Shipping fish

[IDMiamiBob <IDMiamiBob@aol.com>]

I have shipped fish.  I assure you it is a lot easier than I thought it would
be.  With proper planning you will get your fish to their destination easily
and alive.

I offer here a little primer on my own approach.

1) Starve fish for 24 hours before packing.  This reduces the amount of
biowaste they will be sharing their bag of water with.

2) I round up about three times as many polypropelene bags as fish, making
sure that they are of the appropriate size.  For adult Apistogrammas, a 4 inch
bag is adequate without getting too big.  When shipping adults, I will double
bag one fish per bag.  For juveniles (1/2 to 3/4 inch) a six inch bag with
three to a bag or a 3 inch bag packed in singles is good.  It also pays to get
some rubber bands.

3) Determine the size of the box necessary.  The first time I shipped, I
actually blew up the proper number of bags and built a styro container around
them using sheets of styro and tape to hold it together. Then I measured the
styro container on the outside and bought a box to match those dimensions.

4) Obtain the above mentioned sheet of styrofoam from a local home center or
hardware store.  It is sold as insulation in quite large sheets.  One inch
thick is suitable.  After detirmining the box size, get the box from someplace
like a paper goods store or a box manufacturer with a "front showroom"

5) Line the box with the styrofoam.

6) Bag the fish.  I always double bag (That means one bag over the other, both
sealed, and NOT two fish per bag).  Also, fill the bag only 1/4 to 1/3 full of
water.  The "dry" area of the bag will "breathe", allowing air exchange
between the inside and outside of the bag.  

7) Seal them up in the box.

8) Take to UPS, Post Office, wherever, and arrange the shipment.  I prefer to
ship Post Office to Post Office if the recipient lives near a PO facility at
an airport.  These places are open 24/7, although you may have to knock on a
service window to get help.  Then if the fish arrive on Saturday night, you
can pick your fish up when they arrive.  Very cool.
I have also learned to take along some of that wide, clear sealing tape.  I
had a label fall off on a shipment to Pittsburgh and the recipient was told
for about a day and a half that his fish weren't there yet, when they were
actually sitting on the counter waiting for him.  They survived anyway, and
Tim is way happy with his cacatuoides. 

Also, when using the Airport Post Office to Airport Post Office thing, you can
ship the slightly cheaper Priority rate, and generally get your fish there in
one day or less.

Don't worry about adding Oxygen.  The bags are selectively permeable to oxygen
and CO2.  The oxygen some people add to the bags generally leaks out into the
box anyway.  
I always get the boxes and insulation so that I have an extra inch of space in
the box between bags.  I put a little piece of styro into the inside of the
container between the bags to hold them in place.  This allows more air in the
container.

There was a recent thread about "breathable" bags which could be filled with
the same amount of water, then have all the air squeezed out of them, saving
space in the box, and allowing either a smaller container or more fish per
container.  Having given some thought to this idea, I suspect that if you put
more bags of water into the same box, you will have less air and more fish in
the box, which is sealed.  This is much riskier in my mind than doing it the
old way.

I have had fish survive up to a week in a closed, full styro, although the
styro was not sealed.  I have also had fish that I shipped or received in
shipping get hung up an extra two days and arrive after three-and-a-half
days, showing no major signs of stress.  

Hot weather, above 90F, will reduce the amount of oxygen in the water and also
increase the metabolism of the fish.  While some folks refuse to ship in the
winter, I on the other hand, prefer winter shipping to summer shipping.  In
spite of the possibilities for delays, cold water, etc., I have never had a
fish come down with ich, or even show any signs of stress after a January
shippng.

If you feel the need to do something extra, some LFSs will carry or get in for
you some little pills which are supposed to absorb ammonia and give off
oxygen.  Half of one of these pills is sufficient for a single Apisto in a 4
inch bag.

All in all, I credit most of my success with fish shipping to the hardiness of
the fish more than my own approach to shipping.  They are pretty tough.

Bob Dixon