How do you feel about fish deaths?

[xxkenny90xx]

The more expensive the fish, the worse I feel.

+1

 

[Anchor]

The longer I have had a fish the worse I feel.
The more it cost does not matter in feeling bad about a fish death.

My latest is loss of 3 wrasses and a blennie in the last month and a half.

The worst one... was y favorite wrasse. I was using a 12 inch tong to remove algae in a crevasse.. guess what was hiding in that crevasse that I pinched? Solor wrasse.. and I got him right in the middle back.. lived 3 days with no way to save him.. sigh..

Had a Katherines wrasse jump while doing a water change.. Jumped nearly directly into my dogs mouth..

Had a gorgeous Yellow Coris get harassed to death by a Yellow-eyed Kole tang.. been living together for over a year. last 2 weeks the tang was going nuts on it.. put a mirror outside of the tank to decrease its aggression on the wrasse... the tang was in killer mode after that.. Wrasse dead the next day.

I have not figured out what happened with the blennie.. I wanna cry.. I might still..

 

[GeoSquid]

As someone said earlier, It depends on how much I've spent on the fish. There is a definite correlation between cost and sorrow!

 

[RUKelly]

It’s always sad when a fish dies: whether it cost $$$$ or $; whether it was newly acclimated or a 7-yr. resident; whether it’s a wildling or tank-bred; whether some parasite/disease overwhelmed its immune system or a tankmate decided it no longer belonged in the tank; whether it jumped out of its biological boundaries or had live rock earthquaking it to a crushing death (Major tank move due to floor replacement renovation).

Yep, experienced all the above. Sure, I will in the future experience the same or something new. I try to keep informed on my sealife: fish, pretty good; soft corals ok; but mostly corals are now my new horizon I am trying to tread. That’s one reason I joined R2R. I am not good on social media, and am awkward using it. I do enjoy the postings I have read, and thank you all for sharing to the collective.

 

[living_tribunal]

How do you guys feel about fish deaths? To me, I feel terrible about it. I know it is just a fish, but it is an animal, and it could have lived happier left alone in the wild.

I feel terrible, next question.

 

[Clownfish_Boy]

How do you guys feel about fish deaths? To me, I feel terrible about it. I know it is just a fish, but it is an animal, and it could have lived happier left alone in the wild.

Very depressing, especially if it is an expensive fish. I so hate to lose a single fish though, whether it cost $8 or $80.

 

[Clownfish_Boy]

I was so depressed when I lost my Heniochus Butterfly and Cleaner Wrasse; ammonia and nitrite were at zero and there were no signs of disease or foul play..... They were doing fine and eating heartily after having been in the tank a week or so.... Healthy and active one day, then were found dead the next. Still wondering what caused the fish to die (unless it was attacked by the Maroon Clown or the Coral Beauty).

 

[JohnnyDreadlock]

Horrible if it was avoidable. Understanding if it wasn’t. It bothers me if I can’t help reach maximum life expectancy when they’re within my care.

 

[blaxsun]

I'm pretty sure that's how all authoritarian governments justify their actions. We should be honest with ourselves about what we're doing. It's for us. We're not doing our pets any favors.

The wild may be ruthless, but they have billions of years of evolution to deal with it. High ammonia, aggressive neighbors with no room to swim away, uniform diets with no cycles of feast and famine -- these things they have no natural ability to deal with, and I can only imagine that it causes no shortage of whatever a fish's equivalent of happiness is.

I know that it's drifting into the whole "zoo" debate, but the private and public aquatic industry is actually what drives many conservation efforts, laws and funds development of all these wonderful aquatic technologies and products we enjoy.

So yes, while they are "for us" - in by doing so we're actually keeping an industry that promotes conservation alive.

 

[Lightspeed]

the true being of nature is simply horrific from a modern humans perspective, though i think more so within the last 20 yrs than ever before, shall we label it progressive society.....
Nature is wild, truly wild, tendon ripping, throat tearing, live disembowelment, you name it. Humans tend to forget that there is no such thing as forgiveness in the food chain from the bottom of the pyramid all the way to the top Apex predators, possibly even more so the fact that humans are also part of it, but somehow want to refuse that fact so hey lets blame animals because we don't know any better.

