Death from Java Moss?

[bs6749]

I came home from work today to find the second sickening and hurtful surprise in two weeks. The first time was my BN pleco getting trapped under a piece of slate and suffocating, but this one was MUCH more hurtful to me. One of my male GBR's (not even a year old and VERY healthy) was found to be dead when I did a search in my aquarium after having that feeling of "I know something is wrong". I only counted 7 GBR's ( I had FOUR spawning pairs) and I looked at every possible angle in the tank but the last male could not be found. I KNEW at that moment that I no longer had 8 centerpeice fish in my tank. I went and washed my hands before putting my arm into the tank and it seemed like I knew exactly where to look. I reached my arm straight down into the java moss and pulled out the body of the male. Ironically, it was in the same rock formation (between the two sides that held the top rock) that had taken away my male BN pleco. All I can think of is that the java moss suffocated entangled him and he was unable to escape. I have seen them playing around in it before or swim to get food from out of it and not ONCE did I see any of them struggle to get out of it. But when I pulled him out he appeared to have been trapped by the java moss. Any of you have a similar experience? I am ready to throw out all the java moss in my tank. Or move it to my 10 gallon tank that currently is home to some ramshorn snails. BTW I checked my nitrites. nitrates, pH, and ammonia and all were normal. pH - 7.0 the rest 0ppm except nitrates were 5ppm (moderatly planted tank). And no the fish did not have any sign of fungus, parasites, was not bloated, he looked NORMAL... just not moving. This leads me to believe that he indeed was trapped by the java moss. I am going to the lfs right now to do a 10 gallon water change in my 55 gallon tank that houses the fish. I am also going to do a 10 gallon change tomorrow. Sorry this post is scattered and unorganized, I really can't think straight right now.

 

[LandGhoti]

Oh, I'm sorry for your loss.

I know that "something is wrong" feeling too.

I will just be starting a planted tank today or tomorrow, and java moss is something that's on the way for me. I wish I had advice about fish getting trapped. I'm sure someone else will though.

 

[Lonewolfblue]

Personally, I do not think it is the java moss. I've had GBR's die for no apparent reason, which could be the case for you as well, and he just landed where he did. I have a ton of java moss in my 26G, and the fish have no problems getting into an out of it, and have not had any deaths due to it, not even plecos. That's just one of those things with the GBR's that we still don't comprehend, where they look perfectly healthy at the first look, then dead the next. And the GBR's are about the only fish that I've had this problem, and no others.

 

[QTOFFER]

I'm sorry about your fish losses, bs6749

I've heard of fish getting trapped in shifting rock formations like yours and I've experienced fish getting trapped in evil hollow ornaments. However, healthy fish don't get ensnared by live or artificial plants - however dense. Healthy ADULT fish (NOT FRY) are also strong enough to avoid or break free of the filter intake suction - another common misconceived cause of fish deaths.

More than likely, your GBR was already dying and he just wound up in the Java moss. Currents or curious tankmates may have pushed him deeper into the plant. He may have had an internal parasite or a virus that may explain the outwardly healthy appearance and normal tank params. Maybe he was stressed to death by one of the other males.

Fact is, you'll probably never know exactly what killed him - one of the most truly frustrating parts of this hobby - but you can be assured that the Java moss is an innocent bystander. I have Java moss in most of my tanks, and even the smallest bloodfin tetras plunge in and out of it with ease. My only complaint with Java moss is it's annoying tendency to plug up the filter intake and wind itself around the impeller.

 

[Regen311]

I'm sorry if this is a dumb question, but what is GBR? I've had trouble wiht a lot of these in forums, so maybe it would be helpful if people could say Name of fish then in parenthesis the initials and then after that everyone could use the initials (abbreviation) easily. It seems like this would be confusing for of people. I think mainly of new fish keepers, but also for those of us who are simply not familiar with what you are talking about. Sorry for being difficult, but it's very frustrating at times, and it seems like it'd be easy to just type out whatever teh abbreviation stands for then after in the post and replies use the abbreviation.

 

[plecoperson]

...but what is GBR?

It's a German Blue Ram. I don't always know the abbreviations either, but if you plug them into "search" they will turn up.

bs6749--I'm so sorry about both your fish. I also know that "something's wrong" feeling. I agree that the ram probably succumbed to something other than the moss.

My sympathy--

 

[cabezon]

I am so sorry. I've only been keeping fish for just over a year, but the deaths always affect me. that whole guppy problem with the wife almost got our tank out of the house.

 

[severum mama]

Sorry for your loss. I too don't believe it was the java moss, but I guess freak accidents definitely do occur, as evidenced in this link (which I believe was posted by LWB a couple months ago): http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16798&highlight=clown+pleco+panaque+maccus

 

[bs6749]

Thank you all for your sympathies.

QTOFFER - That may be part of the reason why I am so upset... not knowing WHAT killed him and hoping that the others are fine. I am just REALLY confused as to what cause this.

I bought these 8 GBR's from a breeder (Ronbak) on Aquabid and I have had them since July 26th of this year. Honestly, they were some of the best loooking GBR's I had ever seen. They looked very healthy, were full of color and vigor and I noticed NOTHING wrong with the male before he passed. Wouldn't an internal parasite cause the fish to lose appetite, become skinny, or act funny, or do different parasites have very different effects? There was no sort of growth on him when I found him, and that is why I thought that he may have become entangled in the moss (when sleeping most likely... it was a pretty thick bunch of moss). There were no other clues as to why he died but I suppose it may have been a case of being stressed.

LWB - Aren't the "common prolems" associated with GBR's such as early deaths usually associated with ones that have been tank bred for many generations? Mine were only a few removed from the wild, five I believe. I would really like to get the cause of his death narrowed down so I can watch the others more closely to see if I can pick up on anything.

