Moving Fish Across Country,

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Jexnell said:
Have them shipped to a LFS where you are moving to. They charge you a fee for the tank space rental, care until your ready to pick them up.

Ship to a MFK member in the area that has the spare tank space.
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In addition do either of you have any decent LFS near your current abodes that could (safely) keep your fish for you (for a small fee) and then ship them to you when you're set up? Or if doing like Matteus might (bring the fish by air himself) maybe they could at least help you bag, air up & box the fish.

Also I'm pretty sure anyone bringing live (bigger) fish with them on an airplane would have to list them as live cargo -- where they would almost for sure go in the same temperature controlled place where they put dogs & cats -- so there would be no danger of golf clubs or suitcases damaging the box. It will likely cost a bit extra (they usually charge by the pound) but worth the peace of mind that they should be safe.

When I brought my large Black Lab with me from USA to Japan some years ago her ticket was more expensive than mine lol -- maybe put your fish on a diet beforehand :)
 
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islandguy11 said:
Well that indeed is pretty screwed, I hope they were fired -- but it's also like saying all UPS or FEDEX delivery people throw boxes at houses just because a few jerks might do it. And certainly not the first complaint about the services of that budget airline in particular.
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I think that's actually fairly typical treatment of checked baggage. People are only shocked because it was caught on video. All luggage and packages are handled much more roughly than the public realizes.

The difference is that the high cost of overnight UPS/FedEx/DHL/USPS keeps packages small and light.

On the other hand, checked baggage is a bargain (as long as you don't go over two checked bags) which encourages them to be large and heavy.

Other packages/luggage will land on your box of fish. The difference is how heavy they will be.
 
I've worked for both Canada Post, and Purolator (owned by CP) and have seen thousands of parcels tossed on to transport trucks, cargo containers, and delivery trucks - but it is a very rare event to see a styro box labeled *Live Fish*, tossed, or damaged. This includes deliveries from one end of the world, to the other, many carrying fish worth more than I make in a week. Can bad things happen, sure, but as I said it's a rare event, compared to the average box or envelope that gets tossed around. I can only speculate, but I think the fact that it is a live animal makes the vast majority of people stop and think before being reckless with the container. I also have known a number of importers of live fish over the years, and I can't recall a single incident where (when properly packed) their container arrived damaged to the point that fish were injured or dead.
 
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I had to transfer many large (1ft + fish) across country a few years ago, and this is what i did.


-Purchased multiple high quality coolers; these were in the back of a moving truck in the middle of summer, and needed insulation.
-Months in advance, I had set up several sponge filters, so they had full bacteria colonies
-Purchased battery powered air pumps, and lots of batteries

Once I had the coolers, I drilled holes in the top to allow the air hoses to go into the coolers. I set up these air hoses to the sponge filters. This allowed some filtration.

Every night on the trip, I did a 50% water change.

They were in this setup on the road for 5 days, plus an additional day at my new place because I needed to get the aquariums set up again.
 
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Lots of peeps here have had fish air shipped to them before with no problems at all -- and how do wholesalers and fish stores in US/CAN/Euro etc. get millions of fish from SEA fish farms/dealers? Sure they sometimes lose fish, but as RD mentions it's super rarely because the box itself was damaged in transit.

I've had 2 Asian Arowana separately shipped by commercial air cargo down from Bangkok to the island, and they (and their styrofoam boxes) both arrived in excellent condition, despite also being air shipped a couple of weeks earlier from Malaysia to Thailand. It's possible they were just lucky on those (total 4) flights, but statistics would speak otherwise I'm sure.
 
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islandguy11 said:
Lots of peeps here have had fish air shipped to them before with no problems at all -- and how do wholesalers and fish stores in US/CAN/Euro etc. get millions of fish from SEA fish farms/dealers? Sure they sometimes lose fish, but as RD mentions it's super rarely because the box itself was damaged in transit.
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Were they shipped as checked luggage?

islandguy11 said:
I've had 2 Asian Arowana separately shipped by commercial air cargo down from Bangkok to the island, and they (and their styrofoam boxes) both arrived in excellent condition, despite also being air shipped a couple of weeks earlier from Malaysia to Thailand. It's possible they were just lucky on those (total 4) flights, but statistics would speak otherwise I'm sure.
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Air cargo and checked luggage aren't the same.
 
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