When You Purchase a Fish Take it Home Immediately

When you purchase a fish, they will give you the fish in a bag. Always ask them to double bag the fish so that if the bag has a hole the water will not leak out before you get home. If you are purchasing a fish in the winter months make sure to try to keep the bag as warm as possible by do not place it directly on the heater because this will over heat your fish. Whenever you purchase a fish you need to take it home right away. Do not stop somewhere and grab some dinner or stop at a friends house quick. Fish can usually live up to 45 minutes in the bag but I wouldn't count on it completely.

The reason you need to get your fish home is because the oxygen in the bag will run out. Imagine me placing you in a giant bubble filled with water. I give you an oxygen tank and you have 45 minutes until it runs out. This is somewhat like what will happen to the fish. If the fish is really stressed out and moving fast it will use up more oxygen. If the fish doesn't move and it doesn't breathe as much it will conserve oxygen and live a little bit longer than 45 minutes in the bag. It also depends on how much oxygen they placed in the bag to begin with.

Do not leave the bag outside for too long. The temperature of the water will change to what the temperature is outside or in your car. If you do not have heat in your car and it's 40 degrees in your car, your fish could possibly die before you get it home. The temperature in the bag will quickly change to meet that of what the temperature is outside of the bag. You don't want to drop the temperature down more than a couple of degrees or you will get your fish stressed out and sick.

As you can see, it's very important to take your fish home right away. If you have to go grocery shopping or make a few errands you will want to purchase the fish after you are done doing everything that you need to do. You don't want to bring the fish along with you because it might die. The temperature might be off and there might not be a lot of oxygen in the water. You should never shrug off the people at the pet store when they tell you to take the fish home right away. They tell you this for a number of reasons. If the fish doesn't die it will get stressed out which often times leads to ich and other bacterial infections.