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RE: Shipping fishes
RJ,
I have noticed a few of your postings regarding shipping and
transport of Nothos and their subsequent willingness to eat. I don't
think I can agree that shipping live Nothos (i.e. fish) is a
particular problem. When we collect in Africa the fish can be in bags
for up to 2 weeks (occasionally as long as 17 days in my own
experience). Certainly they get thin after such a long period. We
don't feed them while in bags in the field, but we do change water
frequently. It can indeed be tricky to get them to eat once they are
in tanks at home, but they usually can be enticed with live foods
such as mosquito larvae and daphnia, blackworms or other worms. I
have found that mosquito larvae and daphnia are the best food to get
them interested in food again. Once they are eating they quickly come
back into excellent condition.
As far as water conditions go, you should not experience trouble if
you are placing the fish into water that is relatively hard. If going
from hard to soft water you need to artificially harden the latter or
to very gradually acclimimatize the fish. Nothos in nature come from
water that can vary from low to high conductivity. They tolerate hard
water well and some, including myself, would tell you that they do
best in aquaria in moderately hard water. The only time I have had
trouble transferring Nothos was earlier this year when I set up my
new fishroom in Oregon, where our water is dead soft. Even with the
many postings that have been made to this list regarding the
"hard-to-soft" problem, I under-estimated just how slowly I needed to
do the acclimatization.
I think I recall you posting some time ago about what you referred to
as "Notho wasting disease". That seems similar to what you are
describing here. I would suggest that you consider other
possibilities. Wasting is a common consequence of many diseases,
including some bacterial and protozoal diseases. The inappetance
might be the result of the disease not the cause. I recommend, if you
have further incidences of such a problem, that you fix a few of the
(recently) dead fish in formaling (10%) and send them to someone to
examine them histologically. I can arrange this for you if you wish.
If you need to discuss it further, please contact me oof-list.
In summary, in my opinion Nothos can be shipped as fish as well as
other species, provided basic care is taken (bagged individually,
food withheld for one day before, clean water, etc.). I don't
recommend keeping fish in bags longer than necessary, but I doubt
that anyone does so deliberately. Usually fish arrive within 3-4 days
of shipping.
Barry
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