Missing Fish From Shop To Home.

StatMan · Jan 25, 2009

Bought some otocinclus on Saturday from an LFS. 3 Tiger, 3 affinis.

When we got home ther were only 2 affinis in the bag. Now my son and I watched the guy catch them and I am fairly sure they made it to the bag.

Thing is that once finsihed they take the bags to the counter, add oxygen and then tie them up and place in a second non tansparent bag.

Anyway when we got home ready to acclimatise the fish to the new tank my son called me in and said that there are only two affinis in the bag, having sometimes missed fish in a bag by way of some sort of optical illusion I just assumed he wasn't looking closely enough, but he was right only two in the bag. Now I guess the biggest worry here is that some poor fish is in a net on top of a tank.

I tried ringing the LFS but as it was the end of the day it was shut and they didn't have an answer phone.

Called the next morning and spoke to the guy that served us. He was insisting that he had put 3 in there, and I believe he thought he had, but that does not explain the missing fish when we got home. I can not believe that the other two would have totaly devoured the third in the 45 minutes from shop to tank.

Anyway I will go back to the shop next weekend, its closer to the golf course than home, and see what happens.

In future I will check the bags before I leave the shop.

Has this happened to anyone else?

StatMan

tqfan · Jan 25, 2009

i do usually watch them being caught, and there's always been the same amount when we got home, so no, it's never happened to me.

we have had an extra fish, though. the guy caught it and put it in the bag, and said we could have it, instead of taking it out again. nice of him!

this is a strange one, though! i'll always remember to check now.

fishyfeet · Jan 26, 2009

prob as they are sucker fish, it got stuck on the net, or maybe missed the bag altogether, i was bagging some fish for someone and i tipped the net up over the bag and a drip of water went in, when we counted them there was one short and one fish stuck to the net. di

Inchworm · Jan 26, 2009

Hi StatMan

When the lfs double bag fish, they twist and tie the first one and turn it upside down before putting it into the second one. This makes a bottom without corners that could cause some fish problems, but at the same time, it makes pleats in the bag that small and narrow fish like otos could get caught in.

Did you examine this part of the bag carefully?

StatMan · Jan 26, 2009

Inchworm said:
Hi StatMan

When the lfs double bag fish, they twist and tie the first one and turn it upside down before putting it into the second one. This makes a bottom without corners that could cause some fish problems, but at the same time, it makes pleats in the bag that small and narrow fish like otos could get caught in.

Did you examine this part of the bag carefully?

Inch

Believe me we spent several minutes checking the bag over, as I said in the post have miss counted fish in a bag before at a casual glance but we treble checked this one.

My biggest concern is that the poor fella was in the net.

I totally believe the shop is trustworthy and that this is just a genuine mistake, my wife used to go there 20 years ago when she first had fish, and they have a good reputation still I believe.

Anyway I'll see what happens next time I go there, I'll mention it.

StatMan