Lemon peel Angel lying on bottom, barely swimming

Hi everyone,

Our Lemon Peel Angel was doing fine, up until today, he is now lying at the bottom of the tank, in a cave of rock barely swimming. He came up to eat earlier, but then went back to lying at the bottom. All of our other fish are fine. Everything looks fine about him, except he's flapping about lethargically.

Our tank stats are as follows:
Temp: 25 degrees celcius
Salinity: 1.22
PH: 8.4
Nitrite: 0ppm
Ammonia: 0.1ppm
Nitrate: 5ppm
Phosphate: 1

Our tank has been set up since November 07. It's inhabitants are 1 Lemon Peel angel, 1 Flame Angel, 2 Oscellaris Clows, 3 blue/green chromis, 4 hermit crabs. We have an Eheim canister filter.

The Lemon Peel Angel and Flame Angel were put in at the same time, about 8 months ago.

A week or so ago our Flame Angel was swimming quite funny, we tested the water and noted it was all good, but he has since improved, without us doing anything. The Lemon Peel angel was completely fine yesterday.

The most recent additions were about a month ago and were 1 oscellaris clown and 2 blue/green chromis.

I can't remember, but pretty sure our last water change was about 3 weeks ago.

Any idea whats wrong with him? Or what we can do to help him get better?

 

Ammonia should never be present in a tank. Sensitive fish like angels will respond to ammonia by dying. Im 99% sure thats the reason why your angel is dying.

Whats strange is, ammonia being present in a tank set up since Nov 07. Have you done anything to the tank recently that may have caused an ammonia build up like say... changed the sand or stirred it all up etc??

 

We haven't done anything to the tank that would increase ammonia.

Everytime we test the tank its always between 0 and 0.1ppm, maybe we have a dodgy test or something? But the ammonia is the same this time as all of the other times we have tested it in the past.

 

Sounds like the ammonia is a result of your test kit and perhaps not accurate – replace it asap.

Clowns are notorious bullies, it is possible that the angel has been harassed the past few weeks and is stressed. Are the eye’s cloudy or any other signs like labored breathing? Is the tank grounded – you could be developing a stray voltage issue that was not present the past 8 months.

 

Oh he just swam around for a bit! But then went back....

Saw one of the clowns bullying one of the chromis today, but haven't seen it bullying the lemon peel. The lemon peel is over twice as big as him, so it would be a gutsy of him!

Lemon peels eyes look fine and breathing is normal.

Thanks for the tip about the ammonia test, will go shopping this weekend for a different brand!

I'm guessing our tank isn't grounded, as I have no idea how to do that, can you please explain?

 

When you go to your LFS for a new test kit, ask for a ground probe. It is basically just a piece of wire that plugs into your power strip then goes into your sump.

 

It wont be the ground probe, cos nothing else is effected.

How big is your tank? It could just be stress....

 

Hi, this is from a site description; "The Lemon peel Angelfish is a striking species that is yellow overall with bright blue trim around the eyes and on the gill cover. It is not as aggressive toward other fish tank mates as some of the other members of the genus, and it's not as hardy than other pygmy angels. Do not house with other remotely boisterous fishes; this species cannot tolerate abuse. It usually will do best in an aquarium with live rock or profuse micro algae growth. Like many of the pygmy angels, this species can become bold once it has become an established tank resident."
As fish grow older they can become more aggressive and my best guess is the Flame Angel is asserting more dominance over the more docile Lemon Peel Angel. Would be best to remove the Lemon perhaps and see if LFS will exchange or give credit.

 

I don't think this Lemon Peel is particularly docile but this could be because he's the largest inhabitant of our tank. In fact hes the only one normally gutsy enough to feed from my hand. We added both Angels simultaneously. The Lemon peel is slightly larger than the Flame, and usually asserts more dominance over the Flame- if i feed them using the veggie clip the Lemon Peel normally wont let the Flame get close to it untill he's occupied by something else.