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It's a Zombie Lennardi (1 Viewer)

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sneezebeetle

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You can't make this stuff up!

Yesterday I walked up to my tank and spotted my Lennardi floating belly up on the substrate being pushed along by the current and thought oh crap, he's dead! So I went ahead and stuck my hand in the tank to scoop him up and he had some signs of life, but I noticed he had marks on either side of his body near his tail fin that resemble stings from an anemone ( I have 14!). Hollered at the hubby to grab an acclimation box so I could put him in the box with some substrate and just watch him to see what happens.

I checked on him frequently, poor guy is on his side in the "hook" position, which most of us know is not a good sign for a wrasse, and he is breathing heavy and just completely listless. as the day progresses his breathing is getting slower and more shallow, I decided to squirt a little food in there to see if he would respond to no avail. So off go the lights, turn down the power heads so minimize stress on the poor guy and I am hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst.

Flash forward to this morning and I go in to look at the fish and there is zero signs of life, no sign of breathing from the gills and no eye movement. I was going to go ahead and flush him then, but was running late for work and decided to go ahead and take care of it when I got home thinking that he would be safe from being picked on in there.

Get home from work and the first thing the hubby says is "wow, your fish made a pretty remarkable recovery"........say What??? Sure enough I walked in there and there is the Lennardi, like a little puppy swimming happily in his little acclimation box! That darn fish came so close to being flushed just 5 hours earlier!

So for the time being I am going to keep him in there a few extra days and add some extra vitamins to his food and monitor him while I work on getting the rest of the anemones out of my tank. But I guess the moral of the story is, like coral, don't count them out just because they are knocking on death's door. But I am curious if anyone else has had experiences with fish being stung by anemones and surviving?
 
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I have had an almost identical experience with my longhorn cowfish about two weeks ago. He got pushed into my bubble tip nem trying to move out of the way of the tangs and it nailed him pretty bad. His color faded to almost ghost white, very rapid breathing and struggled to maintain position in the tank. So like you I grabbed my large trap/acclimation box and eased him inside. For the rest of the day his condition degraded to the point where I was positive I was going to lose him. At near the end of the day he was resting on the bottom of the box and I couldn't see any signs of life. Absolutely heartbroken when I saw no fin or gill movement at all and it took all I had not to pull him out. Just in the off chance he was just in a heavily paralyzed state but still alive due to the nem sting I decided to leave him in there overnight and moved the main powerhead to force as much water through the box as possible but not stress him out. Fast forward to the next morning and there he was swimming around the box like nothing had happened to him aside from the sting marks on his side and belly. I left him in there for the rest of the day and at feeding time let him out and he eagerly went after food like normal. I have not had an issue with him since.
 

foos

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Fish can be surprisingly tough. I had a pair of black and white clowns in my 210G with my snowflakes and it seemed to be working since they hosted opposite ends o the tank. Black and white female decided that the place the snowflake clown was hosting was a better spot and started to attack. Ended up catching the black and white clowns as I preferred the snowflake. Had to put them somewhere so I put them in the sump and as I dumped them In I though, I hope they stay away from the skimmer on the other side of the baffle. Male clown, first thing, direct to the skimmer and into the intake. I did not see chunks and was just like, sigh, they were such a nice couple. Turned off the skimmer to pull the dead clown out, felt around, yeah, there it is. Could not knock him loose, so I started to take apart the intake for the pump and something brushed up against my hand. It was the male clown minus any scales on either side of his body. Little dude rode the aerator wheel for a good minute and was stripped of all side scales, but was otherwise fine. Named him evel knievel.

Keep them healthy enough and they can ride a rollercoaster that skins them alive and brush it off....
 
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sneezebeetle

sneezebeetle

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Fish can be surprisingly tough. I had a pair of black and white clowns in my 210G with my snowflakes and it seemed to be working since they hosted opposite ends o the tank. Black and white female decided that the place the snowflake clown was hosting was a better spot and started to attack. Ended up catching the black and white clowns as I preferred the snowflake. Had to put them somewhere so I put them in the sump and as I dumped them In I though, I hope they stay away from the skimmer on the other side of the baffle. Male clown, first thing, direct to the skimmer and into the intake. I did not see chunks and was just like, sigh, they were such a nice couple. Turned off the skimmer to pull the dead clown out, felt around, yeah, there it is. Could not knock him loose, so I started to take apart the intake for the pump and something brushed up against my hand. It was the male clown minus any scales on either side of his body. Little dude rode the aerator wheel for a good minute and was stripped of all side scales, but was otherwise fine. Named him evel knievel.

Keep them healthy enough and they can ride a rollercoaster that skins them alive and brush it off....
Dang! That one takes the cake, tough little dude! How long did it take his scales to grow back?
 
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sneezebeetle

sneezebeetle

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I have had an almost identical experience with my longhorn cowfish about two weeks ago. He got pushed into my bubble tip nem trying to move out of the way of the tangs and it nailed him pretty bad. His color faded to almost ghost white, very rapid breathing and struggled to maintain position in the tank. So like you I grabbed my large trap/acclimation box and eased him inside. For the rest of the day his condition degraded to the point where I was positive I was going to lose him. At near the end of the day he was resting on the bottom of the box and I couldn't see any signs of life. Absolutely heartbroken when I saw no fin or gill movement at all and it took all I had not to pull him out. Just in the off chance he was just in a heavily paralyzed state but still alive due to the nem sting I decided to leave him in there overnight and moved the main powerhead to force as much water through the box as possible but not stress him out. Fast forward to the next morning and there he was swimming around the box like nothing had happened to him aside from the sting marks on his side and belly. I left him in there for the rest of the day and at feeding time let him out and he eagerly went after food like normal. I have not had an issue with him since.
Fish are definitely more resilient than we give them credit for!

Thank goodness our first impulse wasn't to pull them straight away, but give 'em a shot.
 

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I have a 6 line that likes to swim back and forth, back and forth in my box of nems. He’s clearly getting stung cause of all the fin damage. I have dumb fish.


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sneezebeetle

sneezebeetle

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I have a 6 line that likes to swim back and forth, back and forth in my box of nems. He’s clearly getting stung cause of all the fin damage. I have dumb fish.


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🤣🤣🤣
 

foos

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Dang! That one takes the cake, tough little dude! How long did it take his scales to grow back?
Not sure exactly. Ended up a gift to a coworker setting up a tank and I did not follow up too much other that to ask how they are doing in general. I do know that he ended up adding a damsel that someone gave him that started to attack the clowns and he was worried he made a mistake, but in the end the damsel drove them into the nem I gave him and it worked out. Meanwhile the clowns I kept ignore the nem and hide in the rocks, and the nem I have picked a high flow spot that rips its tentacles off....
 
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