[Blacktip]

LO

Being in the Channel Islands the fish I receive have been kept in bags for a long time, maybe up to 12 hours, before I get them home. I always buy straight from the bag as my lfs is pretty poor.

So what is the best way of getting them in the tank? I normally float and mix for an hour then release them. I've got my Angel coming in tomorrow and wanted to introduce him in the best way. I dont quaranteen or use hyposalinity or the like. Should I be?

I know as soon as I open the bag, the pH will rise along with the toxicity of the ammonia so would like to get him in asap so as to prevent acidosis and gill damage, stress etc but still dont want to stress him with salinity, pH shock etc. So what is the best way?

Cheers

[chriss]

Tricky one, kind of catch 22. If the shipper had had the forethought of putting some carbon in the bag that would help, not sure if adding it as soon as you open it would help tho.

I helped with a delivery a month ago at Jasons that included a few fish. This had come from Oz without being opened, so guess they had been bagged up for sometime. I can't recall if there was carbon in the bags or not, but all we did was tip them out into a bucket and began drip acclimatizing them for probably an hour just as you normally would and they were fine, admittedly they weren't huge fish.

Chris

[tommo]

The biggest problem with acclimatising fish from abroad is the potential for real pH shock. It is rare that fish are in a bag for as little as 12 hours TBH. I have tested saltwater at pH 5 in one dramatically delayed shipment because of carbon buildup in the shipping water. Of course (which contradics what you say) such a drop only occurs when you actually open the bag, release the oxygen and leave it without degassing or reoxygenation for a while. I would personally recommend a bucket with an airstone (preventing such a dramatic drop) and drip acclimatisation. forget ammonia.

It is potentially lethal not quarantining newly shipped fish. Whilst in holding facilities angels/ tangs and butterflies in particular pick up allsorts of weird and wonderful parasites, some of which a freshwater dip (which could also severely stress a new import) will not cure. Procedure should include at least a treatment for flukes such as kusuri wormer/ cedapraz or sera tremazol (if you can still get that here) and a couple of weeks feed training.

HTH

Tom