Livebearers at Petstores...

[lljdma06]

I have a question for the experts of the board.

I've kept livebearers, mostly swords, platies, and guppies, and they have always done well in my tanks.

But I have noticed that many livebearers don't do well in pet stores. The first day they seem fine, but after a few days, they begin to clamp their fins then do what I call a "shimmy" near the surface of the tank. Then, most of the time, they die. It's really quite disgusting to see dead fish in tanks.

I have noticed this in many stores, and will not buy livebearers as a result, except on the rare occasion where I've seen the same livebearer fine after one week at the store.

I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the water, perhaps the pH or maybe the salt content. I've always kept my livebearers with a little salt. The characins, cyprinids, and cichlids are usually fine at stores. But coincidently, or maybe not, the goldfish also seem to be troubled.

What are some opinions on this topic? Just curious.

 

[Polardbear]

I think it has a lot to do with shipping stress and over crowding. Thirty years ago I rarely saw this problem and if I did would not have gone back to that particular store. Nowadays it is so commonplace that it's disgusting. A couple of things come to mind, way back in my fishie dark ages, most livebearers came from fish farms in Florida as opposed to fish farms in Thailand. Fish stores also would keep livebearers in a quiet darkened room for a week or two to acclimate/quarentine before putting them on display. They generally didn't cram as many fish into a tank as they possibly could either.

I have left many lfs in tears lately after looking at the swordtail tanks. I try to learn the schedules of my stores so that I can pick up new swordies the day they come in and then I put them in my own quarentine tank (in a quiet darkened room) for 30 days. I'd rather take the gamble of nursing them through any illness than waiting to see if they survive a week at the store.

What really outrages me though is the stores that continue selling them when over half the tank is either half dead, obviously dead or covered in open sores. I've made myself unwelcome at more than one lfs by expressing my anger at there lack of concern.

 

[lljdma06]

What really outrages me though is the stores that continue selling them when over half the tank is either half dead, obviously dead or covered in open sores. I've made myself unwelcome at more than one lfs by expressing my anger at there lack of concern.

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Amen to that! I've gotten into arguements too, and I'm quite a spitfire, so I have to be careful. My favorite line is when I walk into a fish store, notice the dead fish, and then the workers as if I need help. I respond, "Yeah, help me count the dead fish." They shut up, turn red, and don't bother me.

Even ten years ago, it was easier to find good livebearers. I had several in my first aquariums, and they were great.

Thank you for your imput.

 

[Angry_Platy]

I just got home from a LFS that I rarely buy fish from. I looked in the neon tank and they all looked kinda pale. Then I saw the clown loaches, skinny and covered with whitespot and constantly flicking. Then I went back to the neon tank and noticed about 10 dead neons attached to the filter intake. The tank next to it had platies dead or half dying on the bottom of the tank and the tank opposite had angels lying on the bottom

SOOO sad

 

[fawnmodel]

Not just livebearers. Today one of my healthy sister danios commited hari kari by getting her fat, egg-laden self stuck in a hole in a decoration and she died. I went to buy a few more smaller danios, to replace her, and one tank in a usually good lfs had danios with a really strange condition. It looked as if their stripes were bleached right off in places, I don't know how to describe it. The fish looked otherwise fine, but I turned around and walked out, not sure if it was a genetic thing or a disease, but I have never seen that before.

Walmarts tanks conistently have ADULT mollies at about 30 in a 5 gal tank. All they do is fight and die, yet I can't stop looking

 

[lljdma06]

Well good news!

I went to my LFS in Illinois, came home with 3 harlequin rasboras, but GUESS WHAT I SAW?

They were so pretty, in a little corner, I saw what were called Eandler's livebearers (My spelling and memory are aweful, so please feel free to make corrections). The females looked like smallish guppies, but the males! Utterly gorgeous! Beautiful shades of orange and iredescence! Very small, less than an inch. So not like guppies! Strange, like a swordtail met a killifish, and their children shrunk. Forgive my strange description. Lovely fish, and the only thing stopping me from setting up a new 10-gallon just for them was the painful reminder that I have no money But I will think about them when I move back to Miami. And they were healthy, as were all their livebearers in that FS, which is a nice, refreshing thing to see. I asked about the little guys, but the store owner told me they were nippy and not the best company for bettas. Hey, I had seven tanks running in Miami, FL before I left for school, so I can do it again when come back and have a job! I love a having a family that lets me indulge in all my eccentricities.

