-1 grey female
One of my grey females died tonight. I have no idea why.
I fed them earlier tonight and they were all eating and fine. A couple hours later, the tank went dark for the night and I happened to glance over there, which I never do after it goes dark, and I noticed one of them pointed downwards, with just her nose poked into a corner of a rock. I thought she was just sleeping, these fish do that.
I had an odd feeling about it, so I walked over there to get a better look and couldn't really tell. I went over to get a flashlight and debated whether I should get a net. My gut told me that I was going to have to net her out of there.
The flashlight revealed what I didn't want to see, she was upside down, with her nose barely poked into a rock. Last hope, I put the net in the tank and hoped she would swim away and show that she was fine. But no. The swirling water dislodged her nose and she floated free to the middle of the tank, revealing that she was, indeed, dead. I think she got lodged in the rock after she died, because if she'd become stuck in there and THEN died, she would have been right-side-up.
I have no idea what killed her. I examined her mouth, thinking maybe she'd managed to get a rock stuck in there or something. One of her gills is red, but I didn't notice anything amiss on any of them earlier, so that may be a post-mortem thing, I don't know.
The other fish appear to be fine, they hadn't even noticed that she was dead. Because the big tank is so big, I really don't worry too much about them. I clean the tank and change the filters somewhat regularly. They really are pretty maintenance free. Mostly, if I worry about any of them at all these days, I worry about Mr. White because he just seems to generally be a bit more sensitive. But then, his tank is smaller, too, at 12 gallons vs. 36 gallons.
I just don't know.
I'm so sad.
Now in the big tank we have 3 white, 5 grey, 1 algae eater.
I fed them earlier tonight and they were all eating and fine. A couple hours later, the tank went dark for the night and I happened to glance over there, which I never do after it goes dark, and I noticed one of them pointed downwards, with just her nose poked into a corner of a rock. I thought she was just sleeping, these fish do that.
I had an odd feeling about it, so I walked over there to get a better look and couldn't really tell. I went over to get a flashlight and debated whether I should get a net. My gut told me that I was going to have to net her out of there.
The flashlight revealed what I didn't want to see, she was upside down, with her nose barely poked into a rock. Last hope, I put the net in the tank and hoped she would swim away and show that she was fine. But no. The swirling water dislodged her nose and she floated free to the middle of the tank, revealing that she was, indeed, dead. I think she got lodged in the rock after she died, because if she'd become stuck in there and THEN died, she would have been right-side-up.
I have no idea what killed her. I examined her mouth, thinking maybe she'd managed to get a rock stuck in there or something. One of her gills is red, but I didn't notice anything amiss on any of them earlier, so that may be a post-mortem thing, I don't know.
The other fish appear to be fine, they hadn't even noticed that she was dead. Because the big tank is so big, I really don't worry too much about them. I clean the tank and change the filters somewhat regularly. They really are pretty maintenance free. Mostly, if I worry about any of them at all these days, I worry about Mr. White because he just seems to generally be a bit more sensitive. But then, his tank is smaller, too, at 12 gallons vs. 36 gallons.
I just don't know.
I'm so sad.
Now in the big tank we have 3 white, 5 grey, 1 algae eater.
Labels: loss
posted by Jammie J. at
5/25/2008 11:06:00 PM
