Yesterday I picked up a Chocolate Cichlid (Hypselecara temporalis) from a store that I'm never going to shop from again.
They have a pretty solid range but their tanks are also, well so/so. Their fish always look washed out and uncoloured, probably due to either bad food, stress, huge nitrates, or as I think probable, all of the above.
If this poor little guy wasn't marked, I wouldn't have picked it as a Chocolate Cichlid. How bad the conditions have to be to make a brown fish white is beyond me, but I decided what the hell, only place on the coast with a small Chocolate for sale, I'll take my chances.
I let the lady who's cleaning a tank on the adjacent wall know that I'll take the Chocolate. Was the only one in the tank but I had to point it out for her anyway, that was fair enough.
First off I notice that she has a jug of water from the tank she was cleaning or next to it, and scoops the fish with the net into the jug. Strike 1, I can understand that though because they were Tropical fish too so it had a decent chance of being on the same centralized filtering.
This is where it goes sour. She proceeds to drop the untied bag from chest height onto the ground and panics. Not knowing what to do, she takes a jug full of water from the nearest tank, which happens to be a self filtered planted tank so who knows what the water was like, picks him up and puts him in that, and tells me "Hmm he looks ok". Big Strike 2.
I'm pretty much in shock as to how retarded she is. She heads back over to the tank and while shes pointing out Geophagus Brasiliensis in the same tank saying they're Chocolates, out of sympathy and full knowledge that this fish will die if I don't take it, I told her I'd take it for half price. Batter out.
After 10 seconds of knowing how terrible she was at maintaining an aquarium, she agrees and we head over. I've got the docket here, it says "due to cheryl dropping the bag with the cichlid in it slipping out of her hand, they said they still wanted him for half price".
Cheryl is a retard.
So I rush this poor fish home in water that it doesn't belong in, grab a bucket, empty the bag into it and quickly try to acclimatise the poor little guy to get him in my tank. Huge risk to begin with but I decided to buy him from that store anyway knowing that Ich or other parasites etc. were quite possibly going to be introduced. Although he was white in the store, he was active and seemingly healthy, even slightly aggressive. I don't have a hospital tank.
5 minutes later I look into the bucket and he's just hovering there. I pick him out with my hand without him even trying to get away, give him an inspection, and just place him in the tank. I pretty much decided he had to go in now or he wasn't going to make it.
First signs on going in is that he couldn't swim properly, he 'sitting' with his head on an upward angle but could control his buoyancy and was quite aware of my Severums and Acara gawking at him.
I took these photos last night about 2 hours after he was introduced into my tank.
His fins are all pretty damaged, particularly his left Pectoral fin, which is split almost entirely in half. I was pretty much worried that he wouldn't make it through the night, but he did.
27 hours in, here he is.
He's still resting on the upwards angle, but can control his swimming and buoyancy when he wants to, so it doesn't seem permanent. I'm also happy to report that he has eaten and held his ground in a little biff that he had with my little Severum of all fish.
Hopefully he makes a full recovery and becomes a big brute with a happy rescue story
They have a pretty solid range but their tanks are also, well so/so. Their fish always look washed out and uncoloured, probably due to either bad food, stress, huge nitrates, or as I think probable, all of the above.
If this poor little guy wasn't marked, I wouldn't have picked it as a Chocolate Cichlid. How bad the conditions have to be to make a brown fish white is beyond me, but I decided what the hell, only place on the coast with a small Chocolate for sale, I'll take my chances.
I let the lady who's cleaning a tank on the adjacent wall know that I'll take the Chocolate. Was the only one in the tank but I had to point it out for her anyway, that was fair enough.
First off I notice that she has a jug of water from the tank she was cleaning or next to it, and scoops the fish with the net into the jug. Strike 1, I can understand that though because they were Tropical fish too so it had a decent chance of being on the same centralized filtering.
This is where it goes sour. She proceeds to drop the untied bag from chest height onto the ground and panics. Not knowing what to do, she takes a jug full of water from the nearest tank, which happens to be a self filtered planted tank so who knows what the water was like, picks him up and puts him in that, and tells me "Hmm he looks ok". Big Strike 2.
I'm pretty much in shock as to how retarded she is. She heads back over to the tank and while shes pointing out Geophagus Brasiliensis in the same tank saying they're Chocolates, out of sympathy and full knowledge that this fish will die if I don't take it, I told her I'd take it for half price. Batter out.
After 10 seconds of knowing how terrible she was at maintaining an aquarium, she agrees and we head over. I've got the docket here, it says "due to cheryl dropping the bag with the cichlid in it slipping out of her hand, they said they still wanted him for half price".
Cheryl is a retard.
So I rush this poor fish home in water that it doesn't belong in, grab a bucket, empty the bag into it and quickly try to acclimatise the poor little guy to get him in my tank. Huge risk to begin with but I decided to buy him from that store anyway knowing that Ich or other parasites etc. were quite possibly going to be introduced. Although he was white in the store, he was active and seemingly healthy, even slightly aggressive. I don't have a hospital tank.
5 minutes later I look into the bucket and he's just hovering there. I pick him out with my hand without him even trying to get away, give him an inspection, and just place him in the tank. I pretty much decided he had to go in now or he wasn't going to make it.
First signs on going in is that he couldn't swim properly, he 'sitting' with his head on an upward angle but could control his buoyancy and was quite aware of my Severums and Acara gawking at him.
I took these photos last night about 2 hours after he was introduced into my tank.
His fins are all pretty damaged, particularly his left Pectoral fin, which is split almost entirely in half. I was pretty much worried that he wouldn't make it through the night, but he did.
27 hours in, here he is.
He's still resting on the upwards angle, but can control his swimming and buoyancy when he wants to, so it doesn't seem permanent. I'm also happy to report that he has eaten and held his ground in a little biff that he had with my little Severum of all fish.
Hopefully he makes a full recovery and becomes a big brute with a happy rescue story
