Deceased Mandarin: why?

[bon_jon11]

I had a Mandarin spotted for about 3-4 days and it looked very content in my tank. I was looking at it and it was perched up on a rock and next thing I know it, its on its side. So i took him out and froze him so he can be refunded. What could have happened? I have two other fish they're fine, everything is fine even the water but he's dead. What happened?

[mnreefgeek]

How old is your tank?

[bon_jon11]

It's about 10 wks. I know what you mean but by the looks of it I thought i had a sufficient amount of pods in my tanks(the lil white bugs on the glass correct). I didn't have as much as other plp speak of when they say they have thousands, because i have all the othe inverts as well.

[Ray1214]

He sounds like he didn't have enough to eat. I let my tank mature for a year before I even thought about it. How large is your tank? It is thought that you should have a 55 gallon with good quality live rock and mature for one mandarin.

Ray

[ckreef]

I seriously doubt you starved the fish to death in 3-4 days unless it was on the brink of starvation when you got it.

[kram138]

Jon, you mentioned in another post that you tested your water and had ammonia at 5ppm and Nitrite at 5ppm. I think that could have led to the death of your mandarin more so than not enough food. Or maybe both.

[Ray1214]

Yes, unless the nitrates threw off the nitrate kit. I noticed both were at 5 ppm. Typically nitrites can be picked up by a nitrate kit but not vice versa. 5 ppm nitrites are pretty lethel and I don't think 5 ppm ammonia is not a good combination with an 8.0- pH (Guessing on pH based on standard reef values). There is a chart on the krib that the higher the pH, the lower the level it takes for ammonia to be lethel.

Ray