Dying Royal Gramma's

[kups]

I have a 29 gallon biocube that I started up in mid-January.  Since then I've added:

 

2 Nassarius snails

6 Blue legged hermit crabs

2 Mexican Turbo Snails

1 Peppermint shrimp 

 

Hairy Mushroom

Interstellar Mushroom

Assorted Zoa's and Paly's

Blue Ridge Coral

 

2 Picasso Clowns (approximately 1 month ago)

 

Nitrite - 0

Ammonia - 0

Nitrate - less than 10 Salifert, approx 20 API.  Currently seeing Cyano

PH - 7.9

SG - 1.025

 

 

I've tried adding a royal gramma but unfortunately have failed more than once

 

I added a nice large royal gramma two weeks ago and he lived for over a week in the tank.  He was eating great and would hang out in the rocks coming out further occasionally.  He mysteriously died on Tuesday morning.  I found him wedged between the rocks with no apparent damage.  He had been eating frozen mysis, brine and pellets.  

On Wednesday I stopped in to the LFS and spoke with the manager as I couldn't figure what went wrong.  He gave me another one at a discount and said it was very odd and this one would likely be fine.  Well this one was acclimated like the other, floated in bag for 15 minutes, dripped for 45-60 minutes and put in.  PH was spot on prior to acclimation and sg was brought up from 1.021.  I left the lights off when he was put in and he started feeding Thursday morning and ate again last night.  He was moving around the tank pretty good after lights out and showed no signs of any disease.  Unfortunately this morning I found him dead (pictures below).  

I think it's time for me to give up on Royal Gramma's for awhile.  If anyone has any ideas of what might have happened I would appreciate it.  I'm especially baffled by the first RG that lasted close to two weeks.  Could I have a yet unseen killer hitchhiker?

One change that I made to the tank recently was adding the in tank media basket with chemi-pure blue and matrix.  The matrix is not in the media basket currently.  

I'm not sure about Nitrate levels as I find the test kits difficult to read.  API shows elevated nitrates while Salifert shows very little.  I look through the side of the Salifert (10x magnification) and it's definitely less than 100 which is how I come to the less than 10 conclusion.

 

My corals and cleanup crew have been going strong and the only new addition is the peppermint shrimp which is 2 weeks old.  I've seen him a few times when feeding frozen shrimp.  The clowns have been great and are finally starting to move around the tank beyond the powerhead but only when the lights are out.  Hopefully they are not to blame.  

 

I've also added a picture of my tank and would appreciate any feedback on aquascaping.  With the RG dying I could change it up.  The clowns don't seem to mind when I'm in the tank but I tried to minimize it when I had the RG's since they were hiding a lot and easily spooked.

[Clown79]

Fish don't need drip acclimation. 30mins floating is enough for fish.

 

It's stressful on fish. They are caught and bagged at store, then you add them to a container of the water and drip acclimate. Then added to the tank.

 

While it's in a bag and container it's pooping and seeing which leads to ammonia which can be toxic.

 

I doubt it's a killer hitch hiker as your clowns are fine.

 

 

the RG's you are buying may not be healthy (regardless of what the store says) both came from the same store.

 

Leads me to think it's related to a shipment of fish.

 

I don't see anything on the body but there are internal parasites.

 

[Oldsalt01]

Looks like the "Peppermint" was lunching a bit on the RG. Unfortunately some collector's still use cyanide to stun the fish to make collection easier and it's still a rather widespread practice despite laws against it. It can take several weeks for a cyanide poisoned fish to succumb. I'm not saying this is your issue, but I agree with Clown. 2 dead fish from the same LFS leads me to believe they probably came from the same supplier/shipment and may have been collected by the same collector. I'd not give up on RG's. They're cool fish and I'm sure would love those caves. 

[dandelion]

It took me three tries to get a royal gramma that lived. Well still living. 

[kups]

Thanks for the replies.  I'm terrified to kill another RG.  I have a local supplier that will hold and quarantine fish for a few weeks prior to selling them.  I might wait a month or two and try and get one off him.  

[Clown79]

I know how you feel.

 

I had the same experience with tail spot blennies.

 

Now I won't have one after 3 died. 1 was a fish killed it but the other 2 deaths were mysterious. Just dead the next morning. Different tanks too.

 

 

[Sailingeric]

Sorry about your royal gramma. I have one going on three months and doing great. Mine had a lot of personality and gets  along with all my fish. I would try another store or wait in case it was something in the shipment,like stated above. 

[kups]

I picked up some frags from a fellow collector tonight and think I'm going to wait for awhile.  Beautiful looking fish though.