Attn: tang police

[Troy F]

Hi Mike. I purchased a fish from your store that had ich with the hopes that I could rehabilitate it with a healthy environment and diet. I was wrong :( , I knew better but thought I could overcome this. I asked the girl if you guys ran Cu in your systems and she said, "no it's bad for them," (it was actually a dumb question because there was live rock in the tanks). I think Cu is the only way to run a fish room considering that even the best suppliers are sending you stressed out and often sick fish. Or I guess you could treat each fish in quarantine but that's probably unlikely. Just my 2% of a peso.

[mikeb]

In are store we are trying to run the systems as naturally as possible and are keeping seperate systems as a preventitive measure .Of course the uv's aren't what we are treating with!sorry about your local store experiance but generalizing that all of of us are in the the same catagory is wrong. If anyone one could tell me of a store that hasn't fought a break out of ich i would like to know.

[mikeb]

when treating with coppersafe it says it treats a 100 gallon system for one month ,but at what level .A level of copper has to be maintained for 20- 30 days to kill the the disease in question. The problem i have is that the test kits that are available out there only test for non chelated copper . when treating with a product like this how do know what level its at.When the the fish shed there protective slime coat this gives a chance for the medication to work ,but what happens when the level of copper falls below the therapudic level, it comes back with a vengeance. The product in a quarintined environment to treat with would be coppersulfate ,this product can be monitored,but has to be checked daily to be effective.Troy are systems do have rock in them and we are using other treatments in these systems.

[Dale D]

Sumpfinfishe

Sorry about your bad experience at the store.

As Mike said we have been having an out break of Ich lately. I can tell you it is not because of a lack of care for the animals. I feel personally responsible for the life of every fish that we get in the store.

I have been working in the Chilliwack store for the last couple of weeks, so, I did not see what shape the tangs were in when they arrived.But,I was surprised to see how skinny they were when I arrived at the store on Saturday, and made sure they were fed often through out the day. The fish were treated on Saturday and I left instruction with the other staff to make sure that the fish were fed several times a day.

I have been keeping saltwater and reef tanks for about 10 years. And I will tell you that keeping fish healthy in a tank at home and in a tank in a retail outlet are two very different things.

I think we have a very good set up for our store. There are only 2 tanks on any one system. Each system has a UV and it's own sump. And all the systems are lightly stocked. The system with the tangs in it has about 350 - 450 gallons in it and contains 4 small tangs and 3 small lionfish. So the ich was not caused by over crowding.

We have tried to run the tanks on a more natural system, using live rock in the tanks, the way we recommend our customers run their tanks. Having live rock in the tanks we have had to be carefull about the types and amounts of medication we can use in the tanks. We have avoided running copper in the systems, because of some of the information that is available on it's extended use. I know of other stores that use copper constantly in there systems, although I am sure that they still suffer loses from ich and other things like everyone does. Maybe it is time to look at how our system is run and make some changes. I would hate to remove the rock and start running medication constantly, but,if that is what it takes, then we will do it.

[Delphinus]

Thank you Dale and Mike, for answering the call to the carpet. I realize that being a retailer is probably another one of those "you can never win" prospects, no matter what you do, people will be unhappy with something.

If the fish are not for sale while they are in a state of recovery, there's not much more I can ask (other than perhaps the obvious, that treatments be in the better interests of the livestock, of course).

Just some food for thought. If the issue is that it is not clear to some that the fish or other livestock are being treated, and that it "looks like" unhealthy livestock might be being sold ... well, obviously, a retail outlet cannot put everything in a back room out of the public eye while treatments or quarantines are performed. In which case, make sure that the tank are clearly labelled "not for sale, under quarantine" or some such.

I know that you guys must care deeply for your livestock. And I know, that no matter how much effort is made, sometimes an order just goes bad. It must be hard on you guys when this happens. But, feeling sad about a bad order doesn't help the animals -- potentially, someone dropped the ball, and we need to look at what can be done to prevent it from happening again. I think more effort needs to be made on the part of retailers, when something like this happens, to examine why it happened, and what lessons learned there may be to avoid similar situations in the future.

I am sure that you guys are already doing this. The fact that you are here, demonstrates to me a commitment to the overall well-being of the hobby, and I applaud this. I just wish more retailers would follow your example here.

In the meantime, good luck containing this outbreak, and best wishes for future orders.

[sumpfinfishe]

for mike.b and dale.d I'm sorry if I was harsh, I was not attacking your store in general, more just showing my concern for these poor fish.I keep one single healthy juvinile tang in my reef and I get attacked, so now it's someone ele's turn I guess. It was Saturday morning when I came to your store in Abtsfrd and the tangs were for sale that day as I asked the girl with the glasses behind the counter how much they where. I also wanted to say that I have seen a few stores now on both sides of the border and I would say that if your going to move fish through your store at a high volume, then I would think treated tanks are the best way to go! Your tanks setups looked great by the way. I also wanted to mention that in my other post titled "abbottsford" on sept 28, I did say that your store has potential. I would like to take another trip out that way when your flowing smoothly and not just trickeling. Sea you in the future-sumpfinfishe ;) [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 30 September 2002, 08:34: Message edited by: sumpfinfishe ]

[Mak]

Originally posted by sumpfinfishe:
for mike.b and dale.d I'm sorry if I was harsh, I was not attacking your store in general, more just showing my concern for these poor fish.I keep one single healthy juvinile tang in my reef and I get attacked, so now it's someone ele's turn I guess.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Dude, they have 4 in a 200g or so tank. You had 2 in a 27g... Oh oh wait a minute it has a 33g Footprint... well woopty frickin doo [img]tongue.gif[/img] . Let this childish crap drop and every body else will, instead of attacking a new Pet store that had an unfortunate outbreak in there tanks. And just cause your looking for a little revenge :mad: you start a thread on the Net and you give zero details making this look like a bad LPS, and a debate starts up about bad pet stores :confused: :confused: :confused: good 1.

[titus]

Hello,

Just got a powerpoint presentation from Dr.Kamal Balasooriya who is the best fish pathologist in Sri Lanka. In the slide it talks about different fish diseases and the type of medication, level, and length of treatment. I'll upload it hopefully by tonight.

Titus

[sumpfinfishe]

Hey Mak :D read the starter thread again, as you will see I was not attacking the store. More so I was pointing out that if the Tang Police want to do some good rather than just stir up #!*? all the time to go help out the tangs or to find out what's going on there. All stores get sick fish, however not all reefers raise sick fish no matter the size of there tanks.Oh and Dude-the tank that they were in was a 33gal not a 200gal! [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[ 30 September 2002, 18:16: Message edited by: sumpfinfishe ]

[Mak]

When I was in yesterday they were in the big one :confused: :confused: :confused: .