Red Fairy Wrasse not using tail fin

[Seige]

My Red Fairy Wrasse has been sitting on the bottom or lying in caves for about 3 days. As of yesterday afternoon he started swimming again but doesn't use his tail fin to swim. He's just using his pectoral fins to swim. He does have some use of his tail as he'll bend from one side to the other every 10 or 15 seconds. He seams to go to the surface a lot more then normal. Color is a little off but not terribly, about the same as when he was first introduced to the reef tank. He is eating but not much. I shut off the lights a little early last night so he'd hopefully rest. This morning as soon as the lights went on he was up and swimming again just using his pectoral fins.

Not sure if it could be related but a clownfish dissappeared about a week prior to this. No traces found but that's not abnormal since I don't like disturbing the reef. Also some of my filtration equipment broke down last week so I'm using a air bubbler for oxygenation of the tank. The bubbler is near his cave. Not sure if that would affect him in any way.

Water tests fine.

What should I do?

Seige

[vio]

what are the parameters in your tank specifically concerning me is pH.

using an airstone can cause excess dissolved gases such as carbon dioxide which is a conjugate base of carbonic acid which would cause a drop in your pH.

just my guess fairy wrasses are very sensitive to water params too, i believe.

[leebca]

Broken equipment; missing marine life forms; non-disturb policy; all point to several problems, the least of which seems to be proper maintenance. I'm unsure who is providing you with guidance, but their suggestions and advice should be checked with others before you take, in the future. You won't be the last and aren't the first to get off on the a slightly wrong foot in this hobby. There is a lot to learn and many myths to break through. Hang in there!

Do an equipment check once or twice a day and try to replace/repair it before it breaks. Keep redundant equipment if it is prone to breaking. Repair or replace broken equipment immediately. Find missing marine life forms. Dead things must be removed quickly before their pollution kills those that are still living. Disturb the aquarium often to remove built-up detritus -- that means clean the aquarium on a regular basis.

The things you can measure are only a few of the dozens of things that can be poisoning the water. I think you would benefit from learning more about water quality in this post: What is Water Quality.

I would like you to test the water for ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates two or three times a day and give us the results of each test. Use a test kit (not strips) for each test. Measure and report temperature, pH, and sp. gr. at least twice each day and provide us the information.

While you put the above data together, help us understand more by answering the following questions and providing this information:
How old is your tank? When did it originally cycle?
What is the size (dimensions and gallonage) of your aquarium? Does the gallonage include the volume from the sump and any refugium?
Do you use carbon, skimmer, mechanical or other chemical filtration? List all along with their maintenance.
Do you have live rock in the system? How many pounds or amount and where is it put?
Other than live rock hitchhikers, list all marine life & sizes in the tank (fish, inverts, corals, clams, snails, crabs, shrimp, etc.).
Do you use a quarantine tank and procedure?
Foods you use and feeding schedules.
How long have you had this fish? If the fish was recently acquired (6 weeks or less), two more questions: Did you treat it or give it a dip before it went into the aquarium? How did you acclimate it – what procedure?
Do you use any vitamins? Fat additives? Any elemental or other additives? Please list all.
Do you see any of the following in your system: hair algae; micro algae; cyanobacteria growths (red slime algae); dinoflagellate (zooxanthellae) growths; brown algae; diatom growth; slimes; off-colored patches on rock or substrate that are not coralline; etc.?
Water changes (how much and how often).
What is your source water? (Tap water, RO water, DI water, RO/DI, distilled, etc.)
List what you added or taken out of your aquarium system (living, decorations, and equipment) during the past 6 weeks.
Maintenance schedule. What have you done lately?

The fish behavior can be due to water quality which I'd say, under the circumstances, is the most likely problem. But with the above information we might learn more about that. If the fish is new, it may have had an injury. Have you seen the fish not behaving this way? When?

[Seige]

Broken equipment; missing marine life forms; non-disturb policy; all point to several problems, the least of which seems to be proper maintenance. I'm unsure who is providing you with guidance, but their suggestions and advice should be checked with others before you take, in the future. You won't be the last and aren't the first to get off on the a slightly wrong foot in this hobby. There is a lot to learn and many myths to break through. Hang in there!

I do keep duplicates of some equipment but I can't duplicate everything since I've been unemployed for the last 10 months. I originally shifted the reef rock every month or 2, but this led to a couple deaths. Detritus isn't a huge issue as I have a large diamond goby that digs everywhere and 3 Koralia #3 jets 1 set below 1/2 way directing on the back wall behind the reef rock and 2 up top on a wave machine.

I would like you to test the water for ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates two or three times a day and give us the results of each test. Use a test kit (not strips) for each test. Measure and report temperature, pH, and sp. gr. at least twice each day and provide us the information.

Using API Saltwater, Reef and Copper Test kits:
Temp 80
Sp. Gr. 1.024
Calcium 540 mg/L
KH 12dKH 214.8 ppm
pH 8.4
Phosphate 1.0
Ammonia 0 ppm
Nitrite 0 ppm
Nitrate 0 ppm
Copper 0 ppm

How old is your tank? When did it originally cycle?

17 months old. original cycle over first 6 weeks Jan-Feb 2009.

What is the size (dimensions and gallonage) of your aquarium? Does the gallonage include the volume from the sump and any refugium?
Do you use carbon, skimmer, mechanical or other chemical filtration? List all along with their maintenance.

55 gallon. 48" long. 21" height. 13" deep.
no sump/refugium. no skimmer.
mechanical filter only cleaned every other water change every 6-8 weeks.

