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edhall_gw

Fish HORROR stories?

edhall
20 years ago

I had a beautiful 29 gal tank with a custom made hood on it. The hood was solid all the way around with just a small opening for the filter in the back and a 4 x 6" opening on top with a hinged lid to drop food into. Well we went to a movie one day a got a sitter to watch the twin boys (4 years old). Well the both of them got up on the dresser in their room where the tank was fliped the lid back and started droping Little Golden books through the hole. Did you know that you can get 56 Little Golden books into a 29 gal tank before you get board and go to sleep and not to have the sitter see you! Oh we never used her again.

I did take a picture of it I think I try and find it and post it. Has something like this ever happend to you?

Comments (75)

  • edhall
    Original Author
    19 years ago

    I showed my boys this post and they could not belive that I did that to them. "their making fun of us"! Oh well.

    I started this thread to let newbies know that bad things happen to good fish keepers so don't give up.

  • dasheen
    19 years ago

    My cat, Casper, washed his feet in my aquarium after using the litter box. He then caught my 8 inch prized Shubunkin and killed it.

    Dasheen

  • order_of_the_spam
    19 years ago

    my friend got a fish tank a few months ago (he calls it the money pit) when it was still relativly new fish mom went into his room to do something while he was at school. she noticed that the light was off so she turned the heater all the way up but the light still wouldn't come on. he lost some pretty nice fish and all of his crabs

  • lsakos
    19 years ago

    Hi, my college roommate who had never kept fish before decided to start with a goldfish bowl. Large bowl, but she decided to go to the bait store for the goldfish, and bought several for about a dollar. She already had her bowl proudly full by the time I got home and tried to explain she had too many fish for the size. About two days later, I told her she needed to clean the bowl, and left for class. Instead of waiting for me to return, she put some water in the bathtub and added the fish from the bowl, and went off to clean it up.

    I arrived home from class about an hour later, and found her in tears with one fish in the bowl. I had to explain to her about soap and fish not mixing very well.

    Laura

  • SHUEZQ
    19 years ago

    I have two. The first was a whole batch of newborn guppies and mollies became boiled fish when my heater went haywire. Seems to be a sadly common occurence. My boyfriend found the mess and cleaned up before I came home (thankfully).

    The other is worse. One morning I got up and strolled into the living room barefoot. I felt a *squish* under my foot and jumped backwards. There was my 4 inch red-tailed shark, half dried out, half gutted by my weight. It must have jumped out of the slimmest of spots in the back of the tank and flipped across the floor overnight. What a terrible way to discover your pet!

  • tucsonliz
    19 years ago

    This is a great thread! I hope it prevents some horror stories.

    I had a 100 gallon tank of beautiful mature African cichlids. I went on vacation for a month and left them in the care of my friend. At some point the suction got broken on the wet/dry filter spillway- leaving the fish without any filtration. My friend didn't know how to get it started, and just left them in the stagnant water. What a mess when I got home.

  • paparoseman
    19 years ago

    My stepson and his friend climbed up and dropped cough drops into the tank which had a large fire eel and several other expensive fish in it and they died a few days later.

  • warbler_IL
    19 years ago

    I could have easily prevented it but for some reason I completly forgot. I cleaned the tube that sucks water up into the filter and didn't replace the small (but very important) piece that keeps the fish from being sucked up. The next morning I had several dead fish (cory, white cloud, etc.).

  • jimcanada
    19 years ago

    This one has a happy ending. I have a breeding pair of Jack Dempseys and a few cory cats in a large tank. Everything was fine until one day the male dempsey decided to snack on a cat. He tried to swallow it head first but couldn't get it past the pec fins and he couldn't spit it out because of the numerous spines on the cat. So, he swam around like that for three days with me hoping it would work out. He would swim up to the glass whenever I was in the room and stay there as if he was begging for help. I finally netted him and my wife and I worked the catfish out of his mouth with a tweezers. We succeeded and the catfish swam away much to our surprise. The dempsey wasn't able to close his mouth for several hours but eventually made a full recovery. He has never tried to swallow a cory since then.

  • chezmoose
    19 years ago

    I came across this post while searching for a vacation watering system and had to share. This isn't my only fish horror story, but probably the worst...