So if anybody has some information on these guys, that would be great. A species tank of them would be stunning.

Sorry for the random thoughts but I thought I'd share a positive LFS experience when all we normally get are negative ones.

 

[Kajuki18]

I live in Kane county in Illinois, where was this store cuz I really like Endler's Livebearers.

 

[Fish_Mike]

well i for one do know that ARE still fish stores that ship their fish from florida and DO keep them in dark quarantine. And that's Big Al's. I love that store because they don't try to sell you the fish, they tell you what's right. And their livebearer tanks are always healthy, a little overcrowded, i know they can be in a fish store, but overcrowded for being overcrowded, and not even one dead fish. Puts me in a good mood that their store also states 'shipped directly from our florida farms' Gotta love a store like that!

 

[lljdma06]

I live in Kane county in Illinois, where was this store cuz I really like Endler's Livebearers.

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The store is located in Champaing, IL. But I don't want to give anymore information in case I'm in violation of any forum rules. So if you want the specifics, send me a message.

They are gorgeous, hopefully they won't sell too quickly and the store owner was looking to sell them only to responsible people.

Hear from ya later.

 

[lljdma06]

well i for one do know that ARE still fish stores that ship their fish from florida and DO keep them in dark quarantine. And that's Big Al's. I love that store because they don't try to sell you the fish, they tell you what's right. And their livebearer tanks are always healthy, a little overcrowded, i know they can be in a fish store, but overcrowded for being overcrowded, and not even one dead fish. Puts me in a good mood that their store also states 'shipped directly from our florida farms' Gotta love a store like that!

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I will be moving back to Florida in a year, where is Big AL's?

 

[paulthegreat]

It breaks my heart to hear about such irresponsible stores. I am fortunate that my lfs's seem to take good care of their stock. Shame on those who do not

 

[Weaver]

My lfs shopgets his stock in on Fridays and wont sell any of them until the following Wednesday.The last day I was in he refused to sell a goldfish to a man who said he was for keeping it in a Pyrex dish!!!!! If a fish is sick he will try his utmost to cure it.He also tells me to always tell him if there is a dead or sick looking fish in a tank that he may have missed.He asks questions and gives loads of advice to anyone buying fish and will not sell to anyone he thinks isnt going to take care of them
Needless to say I have never had a bad fish from that shop. Bought 2 big beautiful healthy swordtails there last week

 

[shuhu]

I have seen that in one of the LPS stores where I get my fish, but is not the livebeares who are affected the most. Sometimes they have death fish in most of the tanks, and you can even see the live fish feeding from the death bodies, this is not that frecuent and most of the time you can see "healthy" fish in all of the tanks unfortunately they get new fish on Fridays and like 1 hour after they got them they are available for selling.

You would think it is better for their business to quarantine the new arrivals and provide a un-stressed situation, but maybe is no such a profit loss for them.

 

[lljdma06]

Well, thanks to some of the posts on this thread, I've been introduced to the wonderful world of Endler's livebearers, and will probably set up my first Endler tank, a 20-long planted, when I return to Miami, FL. They are a lovely fish, and doing my part to help preserve a species in danger would be awesome! It will end up being a biotope aquarium that will try to simulate the habitat of these fish, plants from the region, substrate, etc. Though, nothing can be simulated to perfection, an impression of this fish's natural habitat would be great. Probably sounding really Nerdy now.

I'm very excited about this new direction in my hobby. Just thought I'd share. If anybody has any suggestions, feel free to jump right in. Or should I start a brand new thread?

 

[Fish_Mike]

lol no need to start a brand new thread, and the adress for the big als farm in florida is:


Big Al's Florida Store

well here's the lin anyways