Can stress from Petco to car to tank kill fish?

[FishRKool28]

I bought 10 neon tetras from Petco yesterday for my 10 gallon that was basically on tail end of being cycled, 0 ammonia, .25ppm Nitrite, 5 ppm Nitrate, PH at 7.5. Well they actually gave me 18 neon tetras and all were alive for the car ride, acclimated to tank and within an hour 1 died, others seem just fine and swim together, they’re hiding as well but that’s to be expected with new fish. Could the fish die from stress or could he had other issues? Petco told me that they just got those fish in so they weren’t in Petcos tank for long when I came in to buy them.

Im at work freaking out that I’m gonna come home to dead fish, and yes for past week I’ve been dosing Prime and Stability 

[Guppysnail]

I’m so sorry for your ordeal. 
If they just arrived at petco my guess would be stress and shock. Shipping to petco then trying to acclimate to petco water then netted and transported to new water again. 
Did you float your bags to acclimate to temperature before putting them in the tank. 

[FishRKool28]

On 7/7/2023 at 11:01 AM, Guppysnail said:

I’m so sorry for your ordeal. 
If they just arrived at petco my guess would be stress and shock. Shipping to petco then trying to acclimate to petco water then netted and transported to new water again. 
Did you float your bags to acclimate to temperature before putting them in the tank. 

Yea I thought so as well, felt bad for the little guy. Yea I put their bag in my tank water and let it float for about 30 min to get them acclimated to temp. Praying the rest of them are alive and well when I get home from work.

[FishRKool28]

On 7/7/2023 at 12:06 PM, Pepere said:

You might find this blog helpful.

 

https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/faqs/how-to-use-quaratine-med-trio

 

Thanks for that! I think going forward I’ll do that everytime for new fish, now is that for fish from places like petco or is that all new fish even from AquaHuna?

[FishRKool28]

Do I need to do that with cherry shrimp as well? Planning on ordering some from AH

[PineSong]

On 7/7/2023 at 1:51 PM, FishRKool28 said:

Do I need to do that with cherry shrimp as well? Planning on ordering some from AH

Shrimp illnesses can’t be passed on to fish, from what I’ve read, so You don’t have to quarantine Shrimp to protect the fish in your tanks, but perhaps you would, if you were adding Shrimp to a tank that already had shrimp in it.

[FishRKool28]

I’m realizing more and more that patience is key in this hobby lol

[Guppysnail]

On 7/7/2023 at 2:02 PM, PineSong said:

Shrimp illnesses can’t be passed on to fish, from what I’ve read,

I always thought this same thing. I recently learned they can carry a larval stage camallanus worm. 😲

[PineSong]

On 7/7/2023 at 2:28 PM, Guppysnail said:

I always thought this same thing. I recently learned they can carry a larval stage camallanus worm. 😲

Frightening! Thank you for sharing that!

[FishRKool28]

Well I won’t let one dead fish deter me from the hobby, I enjoy it and I’m determined to become a solid fish keeper. Thanks for all the feedback 

[nabokovfan87]

On 7/7/2023 at 8:46 AM, FishRKool28 said:

I bought 10 neon tetras from Petco yesterday for my 10 gallon that was basically on tail end of being cycled, 0 ammonia, .25ppm Nitrite, 5 ppm Nitrate, PH at 7.5. Well they actually gave me 18 neon tetras and all were alive for the car ride, acclimated to tank and within an hour 1 died, others seem just fine and swim together, they’re hiding as well but that’s to be expected with new fish. Could the fish die from stress or could he had other issues? Petco told me that they just got those fish in so they weren’t in Petcos tank for long when I came in to buy them.

Unfortunately.... I've had the same experience when getting back into the hubby.

One way to approach the issue is to insist that only X fish go in each bag.  If you're buying say, 20 fish, you have the right to ask for 5-8 per bag as opposed to 20 in one small bag.

In my case, what happened was extremely tragic. We lived about 1.5 miles from the store at the time.  Purchased a few neons, a few other community fish, and it was basically each person got to pick 3-4 fish.  Well, the person doing the bagging was not the fish person.  About 15-20 fish all went into one small bag.