    I went away for the weekend during the winter about 10 years ago. While I was gone, the French windows in my living room blew open during sub-zero weather. My furnace tried to heat both indoors and out until the propane ran out. I came home to find my 29 gal. aquarium with my beautiful huge green severum cichlid frozen solid. Of course all the pipes in the house and well pump, etc. were frozen solid too. And no, the fish did not come back to life once I thawed the tank out. ;-)

  • jane_in_bristol
    19 years ago

    Wow, I'm amazed at the number of Heater Horrors! I had a friend as a kid that had the same thing happen - he lost ALL of his guppies & swords! I had a heater go on the fritz, but caught it in time when I noticed all the panicky zooming around in my tank... whew! I've actually sworn off heaters whenever possible (depending on the type of fish), and I'm very leery of them.

    But, alas, alack, the opposite can happen, too. In a small, hot Boston apartment, I had a nice little community tank, just 10 gallons. The temperature outside hit a whopping upper-90's for 8 days in a row. My apartment, on the top floor, reached 98 each of those days, and only cooled to a balmy 88 overnight. Being such a small quanitity of water, the aquarium temp went into the upper 80's. I kept jugs of aquarium water (so as not to make too much of a chemistry change) in the fridge, and it was a week-long struggle, changing 4 gallon-jugs of water 3X each day; morning before I left, as soon as I came home, and again before I went to sleep. Towards the end of the heat spell, I came home to find my little ghost shrimp all dead..... and when I pulled them out, they were pale PINK - yep, like Cooked Shrimp! I felt terrible! The community fish survived the ordeal, but I can still picture those poor pink shrimp!

    Whew!

  • cornweer
    19 years ago

    I am another victim of a heater that went on the blink. I had a beautiful community tank with about 30 fish that were all about 2 years old. I came home from work one night and found all of my fish but one dead. The water was so hot it hurt my hand when I dipped out the one survivor. I am still amazed that he lived through that! I cried like a baby over my poor dead fish.

    I had another incident with a goldfish that I kept in a fishbowl in my kitchen. He was eating one day when he sucked a piece of gravel off the bottom of the bowl. He got it lodged in his mouth and couldnt spit it out. I was afraid it would kill him, so my husband and I "operated" on him. We took a pair of tweezers and pushed them up through his gills to push the rock out of his mouth. He survived the operation and seemed to be fine. A few weeks later he did the exact same thing! After extracting the rock ( I was feeling like an expert at this point). I went out and bought larger gravel that was too big for him to get in his mouth.

  • bonnie_blue_eyes
    19 years ago

    Last year, my above-ground pool blew out its side after I had just super-chlorinated it. The water went everywhere, including my pond of koi, comets, shubunkins, and plecos. The chlorine turned the pond water black, making it impossible to see the fish unless they were right at the surface. My husband and I filled containers with our well water and threw in each fish as we found them. We found all but the two plecos and a goldfish.

    It took a long time to drain the whole pond. At the bottom was a pleco and the missing goldfish. Incredibly, the pleco is still alive to this day! I knew they were hardy, but that was amazing. We lost a lot of fish but some did survive.

    We did NOT replace the swimming pool.

  • order_of_the_spam
    19 years ago

    i imagine that would have killed a fair amount of grass too

  • Cdfortin
    19 years ago

    Advice on heaters: Instead of one high wattage heatter, keep two lower watt ones. That way, if one goes haywire, it takes longer to heat up the water.

  • Marie_NE_PA
    19 years ago

    We also had a heater cook our fish. My 3 year old was devastated. it was a 20 gallon community tank. We had a bumblebee cat, 2 swordtails, and an angelfish that would actually rest on your curled fingers to eat the food you held. The other angel would come up and "kiss" your finger when it was done eating. (And yes, hands were thoroughly cleaned and rinsed before doing this.) My daughter learned a lot about patience in order to be able to feed her "fishies" They were a gift/reward for her when she was in speech therapy. We came home one evening to find them all floating on the top, fully cooked. I punished my boys as I thought they had played with the heater. We cleaned the tank, moved it to her bedroom, restocked it, and almost lost the new fish. Thats when we realized the heater was bad. Took it out, got a new and better one and everythign was fine. Cept we were unable to succeed in training the new fish to handfeed. We also never saw another bumblebee cat.

