alexkharden

Before the skin fell off around the mouth it was bright red and puffy, like a growth almost. Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

Backstory: I previously bought two Marine Bettas from an online vendor. I put both in quarantine, and both died within 4 days. All of the other fish that I've quarantined have done fine, so I don't attribute the Betta deaths to my procedures, although I'm not above being proved wrong. I decided it must be the vendor source, so I ordered one from my lfs and picked it up day before yesterday. It died yesterday. Here's the problem I find myself in/placed myself in. I decided to skip quarantine. I put it directly into the tank, and exposed all of my other fish to whatever it had. I'm 99% that the "whatever" it died from is Enteric Redmouth Disease. So how screwed am I? Does anyone know about this disease? I've been able to find little in it, because apparently it isn't overly found in hobbyist setups. The little I've been able to find says it's a gram negative bacterial infection that's generally transmitted by fish to fish contact. I also saw a mention of transmission via poop, but no description of how that type of transmission would occur. I haven't been able to find much else. Please help save me from my own stupidity! Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

I just didn't understand what the issue was. I mean, is that common practice and I'm just not aware of it, to not feed a fish before purchase? I know the reason they gave me was bs, which adds to the confusion.

Well that was disappointing. We first went to the Reef. It looked very ghetto on the outside, but the inside actually didn't look too bad. There was a larger coral selection and a lot more fish than I anticipated. Nice surprise, until I found a fish I wanted. They actually had a leaf fish there, which is a fish I've been looking for, but has been out of stock online. I tell the guy I want to see it eat. Stop. Hell no, they say. Their reason? It might regurgitate the food in the bag and poison the water. Wait, what? Yes, seriously, I tell them if the fish eats I'm buying it. Nope, won't do it. WTF. That pissed me off, so I left. Tried two Petco's. One had no saltwater fish, the other had a very small selection - nothing I wanted. Finally, on the way out of town we hit Modern Aquatix. That was underwhelming. Nothing against the place, their tanks looked very clean and the fish/corals in general looked healthy, but it was very small and not much selection. So, I'm back home now with no new fish in quarantine. Sad bear. How the hell are you not going to feed a fish if a paying customer asks you to? I've never heard of such. The people, and this interaction, seemed very shady to me.

The corals are overpriced, or the fish, or both? I think I'll be checking out MA for sure:)

Well, I don't want to go there! 1 vote for Modern Aquatix, any one else got a recommendation? Thank you for replying! Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

Any recommendations for good LFS's to check out? Any hobby related hot spots I should see?? Thanks everyone! Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

Lol, were you referencing the catching the mantis with a snowflake eel part? That would definitely work, for sure, but I'm hoping to catch it alive! Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

OK, will do:)

Well, if you're still following this thread, the new one is yours if you want it. I'm not sure how I'll catch it yet, but when I do you can have it. I don't think I want to put it into the 40b, because I don't think I want two in there getting all territorial.

Well, hell. I read last night that my Royal Gramma was a carnivore, so I decided to chop up a piece of table shrimp and feed it to the tank. I was watching everything go crazy over it, and guess what decided to pop up? Another fully grown mantis. Not the baby, since I doubt that one grew two inches in a month. It figures, I get one mantis rehomed, and one set up in the 40 breeder with the lion fish, and now it looks like I have to think about two more. Super fun. I had to kill a limpet because it went all psycho killer and started eating my little Devil's Hand, and I had to kill a mithrax crab because it utterly destroyed my little Hammer coral. The ocean is a brutal place.

Yes, that's the one. Thank you!

I found an online app once, but I can't find it anymore and I was hoping someone would point me in the right direction. What the app did was take a list of fish you planned on having in the aquarium, compare it to the size of the aquarium, factor in whether it was FOWLER or reef, and then give you a list of potential incompatibility issues. Responses would include things like, "Your Lion may eat your wrasse" or "Your tank is too small for your grouper". It also compared your list in it's entirety to see if you were trying to put too many fish into too small of a tank. Things like that. It was quite brilliant and I'm kicking myself for not bookmarking it. Does anyone know what I'm talking about or where I can find it? Just for some background, here's what I'm trying to do. The ONLY fish my wife wanted was a lion, so I bought her a fuzzy dwarf. I don't want to put it into my DT because I have smaller fish that will surely become food. What I'm doing is I bought a 40b from petco. I drilled it and am installing bulkheads and an overflow, and I will be plumbing it to run from my existing 75g sump. I figure that should handle the "dirty" nature of the lion. What I want is to figure out what other fish, and how many, I can add to the tank. Currently the only inhabitants it will have are the lion and a mantis shrimp I extracted from my DT. I'm thinking a flame hawk, a leaf fish, a waspfish....things like that. It'll primarily be a live feed tank, but doesn't necessarily have to be that exclusively. That's why I'd really like to find this tool. Thanks everyone.

Also, my efforts were not without failure. I woke up this morning to find one of my pistols, dead, in the sand. I can only think that a rock fell on him while I was getting the mantis yesterday. He was a pretty big one, about 1.5".

The one that I'll give away absolutely refuses to come out of the rock he's in. So I'll either have to wait for him to come out, or sell the rock, lol. That's a new one, get an item for free, but pay for the packaging, lol.