Fish fatality....

[malounsbury]

Well one of my clowns died this morning, the bigger of the two. Yesterday he was swimming towards the top of the tank in the back for most if not all of the day and this morning he was at the bottom and not very active. I put in some mysis for them, and he didn't really go for it. He eventually swam up towards the top of the tank and was swimming around erratically at the top, and he seemed to be bumping into things. And then I get an e-mail from my wife saying that he died.
At any rate, I was going to have her pull him out of the tank. Is there anything I should look for to clue me to what happened to him? I haven't tested my water yet, but as of my last test last Sunday, everything was perfect. SG was at 1.025 the past couple days. Any ideas?

 

[fishieness]

if he was bumping into things and swimming eraticly.... do you have a grounding probe? did you see this in any of your other fish? This probably isnt the case if the other fish were fine.
were they any symptoms in his appearence? eyes? fins? body? color?

 

[malounsbury]

I don't have a grounding probe in there. I only have one other clown as its a nano and not much room for other fish. The other fish is swimming around fine.
As far as the rest, he seemed to be getting a blackness to his color. Sort of like his orange color had some soot on it, not literally but that's what it looked like. I'll see if I can get my wife to snap a picture.

 

[malounsbury]

Here's a picture my wife took of him.

 

[caillou]

He looks pretty dead to me. I hate losing a perfectly good fish. Actually it's not the losing of it it's trying to figure out why a perfectly healthy (appearance and behavior) fish one day goes belly up the next. Usually i just never see them again as my cleaner crew makes fast work of them. Sorry about your fish.

 

[ant]

So sorry about your fish. I wish I can offer some advice. I hope you figure out what went wrong. Ant.

 

[wax32]

CLowns can take on a darker color when stress apparently. No clue what would've stressed the poor guy to death tho.

 

[malounsbury]

Well, I tested my water when I came home from work and here's my water parameters:
Ammonia: <.25
Nitrates: 5ppm
Nitrites: 0ppm
pH: 8.3
Looking at my other clown, he appears fine. Anything else I should look for? Also, would I be able to get another clown eventually to put in with the one I still have left?

 

[fishmamma]

Oh I am sorry that really sucks. I hope you find an answer. And did you say it was the larger of the two clowns? Was that a true or false percula? If you lost the female getting another juvi will probably be OK, they just may battle a little until they establish dominance. Good luck to you. I have the book 'Clownfishes', so let me know if there is anything specific I can try and look up for you.

 

[monalisa]

malounsbury,
Sorry to hear about your clown. Let us know what you find out about what might have happened so we can learn from it.
Again, really sorry...
Lisa :happyfish

 

[malounsbury]

Thanks for all the replies. I bought another clown yesterday.
The one that died was the larger of the two, so I picked up a small one yesterday. As soon as I put the new one in, they found each other and have been together since. They are both false percs, ocellaris.