I got home, temp acclimated, and everything was ok at that point. There was definitely stress signs and the goal was to get the fish into the tank as quickly and as safely as possible. I cut the bag open and within seconds half the bag went belly up. Not struggling, gone. The amount of ammonia produced in the bag was immense and there was no way that the already stressed fish were going to handle even more stress from improper conditions for moving them from the store to the house.

It was "my first time" buying a big group of fish to stock the new tank and this was when I was first getting back into the hobby.  We called the store and explained what happened and the bag was stuffed with fish. They didn't make a big deal, said to bring the bodies and we'd get refund or replacement.

....and that's the crux of the issue.

The staff doing the bagging wasn't trained. The wrong size bag was used. The fish we picked out, I assume, weren't even compatible in the long run (temp differences).  If the person at this particular store spent a bit longer to bag fish, multiple bags, then it meant that task would've taken 3-4x longer.  Unfortunately what isn't calculated in that choice is the loss of life, the customer time, and the store time doing all of the replacements.

I assume exactly what happened to me is what you experienced. I'm sorry for that and please feel free to speak up and ask for bigger bags, less fish per bag.

[Fish Folk]

I have observed that Neon Tetra health / transfer is touch-and-go. There are a few farms in US that are breeding them, but I suspect that most are still imported. So the thing to consider is how many different times these fish have transferred water. From where they were spawned, to where they were kept for grow out, to where they were shipped into US, to where they were shipped to LFS, and finally to a personal buyer . . . that many moves (and perhaps more) nearly guarantees a weakened fish.

I salute those who religiously perform the MED Trio. In my view though, any fish that dies within a day or two of being introduced to a new aquarium is not suffering from Ich, parasites, or bacterial infection: it's just very weak, stressed, and collapses under various pressures from osmotic stress, temperature adjustment, Dissolved Oxygen variance, pH fluctuations, etc.

Definitely save dead fish and get a refund if you can. I'm concerned a bit about your tank and an incomplete cycle. But it does sound like you know what you're doing. Adding an extra air-stone may help boost your autotrophic aerobic bacteria colonies. 

Edited July 7, 2023 by Fish Folk

[nabokovfan87]

On 7/7/2023 at 10:51 AM, FishRKool28 said:

Do I need to do that with cherry shrimp as well? Planning on ordering some from AH

If you're planning to do shrimp and fish, depending on setup you might be better off doing the shrimp first and letting the colony establish.  Depending on the fish you're selecting there is a change they would attack and overstress the shrimp. It's not a major concern for most nano fish, but something like platys, guppies, swordtails can be very aggressive towards hunting the shrimp.

[FishRKool28]

On 7/7/2023 at 2:10 PM, Fish Folk said:

I have observed that Neon Tetra health / transfer is touch-and-go. There are a few farms in US that are breeding them, but I suspect that most are still imported. So the thing to consider is how many different times these fish have transferred water. From where they were spawned, to where they were kept for grow out, to where they were shipped into US, to where they were shipped to LFS, and finally to a personal buyer . . . that many moves (and perhaps more) nearly guarantees a weakened fish.

I salute those who religiously perform the MED Trio. In my view though, any fish that dies within a day or two of being introduced to a new aquarium is not suffering from Ich, parasites, or bacterial infection: it's just very weak, stressed, and collapses under various pressures from osmotic stress, temperature adjustment, Dissolved Oxygen variance, pH fluctuations, etc.

Definitely save dead fish and get a refund if you can. I'm concerned a bit about your tank and an incomplete cycle. But it does sound like you know what you're doing. Adding an extra air-stone may help boost your autotrophic aerobic bacteria colonies. 

Very informative, that’s pretty much what happened. Went to petco by my work, I asked for 10 and went to pay for them and waited for the girl to meet me at the register. She came with 18 neons in one bag, I’m still a newb so I didn’t know if this was common practice 🤷🏻‍♂️. 45 min drive home, then straight to my tank to acclimate in theyre bag, 30 min later I let them out and they seemed fine. Shortly after I noticed one swimming alone, he died an hour later. My wife just checked and confirmed she sees 2 more dead fish, and said she saw another swimming alone, said the others were swimming strong together in a school and hiding less. So idk if it’s ich, stress, the neon tetra disease. 
 

