Cleaner wrasse dying?!

[obscurereef]

I just came home from my LFS and I bought a cleaner wrasse. I just put the fish in a clean bucket to acclimate him and right away he is lying on his side and being still. I gently nudged him and he moved like he was okay. A little later he swam for a couple seconds and then he laid on his side not moving. The fish was perfectly healthy and eating frozen mysis shrimp at the store. He's fat and appears to have no ich so I don't know if this is a sign of stress or he's dying?!! Please help!

[crister13]

Wrasse lay in sand so I would say he's fine. Don't worry about it. You can't do anything anyways but I think he's fine.

[obscurereef]

True, my LFS will replace him if he's dead, but I hope it's just from stress. I know some wrasses will hide in the sand (or just in general) for a week. Think cleaner wrasses hide that long?

[crister13]

I have heard of them hiding for over a week.

[obscurereef]

Alright I'll keep that in mind. Hopefully all ends well.

[crister13]

Good luck!!!! I hope so too!

[Readingexcalibur]

My flasher wrasse was on his side for the whole drip process. Put him in the tank after 2 hours. He started doing barrel rolls and then ended up upside down. His gills were still moving a little as if he was gasping for fresh water.

I decided to let him go out humanely instead of the toilet bowl of despair. Grabbed him with my hand an put him in a breeder box.

The next morning I came down and he was swimming around the box as if nothing ever happened.

Moral of the story, don't think they are dead until you know for sure.

[obscurereef]

Yeah I wasn't going to take him out until I was sure. I released him into the tank about a half an hour ago and had the moon lights on and right away went in a rock. A couple minutes later he came out of the rock, but was on the sand not moving much. The cleaner shrimp came up to him and tried cleaning him..thought that was kind of funny since they have the same job, but also sad b/c he wasn't moving much. I turned off the moon lights and he slowly went back in the rock. Crossing my fingers for sure.

[obscurereef]

Oh and thank you everyone for the advice and support .

[crister13]

How is he today?

[obscurereef]

Thanks for asking, was just going to do an update. He's doing excellent! He was out swimming in the morning even before I turned on the lights. At first he was on one side of the tank at the very surface, but a couple hours later he was exploring and swimming all over. He's the bravest and most active fish I have now which is pretty surprising since he's so new. Still getting adjusted and I have yet to feed him, but I think he'll be fine. The fire shrimp and corals I got yesterday also are doing great
Excuse the hair algae. He's one of my fav. fish.

[Gregcoyote]

Work hard to see he eats. They can be kind of picky.

[obscurereef]

Will do. I asked the owner if he could feed the wrasse and he fed 3 different wrasses mysis shrimp in separate tanks and they ate the food. He was a pig at the store and competed with a puffer, angel, tang and others so there's that advantage.