Rummy Noses

[Dearra]

Has anyone ever had this problem with Rummy Noses. A couple of weeks ago I bought 4 of them. By the time I got home (20 minutes) 3 of them were dead in the bag. Last week I bought 6 of them and by the time I got home 3 of them had died in the bag.

Today I bought 2 of them. This time they were both alive in the bag by the time I got home. I was estatic that I had succeeded. I put them in the tank in the bag to climatise them and within 5 minutes they were dead.

The lady at the shop said that they pass out due to stress, but they eventually come around. Mine never recovered.

Is this normal behaviour for them. Out of the 12 I have bought I only have 4 alive. I would like to have 10, but I don't think that is going to happen in a hurry.

I would like to have about 10 cardinals as well, but she said they do the same thing. So I am not holding out much hope on getting them either.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

Dearra

[samir]

You need to buy your rummy nose from a different source. i had a similar experience , they were dropping on me like flies. Nicholas convinced me that they were not a hard fish to keep, so i went back to the lfs and they finally told me that it was a problem batch and offered me a refund which i told them to stuff.



The lady at the shop said that they pass out due to stress, but they eventually come around. Mine never recovered.


for the sake of science please do me a favour, could you ask the lfs lady that if i dropped a 3 foot tank on her head, would she pass out, and if she did, how long would it take for her to come around.

[Del]

I have not heard of that Dearra.

I keep cardinals and rummynose, as well as gold tetras with my Discus and have done for over 18 months, with no problem.

In fact, rummynose are a good indicator of water problems, as they tend to loose their red noses when there is a water issue looming...

I do loose a few from time to time, but never before I get them into my tank and never all at once...

I float the bag in my tank for about 15-20mins whilst adding 1/8 of a cup of tank water to the bag very slowly over this length of time. After about 20mins they are acclimatised and ready to be added to the tank.

I'd personally wonder if there was an issue with the whole batch at your LFS... It happens sometimes. I agree with Samir, I'd source them from another LFS and never go back, you want someone to trust when buying fish...

Hope it doesn't dissuade you from keeping them as they are not at all hard to keep and make great, playful tankmates. :)

DEL

[Merrilyn]

Hmmmm there seems to be a big problem alright.

All fish should be able to survive a reasonable journey home. Did you ever test the water in the bag for ammonia. Seems as if you may be getting fish from a tank with already high ammonia readings. The stress of being transported in a bag will increase ammonia anyway, so perhaps that combination is causing the ammonia to rise to lethal levels.

I don't suppose the fish shop has been putting oxygen in the bags.

My suggestion is to try fish from another shop.

[Dearra]

Thankyou for the responses.

Actually, when I think back, when they were at the shop their noses were not all that red, they were quite pale in colour. The ones that did survive have bright red noses now. I now know that is something I should be more aware of when I am buying them. Look for bright red noses.

I didn't think to check the water quality in the bag, I will be doing that in the future.

I am not giving up though, I think they are gorgeous the way they all play together, and can't wait to get some cardinals, now that I know it is not normal for them to pass out. I thought that sounded a bit off.

Dearra

[iro11a]

I brought rummy noses a while back got 10 of them they made the trip home but if they last 2 weeks in the tank they are very hardy fish just the first two weeks they r very stressed out and wont come out.

Out of the 10 i brought i got three left and they are a great fish and come out all the time i know they say they like to school in more bigger groups but they sometimes will school with my small group of neons.

[shewey]

From my experience Rummy Noses are very hardy once they are accustomed to your tank. They are very tempramental when putting them in your tank however. I have put Rummys into my tank and had 2 out of 10 go belly up dead within 20 seconds of releasing them from the bag. It was amazing to watch (and distressing). Ever since then I have always left them in the bag floating in the tank for at least an hour, while adding a bit of tank water to the bag every few minutes. I have had no problems with them since doing that.

On the other hand, Rummies that die in the bag before you get them home would indicate that they are either in bad condition or are already stressed out even before they got bagged. If the Rummies were only transferred to the shop tank that day then doign a second move in the day could have freaked them out. Only buy them if they are looking good in the shop tank (active nd nice bright red noses).

Good luck as I think Rummies are one of the most beautiful fish...especially schooling in nice big groups.

Cheers,
Mark