Acclimation of new fish, esp. shipped fish.

[jschall]

I want to hear some anecdotes or thoughts. Tell your story, in this thread, of how you acclimated your fish and if you had any deaths or not.

So, I've seen discussions of the various methods of acclimation. There's various combinations of floating bags and dripping tank water into them.

There are also people (and I tend to agree with them) who believe that ammonia toxicity in the bag is going to kill the fish much more decidedly than osmotic or temperature shock, and that osmotic shock will take place anyway even with a 30-minute-plus drip acclimation. This group also believes that temperature shock is a non-issue, as long as the temperature change is from cooler water to warmer water, not the other way around.

The reason that the ammonia represents an immediate danger when the bag is opened, is that the act of opening the bag causes the CO2 in the water to gas off. When CO2 dissolves into water, it forms carbonic acid, which lowers the pH of the water. Ammonia converts into less-toxic ammonium when it is dissolved in low-ph water. Opening the bag releases the CO2, causes the water to become more basic, converting safe ammonium into unsafe ammonia. Supposedly this can start occurring very rapidly (30 seconds) This seems to me to be fairly sound reasoning.

One method which is referred often to is the "squirt and dump" method, which involves treating the tank with amquel, and then opening the bag and immediately squirting amquel into it. This is followed by the immediate introduction of the fish into the tank, along with discarding the bag water. This method is pushed by the creator of, and recipient of profits from, amquel. To me, this doesn't make any sense. It involves throwing money at the amquel guy, and most of the amquel is simply discarded. The amquel dosed to the tank is unnecessary because you're discarding the bag water and all of its ammonia, and the amquel in the bag seems unnecessary if you're just going to immediately pour the water through a net and put the fish in a tank.

So, it becomes a balance between keeping the fish in extremely toxic water, and shocking the fish by moving it to (typically) warmer water with different chemistry.

My story is, I recently received a shipment of 15 fish. One fish was already DOA (luckily on its own in its bag), the others were all active in their bags. The company that shipped them to me were all about the drip acclimation. They sent a piece of paper with big letters on it saying "PLEASE ACCLIMATE SLOWLY (2 HOURS+) THIS MAKES A HUGE DIFFERENCE AND SAVES LIVES." I poured the 14 live ones through a net and put them right into their tank. No floating, no dripping. It's been a week, not a single one has died.

 

[jus1time]

What I usually do is, get a bucket with double the water thats in the bag from the tank they are going in. If there is more than 1 bag I guesstimate the total amt and double it.
Then I open the bags and dump the fish in the bucket. I wait a few mins,usually 3 or 4 mins, then net them and in the tank they go. Never had a problem that way. This is usually for African's. Although I have done it for fish from SA as well.

 

[jschall]

What I usually do is, get a bucket with double the water thats in the bag from the tank they are going in. If there is more than 1 bag I guesstimate the total amt and double it.
Then I open the bags and dump the fish in the bucket. I wait a few mins,usually 3 or 4 mins, then net them and in the tank they go. Never had a problem that way. This is usually for African's. Although I have done it for fish from SA as well.

The thing is, I think you've got worst of both worlds going on there. You're diluting the ammonia in half, but you're increasing the pH much more rapidly vs the drip method, and immediately converting the ammonium to ammonia. You're also changing the water chemistry and temperature almost as fast as you would if you had just netted the fish into the tank. Temperature not such a concern, since the fish should adjust to the intermediary temperature in 5 minutes, but as far as water chemistry goes, I would think you might as well have netted your fish right into the tank.

The fact that you've never had a problem with this, perhaps is a testament to the futility of even worrying about acclimation? If they survive this method, which is essentially worst-of-both-worlds by not accomplishing the goals of either method, does it matter how the fish are acclimated? If it doesn't, why not simply net the fish in? It's much more convenient, and ammonia toxicity is known to cause permanent damage. I would think that shock, on the other hand, either kills outright or the fish get over it.

