Princess tge Angelfish dead...

[Batt4Christ]

Well, wife called me into the front room a little while ago, somewhat upset. Her "special" angelfish "Princess" was dead as a doornail.

"She" was a solid white veil angel about 3 inches in size. This fish was special to my wife for a few reasons- one if which being that it made the trip from Dallas where we bought it, to home (6 hours).

I had notice I was kind of hanging out near the top of the tank behind the HOB discharge. She never shied any symptoms and I was starting to wonder of the larger angel was starting to establish a "pecking order" among the four angels.

Yes, I realize that a 29g is too small for 4 angelfish, but our intent was (and still is) to get a larger tank (saving up for a 125g), and felt confident that we ha plenty of time (especially with the heavy planting giving lots of hiding areas).

So- I netted the dead fish and took a close look- no signs of external trauma of any sort, not even nipped fins. No apparent gill damage, and other than "being dead", the fish looked perfectly healthy...

So, next step is to check water parameters (Monday is my normal maintenance day anyway):

Ammonia: 0ppm
NitrIte: 0ppm
NitrAte: between 10-20ppm (as others have commented before- kind of hard to tell- color after the timed 5 minute wait was right in-between).

Of particular interest- when the API instructions say to way 5 minutes to read the Ammonia test- they mean it! Right after adding the 2nd bottle, the color was straight yellow. After 2 minutes, I started to get concerned- I was seeing a bit of green tint, but at the 5-minute mark- straight "0ppm yellow".

So- with no signs of disease (and the fish was eating as of the last feeding yesterday). My only theory at this point is that I got stressed?

Dunno...

 

[HUKIT]

Sorry to hear about your fish passing, I know the only bright spot for me when I lose one going to look for his/her replacement. So maybe this weekend you could to pick up Princess the angelfish 2.0

 

[jetajockey]

sorry to hear. I've had a few platinum angels that died for no apparent reason also, ended up chalking it up to weak stock or just some freak occurence.

 

[rich311k]

I am sorry, it really stinks when you can not figure out why.

 

[mfdrookie516]

Angels are one of those fish that I never could figure out. I had 4 that just started dropping like flies. I would highly suggest finding a breeder if you decide to replace it, as you'll typically get better quality fish that way.

 

[Batt4Christ]

Of interest- "Princess" replaced a previous angelfish, which replaced one before that. For some reason, we could not keep mostly-black calico angels alive. In talking to several people, we chalked it up to weak fish due to bad inbreeding.

But when traveling back through Dallas back in April, I planned to visit some of my old favorite aquarium/fish stores. At the site of on of them, I found that the old store (was a general pet store with a great fish/aquarium section) had split with a young man having bought the fish business. In fact, he had just opened it up the previous week. Place looked great- tanks clean, fish all bright and healthy. He had quite a few angels, all of which looked great. He said he gets those from a local breeder. For a fish that cost $4, he bagged it up, gave us one of those big styrofoam shipping boxes, and added a couple of empty aired-up bags for protection! Fish had done great.

In watching the remaining fish, I am about convinced that one has grown enough to be starting to establish his "turf". Also, another of our angels (call it "Tigger") seems to hang around the bigger angel, while #3 (mostly white with a few black spots) stays clear...

 

[HN1]

If your angels have formed a pair, you most likely will not be able to house another with them unless you have a large tank. They are some of the meanest fish when paired. The rarer the color morph, the more likely they have been inbred. This shows up as weak fish especially with the blacks, pinoy, paraiba, pb, koi, superfins, etc. Fish do just die too. Sometimes for no apparent reason.

Sorry for your loss.