  • spookables
    19 years ago

    I know some people may have not been home when their heaters malfunctioned, but did anyone have a thermometer in their aquariums as well to monitor their heaters? Just curious :)

  • drg_
    19 years ago

    How's this one? I was walking along an Alabama beach on vacation after a powerful storm had blown through and I found a tiny octopus (Octopus Vulgaris) washed up on the beach. He was no bigger than the "Wacky Wallwalker" childrenÂs toy (less than 1" arm span). I "rescued" him and put him in a childrenÂs plastic sand pail with seawater. He made it through a 6+ hour trip back. I raised him in a 10G tank, then 30, then a 55. He was possibly the coolest pet one could have. He drew crowds to see him at feeding time. Anyhow, I had to move to a new apartment and had to partially drain his home. His temporary home during the move was a 5G bucket. Unfortunately, while moving his tank and other stuff, he climbed out onto the carpet and died. It was a sad day.

  • Enid
    19 years ago

    I recently had a close call with the aquarium heater, so I thought I'd share. For some reason I woke up at 2am on a saturday, so I went to sit at the computer. After a few minutes I heard a crackling sound, a few later I heard it again, this time louder; my dogs went to look at the den, all of them just stood there and looked, so I went to investigate. Just then, another crakle, large spark, and the surge protector I have everything aquarium related caught fire! I literally jumped over the dogs and ran to it, unplugged the whole she-bang and proceded to inspect every single plug. The heater was the one and only culprit. Thankfully I woke up when I did and went sit at the computer, instead of staying in bed trying to fall asleep again. Got me another surge protector ( at a more decent hour saturday) and thankfully the power filters didnt sustain any damage. This is a 55 gal. that is the home of my 12inch+ pleco ( anybody else in there is incidental). Scary thing, the house could have caught fire ( wood floor in the den) because of this danged heater malfunction. I'm just about to swear off heaters at this point, havent replaced that one, and I dont think I will, I can use a space heater in there to keep ambient temperatures constant and that (so far) has kept the aquarium at a confortable level for "The Beast". Of course the guppies and swordtails love it and have been breeding prolifically with no particular effort on my part to keep the fry going. Just be wary of heaters, too many scary heater stories here.

  • FrozenMyst
    18 years ago

    Ok... so.... I'm terribly sad right now. This doesn't seem like a huge horror, but I feel so horrible about it. I had a betta. Today would make it a month and 1 day. He was looking sick for the past week or so and started breathing heavy today. I thought I'd change the water to make him a bit happier. I rinsed his stuff off in burning hot water to clean off any bad stuff and it hurt like heck for my hands. As a result, I couldn't feel the difference between warm and hot. I thought the water was just right... well it was too hot for my poor little guy. Needless to say, I'm now fishless. I feel terrible. First fish I ever got and not only did I fail at helping him, but I cooked him too! ;_; I should have paid better attention. I miss him. I loved him very much. Note to future betta or fish owners: PAY ATTENTION to the cleanliness of the water and to the temperature of it!!! It can make or break the fish. -_-

  • Minaku
    18 years ago

    I cannot stress enough the importance of having a thermometer, especially in the smaller tanks where water temps can fluctuate up to ten degrees in a day.

    I'm sorry for your loss.

    Also, these fish stories are great! I'm very sorry for the fish deaths, but it's a learning experience - I thought I was the only one with a screwy heater!

  • cjbrady
    18 years ago

    1, When I was 18, a friend and I made a 55 gallon tank - it was awesome! We had a community of fish, including smaller, more peaceful cichilids like Kribensis etc. Evidently, we didn't use thick enough glass because one night, the front bowed the burst and 55 gallons came pouring out across the floor and down the carpeted stairs. We scrambled to catch the fish with our hands and place them in a small ten gallon tank. We also stayed up all night with blow driers to dry out the carpet so it wouldn't mildew.

    We kept the fish in the smaller tank for about a month until we had time to repair the 55. When I went to clean it out (it has like 1/2" water on the bottom - I found a kuhli loach - very much alive and well in there! What a survivor.

    2, I also had a ten gallon when our oldest son was about 3. The morning after Christmas I found my son's new stuffed "Ernie" toy floating face down among the fish. It grossed me out so I gave the fish away and put the tank away as well.

