Buying Fish online

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

Guys I need advice. I ordered fish online and they were shipped on the 16th at 3pm for delivery today (17th) before noon. The driver didn’t bother delivering it and has taken it back to the depot. Now they are saying they will try contact me tomorrow to make the delivery. I took a day off work for today AHHH.

My question is how likely are the fish to be alive if the delivery happens tomorrow (18th) at 3/4pm. And how should I acclimate them. There is a yellow tang, blue tang , and a fox face rabbitfish.
I ordered from a website called masterfisch.com

So annoying as tomorrow no one is home, except my dad and he knows very little about salt water fish so have no idea what to do.

YMRreefer · Jun 17, 2020

Call the depot and try to go pick it up asap. I would explain the situation as best you can to them (i.e. live contents!) . You may have to wait for the truck to get back but I would do everything possible to get the fish today...

Fred2482 · Jun 17, 2020

+1 call them. Depending on how they were packaged (and handled) fish can survive in the bag for 2 days.

homer1475 · Jun 17, 2020

+2 CALL THEM!

UPS did that one time to me, and they allowed me to go to the depot and pick the package up once the driver returned.

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

homer1475 said:
+2 CALL THEM!

UPS did that one time to me, and they allowed me to go to the depot and pick the package up once the driver returned.

I called at 7:30 the driver was back at 7:28pm but they said no they’re closed now? I don’t understand why it wasn’t delivered regardless it was on a time stamp for between 9am and 12pm

blueface · Jun 17, 2020

Always have your live shipments held for you to pick up instead of driving around all day in the truck.

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

blueface said:
Always have your live shipments held for you to pick up instead of driving around all day in the truck.

I paid for priority posting it should of been the first delivery seeing as the depot is 1 mile from me

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

How do I go about acclimating them if they are alive?

Fred2482 · Jun 17, 2020

Are they going into QT? If so just temp acclimate by floating bag. If not, I would drip as normal.

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

Fred2482 said:
Are they going into QT? If so just temp acclimate by floating bag. If not, I would drip as normal.

Yes quarantine tank so just float and put them in?

homer1475 · Jun 17, 2020

Yes, float and dump if going into a QT.

With them being in the bag for more then 24H, your going to have massive ammonia buildup when you open the bag. Do not drip in this situation, match your QT to the bags salinity, float for temp, then dump in.

Shesame · Jun 17, 2020

I would still drip acclimate them i you can. The only reason i would just put them in is if the water quality is really bad and I would prefer to drip acclimate them faster then normally. Maybe prepare everything tonight and show your father how to do for tomorrow ? Finger cross and tell us tomorrow how it went.

YMRreefer · Jun 17, 2020

If it were me - I would float them for temp and get them out of the bags into QT as quick as you can. I'm sure ammonia is going to be high in those transport bags after all that time.

NowGlazeIT · Jun 17, 2020

Temperature and salinity match.
1st- open the box And float the bags in the tank your putting them in. That will match the temp.
2nd- meanwhile open a bag, take a sample and check the salinity. If the salinity is a close match then add the fish after the bags have floated for 15min.

homer1475 · Jun 17, 2020

Shesame said:
I would still drip acclimate them i you can. The only reason i would just put them in is if the water quality is really bad and I would prefer to drip acclimate them faster then normally. Maybe prepare everything tonight and show your father how to do for tomorrow ? Finger cross and tell us tomorrow how it went.

Only reason to drip acclimate is to match salinity from bag to DT.

In this case hes using a QT tank so just match the QT to the bags salinity. With the fish being in the bag for so long, your likely to kill them(massive ammonia build up when exposing the water to air) by drip acclimating in this situation.

Saaqib_Ansari · Jun 17, 2020

Trying to explain this to my 70 year old father with little English yikes, I’m just going to be stressed at work tomorrow

homer1475 · Jun 17, 2020

If it were me, I would just set my QT to 1.020 and have my father just float for 10minutes, then dump in. Easiest thing for him to do, and the fish can handle a large drop in salinity better then a large increase.

vetteguy53081 · Jun 17, 2020

ask for a facility supervisor and go retrieve them or it will be too late.

Savo · Jun 17, 2020

Who’s the shipping company?

DaneGer21 · Jun 17, 2020

Do not, I repeat, do not drip acclimate using only the bag water because of ammonia reasons.

Match QT to the bags salinity, float for 10-15mins for temps, dump in QT.

If your QT is small, I would even dump the bag water down the drain and not into the QT. Lay a net over a bucket, dump fish into the net, put netted fish in QT. Discard bag/bucket water