Mr. Saltwater Tank TV Friday Am Quick Tip: What NOT To Do When Acclimating Your Fish
Once you’ve returned home with your new finned friend, acclimating them to your tank’s water is very important. Make sure you leave this step out of your acclimation procedure though.
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Airstone in the bag you got it in ?
Never heard of that one.
Could you also possibly explain how adding air raises the Ph level?
Here in Europe such discussions are not started, so we aer unaware of it.
Thanks Mark, its also important to introduce my tank water to fish Bag?
Muhammad Ali…absolutely. Once the bag is temperature acclimated, you need to drip acclimate or add water to the bag via the 1/2 cup every 5 min method
I use a bucket and a drop line to acclimate my new fish, but I find the water cools down a lot. Should I use a heater in the bucket?
Thanks for touching upon key points… When I buy a fish I bring him/her home and place them in the sump still in the bag. I then start preparing a 1.6, 2.5, or a 5 gallon tank for them so I can prepare the drip method. This also keeps the fish in a nice quiet not too dark of a location.
once I cut the bag into the prepared tank with filtration and a heater then a timed light.I start the drip for 2 hours and then remove 3/4 water and drip again, remove 3/4 water and drip again. This is until I feel that the LFS water is so diluted that I don’t need to drip. After a week or 2 I add them into a see through container with holes in it to introduce the tank mates and the new fish. After a few hours they go in and find a place to call their own.
If you can put the bag in your sump when you drip it will keep the same temp. Secure the bag in the sump by putting one side in the bag and the other on the outside of your tank while keeping the top of the bag open and above water level.
I always QT, so it makes it much easier to acclimate a new fish. All I do is match the QT salinity to that of the transport bag, float for 20-30 minutes, then do the 0.5 cup every five minutes for 20-25 minutes. Haven’t lost a fish yet using this method.
CO2 in water creates carbonic acid and by adding O2 you decrease the partial pressure of the CO2. Thus, the pH in the water is increased. I know from a physiological stand point we need CO2 to a certain degree as well for acid-base balance as it is is converted to bicarbonate (a base) by the body. By increasing the 02 in the water you have inadvertantly have also decreased the pH of the blood of the fish.
Ilker~ As the fish breathes, it lowers the O2 and raises the CO2 levels in the water. This drives down the pH, which in turn, lowers the toxicity of the ever-increasing Ammonia. Raising the O2 level too rapidly will bring the pH back to normal and make the Ammonia toxic again before you’ve had a chance to lower the Ammonia level. Again, this applies mainly to fish that have been shipped as they’re in a sealed bag for an extended period of time.
Thumbs up
If the fish was shipped correctly then the bag would have been inflated with pure oxygen, so there is no need to panic about getting air in the bag, just as Mark said the waste products are going to turn toxic if oxygen levels are increased by means of air-stones etc, unless the fish looks like its in distress in which case you need to do a fast pH check, temp check, get both matched. By this I mean poor out half the bag water, use your feed or any clean cup to start to put your tank water in and poor it from a height to introduce a few bubbles by the action put the bag back in the tank, I usually drape the bag over the side & use the lid or cleaning magnet to secure it from drifting away in the current ,wait 3-5 mins then repeat the process, this is just a faster way of achieving the drip acclimation method ( just without the hose line) get the process done in ten mins without letting any original bag water into your display tank.
This above method was a faster way to achieve the same results as drip acclimation, for a fish or group of fish that are in distress, needless to say if they are distressed look closely for signs of disease, don’t assume that the animals are infected unless you know the shipping was not overly long. If speckles are seen, or a smell is present that is fowl then quarantine must be carried out.
Assuming infection is not an issue, nor is a lack of oxygen from long shipping then carry out a drip acclimation, but don’t take hours to as using a bucket will mean that tank temperature will not be matched.
Perhaps placing the bag into the sump if able will help to match temps. Then its a matter of not letting the bag overflow into the sump. I will take maybe 1.5hrs tops to drip acclimatise a very delicate animal or coral and use my sump to match the temps. while using air line with a loop to kink it (simply tighten or loosen the loop for wanted flow rate). Generally drip method will need 1/2hr to 45mins max. All this shouldn’t be a unenjoyable thing, everything I do from all maintenance to stocking is what makes it fun. If you don’t enjoy the tasks of the hobby then its not going to be a long one. Enjoy all you do, and do it well.
I love my turkey baster. Never had to acclimate for more than an hour or so. 15-20 min for temp adjustment. And then start squirting. I make note of how much the tank/sump water rises with the bag and every 10 min or so I squirt out bag water into a bucket and introduce same amount of squirts of tank water into bag. Takes about 45 min to replace all the bag water. Once the tank/sump level is back to its original level I know all the water has been cycled(replaced) out. Never lost a fish like this.
If you add one of the ammonia eliminators, like Prime or Amquil, then could you add the air stone to the bag? When I get coral in, I drip acclimate in a bucket where I use an air stone and a heater.
Wow… My question actually gets ignored?
wow …..
@Ilker, I have read that ammonia is high in the bag of water a fish gets shipped in, and when you put an airstone in the bag it dissipates the ammonia and at the same time raises the pH way too high and at a very fast pace putting a great amount of stress on the fish.
@polojeff: Thanks man!
So the best is to set up acclimation tank