yes, but, she lost the fish during acclimation, didn't even get to put it in the qt tank. Surely that cannot be a system that was stocked too quickly issue related death. Not that I am saying she has that issue, as I do not know.

 

[RockStacker]

Sorry to hear about the fish deaths.
I too have recently added a flame angelfish that looked healthy but died suddenly after being in the tank for just over two weeks.
Prior to that it was eating well and there were no signs of stress or illness (or at least none that I could observe).

 

[Smitty]

Everyone has you covered...welcome to the site, hopefully we can help you find the issue.

 

[FishyReef]

For the ones that were shipped, it may actually be a case of acclimating them too slowly. When they ship fish, waste levels can build up which isn't a problem when the bag is sealed, but when the bag is opened the increased oxygen will cause the ammonia levels to rise rapidly. Some people just float the bag to temp acclimate and then throw the fish right into their display tank. I personally have done both the drip acclimation method and the shot glass acclimation method and haven't lost a fish with either, but if you've been doing drip acclimation, it may be worth trying a faster route instead (such as a shot glass of tank water every 5min for 30min and then adding the fish to your tank). Also, there are a lot of online dealers and only a very few that are reputable. I've purchased about half of my fish online and as a rule of thumb I only buy from places that have a 2 week life guarantee - this tells me they believe in the health and quality of their livestock and shipping otherwise would go out of business pretty quickly! If you don't mind me asking, which online dealers did you buy the fish from?