Do you have live rock in the system? How many pounds or amount and where is it put?

50 pounds along back wall.

Other than live rock hitchhikers, list all marine life & sizes in the tank (fish, inverts, corals, clams, snails, crabs, shrimp, etc.).

Fish: 1" Clownfish, 1" Royal Gramma, 1.5" Mandarin, 2" Red Fairy Wrasse, 2.5" Banana Wrasse, 2.5" Diamond Goby, 2.5" Flame Angel
Small Corals (1"-3"): 2 mushrooms, candy cane, australian acan.
Larger Corals (3"-5"): mushroom, frogspawn, zoanthid, xenia, plate brain, 2 button polyps, open brain.
Other: strawberry crab (somewhere), conch, 2 feather dusters, 3 Mexican Turbos, 6 Turbos, 1 Orange Turbo, 2 Nassarius, 6 Cerith, 1 Astrea, 1 Bee, 2 Blood shrimp.

Copepod 20 gallon tank has: 10# live rock, thousands of copepods, orange turbo, 2 nassarius, 2 peppermint shrimp, 1 camel shrimp, very small mini stars and brittle stars.

Do you use a quarantine tank and procedure?

Yes, but varies on source. Haven't added any fish in the past 6 months and since then my q tank has been converted to a copepod breeding tank to supplement foods for the Mandarin. I don't intend to add any more fish to the main tank until I can upsize.

Foods you use and feeding schedules.

3 times a day (9am, 2pm, 7pm) Microcrabs Cyclopeeze Granules rarely adding New Life Spectrum Thera A+ if they aren't interested in the Cyclopeeze. Every other day I'll replace one of these meals with Frozen food alternating between Brine Shrimp, Chopped Krill, Cyclopeeze, Cyclops Copepods.
Every 3 days I feed the shrimp etc with frozen Hikari Krill whole or Seafood (no additives). The fish take some of this too.
Approximately every 4-5 days I feed the corals Reef Roids.
Approximately every 2-3 weeks I'll transfer live copepods from my copepod tank to the main tank for the Mandarin.

The copepods in the copepod tank are fed plankton and invertebrate pellets.

How long have you had this fish? If the fish was recently acquired (6 weeks or less), two more questions: Did you treat it or give it a dip before it went into the aquarium? How did you acclimate it – what procedure?

The red fairy wrasse was added about 12 months ago. No fish have been added in the last 6 months.

Do you use any vitamins? Fat additives? Any elemental or other additives? Please list all.

Calcium. No others except what's in the Spectrum Thera A+.

Do you see any of the following in your system: hair algae; micro algae; cyanobacteria growths (red slime algae); dinoflagellate (zooxanthellae) growths; brown algae; diatom growth; slimes; off-colored patches on rock or substrate that are not coralline; etc.?

Some hair algae.

Water changes (how much and how often).
What is your source water? (Tap water, RO water, DI water, RO/DI, distilled, etc.)

8 to 10 gallons every 3-4 weeks using RO/DI water.

List what you added or taken out of your aquarium system (living, decorations, and equipment) during the past 6 weeks.

Only addition during the last 6 weeks has been live copepods from my copepod breeding tank.

Maintenance schedule. What have you done lately?

Water changes, glass and filter cleaning and some hair algae removal by hand.

The fish behavior can be due to water quality which I'd say, under the circumstances, is the most likely problem. But with the above information we might learn more about that. If the fish is new, it may have had an injury. Have you seen the fish not behaving this way? When?

The Fairy wrasse was swimming fine up until 4 days ago.
Day 1: Each time I checked it would be sitting unmoving on the sand or rock.
Day 2: Same, it did move once when the diamond goby came up to it.
Day 3 (yesterday): It was swimming but not using it's tail, just using pectoral fins. It's nose is pointed upwards towards the surface about 85% of the time. Travels around the open areas of the tank. Eating very little.
Day 4 (today): same. Hasn't eaten. Tried mixture of foods.

Thanks for your help.
Seige

[leebca]

Thanks for the information. From what you've provided I'd say the worst condition is organics. Your systems is building up in organics. Ideally you have a skimmer AND a chemical filter at work. Without a skimmer your chemical filter needs to be larger. But your system, as far as I can tell, has neither. The current organic build up needs cleaning out, but this has to be done slowly so as to not 'shock' the system. Keep in mind that 'churning up the substrate' isn't the same as removing the detritus. Moving it around isn't getting rid of it.

Why be concerned about organics? They promote excessive bacterial and microbial growths which in turn take up other nutrients and oxygen in the water -- things that your biological filter and marine life forms should be given. Lastly, with such a large grouping of different immobile invertebrates, you need to constantly remove organics to control poisons released by the corals.

Corals 'fight' other corals both physically and chemically. These chemicals can stress, harm, injure and sometimes even kill other marine life forms -- even marine fishes. In the confines of an aquarium without good organic control these chemicals can create problems.

As to the fish, it is being stressed, no doubt. But exactly from what isn't clear. It should not be behaving like it is just from general organics, unless there is a particular microbe that is stressing the fish and not the others. This is not likely, but also not impossible. More than likely one or more of the other inhabitants is releasing something that is stressing this particular fish.

The other main alternative to the above is that this fish has been injured or previously poisoned, which is just now taking its toll. These sorts of things shorten the lifespan of our marine fishes and they 'end' by refusing food in captivity. Keep offering the food, but I would take small steps to gear up controlling the organics.