That leaves me with another problem...what am I going to do with the female? She is already being harassed by the other pairs and I am worried about her health. I may remove her and place her in my 10 gallon tank, and if that is the case then I will buy provide her with some other tank mates so she isn't all by herself. She is my favorite female (she is a little runt) and I do NOT want to lose her right now. I don't think I am going to try to get her a new mate because the ones available at the LFS are SO imbred that it's not even funny. The lfs guy was telling me about how they get really long fins from being imbred and they also had very little color. I cannot believe the difference between the ones available locally and the good quality I have seen online. To me they almost look like they may be 2 different species. I never would have guessed that they were the same.

 

[Lonewolfblue]

As for common problems, one common one in GBR's is gill flukes. But the only problem with that is he would have started showing signs, such as surfacing in the corner of the tank and rapid gill movement. Other than that, could have been another parasite, one that's internal, and doesn't affect the digestive sytem. But it's really hard to tell for sure exactly what happened, could be something we don't even know about.

As for the female, she should be fine with the rest. The more females there are, the less chances of a female being harrassed too much. All I have left is 4 GBR's, 3 male and 1 female. And the males are duking it out for her with their displays of color. Really neat to watch.

As for the GBR's that are inbred several generations, yes, I do believe they lose some of their coloring, as well as hardiness, but I'm not fully sure to what extent, or how many generations before you start having problems. I've kind of been moving away from GBR's and thinking of trying Apistos instead, as I've not been able to duplicate my first successes. One day I would have a couple hundred wigglers, then the next day almost none. And the adults don't seem to last as long either.

 

[severum mama]

Sorry to hear your little female is getting picked on. IME with cichlids of any kind (dwarf or not) you are probably right to consider moving her to your 10 gallon. As you already know, GBRs stress easily and the others might stress her to death. Don't beat yourself up over the loss of your male. You obviously are doing all you can to keep your GBRs happy, but the reality is that you're keeping a sensitive, difficult species. I've personally never been able to keep GBRs alive for too long, even in tap water with pH 7.0, NH3 and NO2=0, and NO3 under 10! Mine died for seemingly no reason as well, so I can sure identify with your frustration.

I checked your "my info" and couldn't find your tank specs. What other species do you keep in your 10 gallon? Hopefully you are keeping species that won't stress your female GBR further. Again, so sorry for your loss.

*edit* I should clearly defer to the experts here. I figured that your female would have some problems in the presence of multiple males/pairs, but that does not seem to be LWB's experience.

And for the record- LWB, you should absolutely try apistos if you can get your hands on some. I waited for almost 3 years to get some through my LFS at the time. Finally I did, and I ended up with juvenile a. steindachneri. They seem to be more hardy than GBRs, and mine have tripled in size since the summer! I highly recommend this species if you can find them. 8) Plus, they are exceedingly beautiful, of course!

 

[Lonewolfblue]

Sorry for your loss. I too don't believe it was the java moss, but I guess freak accidents definitely do occur, as evidenced in this link (which I believe was posted by LWB a couple months ago): http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16798&highlight=clown+pleco+panaque+maccus

LOL, you remembered correctly, lol......

As for the female GBR's, if she's in with multiple pairs, yes, she could get harrassed. But that hasn't been my experience when I had more females than males. And some have said that it is possible that a male could take in more than 1 female, harem breeders. But I have not seen that personally yet, just read about it. If she does keep getting picked on, then yes, I would remove her. But give things a day or 2 to see if she settles in somewhere, and if not, remove her. And whatever you do, with the pairs, DO NOT ADD ANOTHER MALE, unless you put the 2 in a tank of their own. The male will be seen as an outsider, and it will be much worse than what an extra female would cause. I tried it once, and in 10 minutes, had to remove the new male to another tank, along with the free female, as it did not work, period. The original pair would have eaten him alive if left in there.

Remember, TERRITORIES have already been made.

 

[severum mama]

LOL, I saw that link while Googling, and then you actually found a practical application for posting the URL, LOL! When you posted the link, I had already read it, but found it informative the second time around as well.

However, my clown pleco (panaque maccus) still lives in a tank with TONS of java fern with no issues. I guess some folks never learn LOL!

 

[Lonewolfblue]

LOL, I saw that link while Googling, and then you actually found a practical application for posting the URL, LOL! When you posted the link, I had already read it, but found it informative the second time around as well.

However, my clown pleco (panaque maccus) still lives in a tank with TONS of java fern with no issues. I guess some folks never learn LOL!

But you might want to read it again, lol. The injury was due to java fern roots, and not java moss. The roots are much stronger, and not as giving as moss.

 

[severum mama]

Yes, I read the article fully, but just wanted to throw it in there as a possibility, I guess.

The reference to the "folks that never learn" was a self-depricating comment aimed at myself, for the sheer dumb luck I've had through much my experience in the hobby. LOL.

 

[Lonewolfblue]

LOL, doesn't aim just at yourself, lol. I'm sure it's happened more than once to me too, lol. But when it get's really bad, your albino rainbow shark will slap you in your face, lol. Oops, that would only happen to me, lol. Or, might I say, getting bit by a fire eel in an Emperor 400 HOB filter? hehehe.....

But yes, I seriously doubt it was the java moss. It's just not strong enough to hold a healthy fish in place. That's just my opinion.

 

[severum mama]

Mwahahahaha, I think either situation would only happen to you LOL! For the record, I thought it was another one of your eels that put the smack down... guess I should have read more closely!!! That is so seriously hilarious, as I am the proud owner of a rainbow shark!

I agree with you BTW, the root system of java ferns are a whole different ballgame than an aggregation of java moss. Just throwin' it out there as a fascinating anecdote, but clearly I have to look no farther than your tanks... LOL.