If You’re Thinking of Buying Fish, Go For the Ones In Little Stick Shapes Covered in Batter

FISHY! WHY ARE YOU SLEEPING!?

I am officially Darla from Finding Nemo.

Another fish died, the sailfin tang named Dead-Eye that was my second favorite (after Snowflake the baby eel). The poor little guy had actually been at Davy Jones’ locker door before, crashing a couple of times only to revive in a clean saltwater bath. But alas, he finally kicked it and it was probably a relief for him.

Unlike Darla, however, I was as tired of killing fish as they were of dying. It may seem ironic that a sushi loving family like ours can grieve over the fish we attempted to keep as pets, yet kept losing in distressingly regular intervals, but it’s true. This supposedly relaxing hobby that my husband forced upon me thoughtfully selected for us was exhausting and macabre and I didn’t know what to do.

Enter Joe the Fish Guy. This is an actual job description. Joe owns the shop where we kept purchasing our little victims, and for a fee (of course – it’s never a fish charity) he and his partner will come out and clean and test and tell you what you’re doing wrong. So we ponied up and begged them to come rescue the survivors.

Snowflake - the Snowflake Eel. Unoriginal but apt.

Well. As it turns out, I AM actually the one who killed the fish. Not a disease. Not some rare element in our water that fish are allergic to. Me. Not on purpose. But the people who brought the tank out (Different Fish Guys, who provided no advice of use and who’ve since mysteriously vanished off the face of the earth. Assholes.) left me some water conditioner stuff. It said it had vitamins. It said it was safe. It said it gave the fish a nice slimy coat which sounded disgusting to me, but which fish apparently covet like Prada. It said you could put it in whenever the fish seemed stressed. Hot damn! Our fish always seemed stressed so I would just add it every day. Sometimes twice a day. I mean, I measured it, I added the right dosage for our tank size and all. I just added A LOT of it. And then I overfed them. Because I felt bad that they kept dying. So they got extra snacks.  

But the fish kept dying and being stressed. For those of you out there who are not Fish Guys or Serious Marine Aquarium Hobbyists Like Me (shut up), fish don’t actually ask for Excedrin or a huge glass of wine or suddenly start crying in the middle of Target to let you know they’re stressed. They gasp. They get infections. Then they die.

Joe told me I basically turned the water into a soap solution/jelly kind of thing. Hence the gasping, infections, and dying. So they never needed copper and I COULD HAVE SAVED THE GODDAMNED STARFISH and probably everyone else if I’d only known.

Greenjeans the Wrasse. Hey, NICE WRASSE!

Joe was actually very nice about the whole thing, though. He said it’s a common mistake for beginners to think they need lots of additives and to overdose their tanks and I said I’m sure that’s a huge comfort to the dead fish and he laughed. So Joe and Co. changed out a lot of the soap/jelly water and cleaned all the gunk and fish poop (does fish poop taste like fish, do you think? What? I’m just asking). Then he sternly told me not to put anything else in there but food – and no more extra cubes o’frozen shrimp because the survivors seemed sad and hungry.  He finally warned that we still might lose one or two more while the tank turned to non-jelly and all the ammonia cycled out (I’ll spare you The Story of The Nitrogen Cycle In Marine Aquariums because unless you’re a fish, a Fish Guy, or me – who cares? You’re all welcome.)

We hoped for the best. I stopped adding chemicals willy-nilly and teaching my fish to be emotional eaters. It must have been a complete Darwinian experience, because all of the survivors are still alive and swimming to date. I’m telling you, after this baptism by fire, these fish must be almost indestructible by now. Survival of the fittest, baby.

Punky Bluester. One of the O-G's

Recently, Joe The Fish Guy came back. He was pleased with our progress and we were given permission to add a new member to our briny little family. We wanted to get another sailfin tang, but the ghost of old Dead-Eye must have been haunting me still, and there wasn’t a new victim sailfin tang available.

After much debate, I picked out an unusual, amusing little guy called the Panther Grouper. As they were bagging him up for us, Joe’s dad (a co-owner) said casually ”Oh hey – you know these guys get big, right?”

Me: “Like how big?”

Fish Dad: “Oh, ’bout 17 inches. Or so.”

Me: “How long does it take him to get that big?”

Fish Dad: “Several years, not to worry.”

Gunga Din. Later on, he'll take off fingers. For now, he's kind of cute.

So we took little Gunga Din home and I did a little research online. As it turns out, Panther Groupers are an incredibly hardy species (thank the Gods) but they actually get up to about 20+ inches, grow fast, eat anything that can fit in their mouths (like, oh, say, a Volkswagen), and require a 300 gallon tank at adult size. Plus they live like seventy years or something ridiculous. Assuming I don’t kill him off with kindness first.

Big Red. The Boss of You.

Damn it. I’m really stuck with this hobby now. Pretty soon we’ll just wall off  a section of  the house with sheets of 4-inch thick plexiglass to make our own ocean. At this point, though, Gunga is only about 4 inches long. He’s busy duking it out with Big Red, another Grouper, for Tank Sheriff, and swimming head down in a kind of Woodstock-of-the-Sea thing.

Poor Tomato. Mommy's sorry she killed your anemone friends.

The rest of the gang is adjusting, and Joe said I can even get another anemone for my poor Maroon Clown, Tomato, since I killed off his first two and he’s currently making do with a piece of bleached out coral that’s approximately the right size. He looks sad, though. I want to give him snacks, but I think Joe has a hidden camera installed on a hermit crab.

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