I digress though, if you are going to elect to take on responsibility, i think along with that hopefully comes a conscious recognition of that which you have undertaken. We all fail, we strive to do better, some things happen out of our control, some things well within it. Though would they have happened if humans/ we had not chosen to keep wild creatures captive, so where do we draw the line. Or... we could just continue poisoning the oceanic habitats through our various means of industry and make no such effort to preserve, which side of the coin will we choose.

For me a $50 fish is or $20 coral is no different than a $500 specimen, the responsibility is the same, maybe many choose to take that recognition of responsibility very lightly, do we expect too much of ourselves? Hopefully our level of application on the topic of husbandry is one that reflects the fact that all life matters.

 

[jrill]

Things die in the wild or in our tanks. Big fish eat little fish. We eat fish by the billions. You do the best you can to care for them but if they die you buy another and learn.

 

[vlangel]

I feel the worst when a fish death should not have happened. I lost quite a few fish immediately after ordering from an online vendor about 2 years ago. I won't order anymore from them at that facility.

I ask how long a fish has been at a LFS and I want to see them eating. Those 2 factors have increased the odds of new purchases. That and I choose reputable LFSs.

I acclimate new fish in my sump. They are not stressed by new tank mates while they are dealing with new water conditions, but they are in a mature stable system.

I have chosen mostly peaceful fish. My tank has a lot of craggy rock which is well suited to the blennies and gobies that make up the bulk of my fish, so I do not have a lot of territorial skirmishes.

I enjoy feeding them well and often.

Nothing can prevent a premature death 100% but over the years I have reduced them significantly. I have had fish for 15+ years. Having my fish live long lives cuts down on how many fish I buy because my tank gets maxed out. I have learned to enjoy those fish instead of continually buying just 1 more. A happy community is usually a healthy community. And that adds to my happiness and health!

 

[Mickeyt1reef]

I finally got my flame hawk in the DT. It was doing great, however; my female clown, super territorial, was still showing some aggression towards the hawk if near her area. I was doing maintenance on internal pumps with the cover diagonal. I assume that being on the opposite end from the clowns drove the hawk in their direction. Long story short, the hawk jumped without me noticing! Later, I'm like where's my hawk? Then AARRRG! There it was behind the tank. I assume the clown got aggressive and he jumped through the small uncovered area. I had a mini meltdown that scared the dog and my wife. So, yes it SUCKS loosing fish especially if it could have been avoided!

 

[Timfish]

It always bothers me. But I'll disagree with the assertion a fish would have been happier in the wild. Trying to find what the life expectancies are for fish there's evidence they live longer in captivity than they do in the wild. Not just 10% or 20% longer but potentially 2X or 4X or longer if properly cared for.

Local variation in mortality rates and life-expectancy estimates of the coral-reef fish Centropyge bicolor (Pisces: Pomacanthidae) - Marine Biology

Mortality rates of the coral reef fish Centropyge bicolor were based on the disappearance of known individual fish. Data were collected over three years from 1978 at four sites around Lizard Island, Queensland, Australia. To measure disappearance, membership of 36 harems (comprising about 150...

link.springer.com

Aquarium Fish Longevity

By J. Charles Delbeek M.Sc. (1) and John E. Randall PhD (2) 1. Senior Biologist, California Academy of Sciences, Steinhart Aquarium 2.Professor Emeritus,

reefs.com

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1444899?seq=1

An extraordinary life span estimate for the clown anemonefish Amp...: Ingenta Connect

www.ingentaconnect.com

This Lemonpeel Angelfish Is Old Enough To Buy A Beer! | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog

The saltwater aquarium hobby is chugging along and with it, some very old aquarium veteran fish are continuing to thrive, many of which are older than our youngest aquarist. So anytime someone says…

reefbuilders.com

http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/134/m134p015.pdf

http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/145/m145p033.pdf

 

[DeniseAndy]

I feel sad. Just had 4 of my clowns die over the last couple days to crazy fast illness with no changes to environment for months. I tried to help with qt, but it was too late. No idea how got sick or what got them. I did not do necropsy as they were isolated and should not effect others. Sad.