wrasse might be dying from moving stress

Bought a carpenters wrasse this afternoon, brought her home and acclimated her for two hours with a drip line. She seemed miserable the entire time, but no breathing heavy, just laying very still.

I've just gotten her into the tank and she went straight under a rock and is laying there puffing heavily with all her color gone. I don't know what happened, but is there anything I can do RIGHT NOW to save her? I'm afraid interacting with her will just stress her out more, but it's agony sitting and watching her not knowing if she'll pull out of this or not.

I had read wrasses need longer acclimation time than most fish. Sigh :( try to do the right thing, and look. Thanks for your input, at any rate. I really hope she makes it.

That would have been perfect, I wish I had known about it! She did get up and start swimming around a little, and then would retreat back to her spot under the rock. She was getting pestered by the damsel and hawkfish :/ to be expected, but now she's hiding somewhere I can't see her.

I hope she's okay. She was swimming normally last I saw her though, so at least it's not the transition killing her anymore. I can QT the hawk and damsel if I need to to get her to come out if I don't see her in a day or two.

wrasses will freak out the first few days in my experience.  I had one dive in the sand and stay hidden for about 2 days.  I thought it died.

That makes me feel so much better. Please be alive in there somewhere, little lady!

Water doesn't go "sour" during drip acclimation if you're constantly adding in oxygenated clean water from the display. I've drip acclimated some fish for 8 hours and more due to the difference in salinity between my tank water and the water used at the fish distributor. I've never personally experienced any negative side effects to longer acclimation, only positive ones.

A drip acclimation of only 10 minutes can be lethal if there are large differences in water quality and salinity. It also depends on the tolerance and hardiness of the fish.

Just my experiences with acclimation.

Edited by Pete Moss - March 16 2015 at 12:04pm

In my opinion, the best way to acclimate fish is to set up a secondary tank with low flow, and a small heater to maintain temperatures. Providing hiding spaces inside the tank ( 2" pvc elbows work great ) helps the fish feel more comfortable as it adjusts. A drip system from your existing reef, into the acclimation tank should be run for as long as possible to give the fish time to adjust.

If the water from the fish store doesn't fill the tank enough to run a heater, just wait for the water level to rise before turning the heater on.

My $0.02:

She came out during feeding time tonight! :D and then she went right back to her hidey spot, haha. This is actually the best case scenario, she's alive and eating, and she has a great hidden spot where the damsel can't get to her until I can relocate him.