Edit: I want to clarify that I'm NOT yelling at you or demanding that you change your method. If it works for you, it works for you. I'm merely observing that I think your method is contrary to the arguments from BOTH sides of the table, although it is somewhat a middle-of-the-road. I do hope that you either come up with a logical argument for keeping your method, or change it to a more logical method, however.

 

[jus1time]

you are partially correct. I am adding 2 parts freshwater to 1 part bag water. Therefore it has diluted the bag water sufficiently not to cause irreputable ammonia damage to the fish. As far as the PH goes. Ph fluctuations can occur quite rapidly even in large lakes and ponds, depending on the amount of sun and plants present. Along with many other factors that contribute to the Ph swings in any given body of water. Fish are very resilent animals that can easily adapt to wide range of conditions. ( Look at Lake Victoria)
I have had good success in doing this and havent lost any fish to date.
If aint broke there is no reason to try and fix it! Good discussion!

 

[Darth Scohin]

Well I had followed a shortened version of the drip for my Afro (because I didn't want to loose him) but all my other fish as long as they're not sensitive I've just float temp acclimated and netted out....I've however done a scoop of water after temp waited another 10min for more "sensitive" fish.

 

[aclockworkorange]

Open bag, squirt in ammonia neutralizer, drip acclimate. I've worked in a wholesale fish dealer and seen it done different ways, you have to realize when fish come in from Colombia or Singapore the ph can be like 3.0. You cannot just dump a weakened fish in a tank from 3.0 to 7.0 ph.
Make sure to test the bag ph when you get the fish. If the ph is close to your tank then I'd say squirt and dump is ok.

 

[3dees]

when I have fish shipped to me I float the bag un-opened for about 1/2 hour for temp. open the bag, net the fish and drop them in. never had any problems. I really don't think that 1 or 2 hours is going to make a difference as far as PH. fish need days if not weeks to acclimate to a different PH. the shipper that sold me my wild discus and wild festivum's has them in a PH of 8.5. my PH is 7.6. my fish were swimming all over the tank and eating the next day. I believe that acclimation is another myth that needs to be re examined. many of these myths are from long ago when we had far less knowledge and inferior equiptment. many people stick to these beliefs but it's ok because the old ways usually don't do any harm. thats my take and I'm sticking to it. lol

 

[packer43064]

Ummmm I didn't know this was so complicated, lol. I've always opened the box with the said fish I bought. Take the said fish in question and float it in the water in the tank where it will be going. After about 10 minutes of floating I puncture a whole in the bag and put a small amount of my water in the bag. Walk away, wait 5 minutes go back put more in and so foth for close to 30 minutes then open bag more and dump the fish in. IDK if I'm risking life and death with the fish I bought, but so far none have died. So I guess this way works for me.

 

[kevinfleming21]

Ummmm I didn't know this was so complicated, lol. I've always opened the box with the said fish I bought. Take the said fish in question and float it in the water in the tank where it will be going. After about 10 minutes of floating I puncture a whole in the bag and put a small amount of my water in the bag. Walk away, wait 5 minutes go back put more in and so foth for close to 30 minutes then open bag more and dump the fish in. IDK if I'm risking life and death with the fish I bought, but so far none have died. So I guess this way works for me.

+1 on most instances with never a death or problem.

 

[jschall]

Open bag, squirt in ammonia neutralizer, drip acclimate. I've worked in a wholesale fish dealer and seen it done different ways, you have to realize when fish come in from Colombia or Singapore the ph can be like 3.0. You cannot just dump a weakened fish in a tank from 3.0 to 7.0 ph.
Make sure to test the bag ph when you get the fish. If the ph is close to your tank then I'd say squirt and dump is ok.

That makes more sense, adding prime or amquel or whatever and then dripping.
I would like to know why squirting amquel into the bag water is useful in the slightest when you're just going to remove the fish from it immediately. The "squirt and dump" method seems to have been invented solely to waste as much amquel as possible.