By Enrique Patiño

What would the hobby be like without the ability of effectively ship guppies around the planet? Some of the "old-timers" may know the answer to this question. But nowadays, shipping guppies long distances, even across political borders, from continent to continent is commonplace, even during cold winter months. We already published an article on shipping guppies in our July 2004 Issue. . Here we deal with some aspects of shipping during cold weather.

Wintertime in the northern hemisphere isn't only dark, but cold, and people spend more "quality time" inside with their guppies. If you are either considering purchasing, selling or trading guppies during cold weather, knowing how to best ship guppies during the cold months is a must. And if you sell guppies with live delivery guarantee, you do not want the winter months to stop you from doing business and retaining happy customers.

We have often been curious as to what happens inside a shipping box of guppies when it leaves our hands en route to its destination.This is why we decided to write this article. Here we describe the results of mock trial runs simulating conditions a box full of guppies may encounter during transship in cold winter months. Of course, we would have like to have data loggers, but these are too expensive and our budget does not allow it. However, as you will see, the results presented here, even if inconclusive, are nonetheless very informative.

MATERIALS

• 1 (or 1.5) inch think styrofoam insulation
• 10" x 10" x 10" corrugated cardboard box
• Aquarium thermometers
• Shipping bags
• 60-hour heatpack
• Newspaper filler
• Adhesive tape

METHOD 1

PREPARING THE SHIPPING BOX

In the absence of a seamless styrofoam box, we often have to construct our own. During cold weather, it is best to assemble the styrofoam box outside the corrugated cardboard box, seal it properly, and then, after is it sealed, put it inside. The following sequence of pictures illustrates this method.

1. Cut to size pieces of 1 inch think (or thicker) styrofoam. Make the cuts as clean and straight as possible.
   
   
   
   
2. Assembled styrofoam box - note that tape is used outside of the box. At first, small pieces of tape are used to hold the cut pieces together, and then a roll of tape is used to secure the box tightly. Make sure there are no gaps between the pieces. Leave the top off for now.
   
   
   
   
3. Prepare the heat pack - open the heat pack (we recommend a 60-hour heatpack) at least an hour before putting in the bag to make sure it is working properly.
   
   
   
   
4. Place the fish bags inside a larger plastic bag. Close the larger plastic bag by folding it on top of the fish bags. Place the heatpack assembly facing up on top of the fish bags, then seal the top of styrofoam box with roll tape tightly.
   
   
   
   
5. Place the sealed styrofoam box inside the cardboard box. Seal the cardboard box and label it properly
   
   
   

TESTING THE EFFECTS OF EXPOSURE TO EXTREME TEMPERATURES

In order to test the effects of exposure to extreme temperatures, we decided to have 2 treatments, one at room temperature (about 18 degrees Celsius), and one at below freezing temperature (freezer). We assembled two boxes as described above, and put mock fish bags inside each box, with water and all, except fish. One of the bags in each box was fitted with an aquarium thermometer. We put 4 bags, with a total of 18 ounces of water, or the equivalent of water we would use to ship 2 trios (3 ounces of water per fish).

After we assembled and sealed the boxes as outlined above, we waited 3.5 hours before we placed the one box in the freezer. We thought this would simulate the box waiting in the post office warehouse before pick-up time, and to allow the heatpacks to be fully activated. We then left the boxes in their respective environment for 6 hours. We then opened the boxes, and quickly read the temperature by quickly inspecting the bag with the aquarium thermometer inside. The results were as follows

This mock trial obviously not worked as we expected. We even noticed that the heatpack were not "hot" when we recorded the temperature. Obviously something went wrong. The heatpack for the room-temperature box was barely lukewarm and the heatpack for the freezer-box was very cold. Instead of looing at this results as a total failure, we decided to pursue a couple of more angles.

Set up # 2

We re-equilibrated water in the bags of both boxes to the same temperature (70 F or 22 C). After 1.5 hours we noticed that the heatpacks had warmed up again and were working. Suspecting that the total sealing of the assembled styrofoam box had something to to with the lack of temperature in the heatpack (since these need oxygen), we decided to leave both mock shipping boxes at room temperature for 12 hours, sealing the cardboard box, but this time we did not sealed the tops of the styrofoam boxes.