My water had very low Nitrite .25ppm and no ammonia and 5ppm Nitrate, been dosing my tank with Prime and Stability daily. I have a airstone going into a sponge filter and a HOB AQ filter.  I’ll post a pic 

[Fish Folk]

Beautiful tank!

Hard to diagnose.

I’ll raise a glass with you, though. I  bought 18x Cardinal Tetras the other week to add to my Discus tank. Those Discus _ate_ them all… 😬 Brutal! Never dreamed that would happen…

[JChristophersAdventures]

@Fish Folk That's some expensive "eatins'" ... sorry to hear that... cardinals are one of my favorite fish.

[FishRKool28]

On 7/7/2023 at 2:58 PM, Fish Folk said:

Beautiful tank!

Hard to diagnose.

I’ll raise a glass with you, though. I  bought 18x Cardinal Tetras the other week to add to my Discus tank. Those Discus _ate_ them all… 😬 Brutal! Never dreamed that would happen…

Thanks! My first one excluding my sons 5 gal Betta tank. Yours looks amazing! 
 

Yea I’m pretty bummed but I’ll use this as a learning experience, praying I don’t lose anymore. RIP to the 3 that vanquished 

[Lennie]

Okay, that will be kind of a silly question but,

Are you sure they were dead?

 

Fish like neons, embers, and black tetras etc. commonly play dead when caught from tank under stress. When I was at my lfs and wanted to buy embers, they were amazingly healthy and active in their tank, when they were caught & moved to the bag, they started playing dead as a stress response. If I wasn't the one observing them at the store, or catching them, I would %100 say there is something wrong. They were not swimming, turning upside down in the bag, and so on.

And yes, I thought they were dying and I said I wanna wait more to see if they will face losses in the following days and didn't buy them at the time. So when we poured them back to tank, they were again perfectly fine. They said for a couple species, they always have the same sort of behavior when put into the bag.

 

So again, are we %100 sure they were dead, but not playing dead?

[Galabar]

I would probably wait until the nitrite reading reaches 0 before adding fish.

As for adding medications for new fish, that might depend on where you get them.  My understanding is that Aquarium Co Op, as part of their quarantine procedure, add medications.  I'm not sure that multiple rounds of medication would be good for fish kidneys/liver/whatever...  So, if you get them from somewhere like Aquarium Co Op, I might not medicate...

Edited July 7, 2023 by Galabar

[FishRKool28]

On 7/7/2023 at 3:17 PM, Lennie said:

Okay, that will be kind of a silly question but,

Are you sure they were dead?

 

Fish like neons, embers, and black tetras etc. commonly play dead when caught from tank under stress. When I was at my lfs and wanted to buy embers, they were amazingly healthy and active in their tank, when they were caught & moved to the bag, they started playing dead as a stress response. If I wasn't the one observing them at the store, or catching them, I would %100 say there is something wrong. They were not swimming, turning upside down in the bag, and so on.

And yes, I thought they were dying and I said I wanna wait more to see if they will face losses in the following days and didn't buy them at the time. So when we poured them back to tank, they were again perfectly fine. They said for a couple species, they always have the same sort of behavior when put into the bag.

 

So again, are we %100 sure they were dead, but not playing dead?

I’d say if they were laying motionless under gravel they’re dead 😔 

[FishRKool28]

This one just died, what is the white thing that’s breaking his stripe? Is that ICH? 
 

next photo is the 2 my wife pulled out 

[Arnam Anan]

Short Answer: Yes and they might be stressed for a week or so.

Long Answer: Since you bought from Petco, you should be able to get a refund if you bring back water samples. Money aside, Transportation is one cause of stress. Others might be the water parameters, noise, lighting and temperature. Any or all of these can cause stress. Since a lot of these are out of your control, I would say don't freak out at your work. Enjoy the hobby.

[FishRKool28]

Yea I’ve been checking water quality twice a day for past week to monitor the cycle process

[Tanked]

I have been fortunate in having experienced this only once.  Realizing that they had a problem, they had already stopped selling the fish and refunded the entire purchase, not just the dead fish.

When buying fish I usually check all of the tanks to get some idea of the care level, sometimes returning a day or two later to see what has changed.  Dead or listless fish in the tank are a warning.  As for transportation, mine travel in a small personal cooler.  This limits stress by limiting temperature variations, noise, light, and excessive movement.