For one box, we put the following assembly with the heatpack facing down, and for the other one, facing up:

At the end of the 12 hours, we also measured the temperature of the heatpack using the following assembly:

RESULTS

DISCUSSION

What new observations can we make form this follow-up experiment? The box with the heatpack up was warmer than the box with the heatpack down. Similarly, the heatpack facing up was warmer than the heatpack facing down. Why? Well, it is our hypothesis that the heatpack facing down was smothered because it had a piece of styrofoam on top and plastic underneath, preventing it access to oxygen inside the styrofoam box.

FOLLOW-UP TESTING

We decided to leave the heatpack assemblies outside the boxed for a while and measure their temperature after 45 minutes (it was 1 AM by then). Both heat packs were at approximately 100 F or 38 C. We therefore concluded that both heat packs were working and decided to follow up with a slightly modified set-up.

Set-up # 3.

This time we repeated set-up #2, but placed the heatpack directly above the folded plastic bag containing the smaller fish bags, without the piece of styrofoam. The fish bags inside were at approximately the same temperature (73 F or ~22.5 C). Again, we did not sealed the top of the styrofoam box assembly, but sealed the cardboard box. After 10 hours, these were the results:

RESULTS

After concluding this last set up, we left the heatpack outside, laying on the table. After 45 hours, the temperature of the heatpacks using the set-up above were ~107 F (~42C) for one, and ~103 (~39 C) for the other one. So, there is no question as to whether these were working all along. The manufacturer's specifications state as follows: minimum temperature of 90 F, average temperature of 110 F, and maximum temperature of 145 F.

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

Each time the heatpacks are placed inside the styrofoam box assembly, their temperature decreased. Our hypothesis is that the oxygen inside the box was a limiting factor. We need to design a follow-up experiment to find out how to optimize the temperature of heatpacks inside shipping boxes.

Unfortunately we do not have time to design and implement these follow up experiments in time for the publication of this issue, but we would like to get input form experienced people as to how to modify this experiment to simulate actual shipping conditions.

Our intention in conducting these series of experiment were two: 1- to find out if the use of heatpack would result in overheating the fish if they spend most of their time in transship at room temperature (e.g., heated warehoused and heated cargo containers in planes), and 2- if the use of heatpacks would prevent the fish from extreme cold temperatures if left outside at freezing temperatures.

We recognize that there were flaws in the experimental design, at least with respect to getting to the two questions. Our hope was to fin out that heatpacks would heat up fish up to, but no more that 82 F (~28 C) while the box at room temperature, but keep the fish at or above 65 F (~18 C) if left outside someone's front door during the cold (freezing) winter months. To that effect, we failed.

However, the results were not a total failure. At least we found out that heatpacks used in this manner do not overheat the fish if the shipping box spends most of it time at room temperature. If room temperature is 70 F (~21 C), the fish will be at a comfortable 74-75 F (~24 C) if the top of the styrofoam box is not hermetically closed. Maybe that is good enough. The important question then becomes: How much time do shipping foxes spend outside the room temperature range, either above or below, and by how much, and what are the variations one could expect to see using different carriers?

FOLLOW-UP TESTING IN NEAR FUTURE

Some experienced breeders say it is best to wrap the heatpack in wet (damp) newspaper to generate some sort of "temperature buffering" effect with water vapor inside the container. They also advise leaving about 25% of the cavity inside the shipping box empty (with newspaper filler) to serve as an oxygen reserve for the packs. you want the heatpacks to smolder, not outright burn. This is why you can't use pure oxygen inside the shipping container, we think.

In our case, we had this empty space, but it was not quite accessible to the heatpack because the heatpack was placed outside a larger plastic bag enclosing all fish bags and newspaper filler. The oxygen in this space was therefore not easily accessible to the heatpack. We will try some of these variations to the set up, and other ideas and publish the results in the next issue.