  • hosta_miser
    18 years ago

    I've had lots of them, but my favorite is from about 30 years ago when I was just a youngster about 12 or 13 years old. I had a beautiful 29 gallon tank set up with some, at that time new to the hobby, African Cichlids. The tank was set up right next to my bedroom window and had a lot of rocks in it for them to hide, as I had seen pictures from the lakes showing all those rocks that the fish swam amongst. Well, one day I was playing ball with my brothers in the street, and noticed that there was water dripping from the corner overhang of the house over the garage (right below my bedroom!) It seems I learned the hard way that African Cichlids like to dig in the gravel. The rock structure collapsed and of course, broke the bottom of the tank. I acted like nothing was wrong, put the fish in some smaller tanks temporarily and fixed the crack with a sheet of plastic siliconed right over it. I don't think my parents ever found out :)

  • woeisme
    18 years ago

    I won a goldfish at the county fair when I was about 7. I had a small bowl to keep it in. I used to put it by my bed on the window-sill every once in a while when I would go to sleep (usually after a scary movie, guess I thought it would ward off monsters). This was finr thru the summer then winter came. I woke up to find the goldfish frozen solid in the bowl which was a block of ice. It was a little upsetting back then but I am cracking up as I write this. I still get ribbed once in a while by a family member when they come over and see my tank.

  • isis_nebthet
    18 years ago

    I cracked my heater during a water change...

    Turn off heater when changing water....No one got zapped anyhow.

    Other horrors mostly have to do with not quarentining. 30 goldfish destroyed by finrot from a fair fish.

    50 guppies, a betta, some danios, and a gourami died due to columnaris brought in on the guppies. I confused it for fungus and was reating with malachite green. Someone gave me a microscope and I looked at it and saw it was indeed columnaris.

    1000$ worth of koi decimated by bacterial gill disease brought in on some koi that I didn't know weren't healthy. 300$ in meds and still had only 7 koi left.

    Not a fish but my western painted turtle is a tripod now. I put him outside in a tank where he could bask but not get out and the dog got him while he was basking.

  • ncgardengirl
    18 years ago

    My son tried to feed the fish spaghetti one time, thankfully it was not cooked, just dried noodles.
    Then he decided the next time they needed milk and sprinkled it in from his sippy cup. The water was clouded so bad the fish could not be seen to be netted. I drained the tank to be able to get them out. Thank goodness we were on well water. This wouldn't have been so bad if I had not took the tank day and sleaned it the day before!
    He was not 2yrs old yet at the time. It was cute to see him tring to 'feed' the fish but I did explain to him they had their own food and not to feed them our stuff anymore, the result? He decided to feed a container of fish food, that was a mess! It is amazing how much food in actually in those containers.
    After these 3 things happened and I explained fish basics to him, Then I had to expalin HOW much to feed them, he stopped tring to tend to them so much, after that he did fine. This tank was set-up in the family living-room. So everyone could enjoy it, so he needed to learn to look at the fish....lol.
    He is 18 now and I can't even get him to look at my fish much less feed them!
    Not so much a horror, just a little mess! Glad it wasn't a heater story....

  • lexie1397
    18 years ago

    Mine seems insignificant compared to the stories here, but it was sure devastating to me!

    I had just gotten two fancy guppies to put in with my african dwarf frogs-after doing the research to make sure they would be docile enough not to attack the frogs, only to have one of the frogs bite the top lip off one of the guppies! The poor guppy couldn't eat and his tail started deteriorating. Thank goodness he was able to grow his lip back. He is now able to compete with the other guppy for the food and his tail is almost as full and beautiful as it once was.

  • sleepingdragon
    18 years ago

    horror stories .... OK well
    I keep a 125 gallon SALTWATER reef aquarium. Shortly after moving into our new house my daughter called me in a panic.. "Mom that tall thing in the back of the tank it's puking water all over the floor!!" The power had gone off and when it came back on the protien skimmer blew 30-50gal of saltwater all over my carpet.. down the hall..into the bedrooms.... I did get airconditioning out of the deal though! It was the only way my carpet would dry out in the summer humidity!!

    BTW.. I have NEVER had a heater in my tanks!! you don't need one if you have stable air temp in the room ..That and any lights create heat.. my problem is keeping it cool

    Here is a link that might be useful: click on seaworld in my livingroom

  • LindaMA
    18 years ago

    When I was a little girl, one day I decided that the fish in my dad's 20 gallon tank needed a bath. I took the Ivory soap and proceeded to try and wash all the fish in the tank with a bar of soap. Some of them survived, not sure I did from my dad's wrath, he was so angry at me.

  • wildspirit922
    18 years ago

    This isn't a horror story, this is just BIZARRE.

    I bought a betta about a month ago and put him in a little 1 gallon tank. After a couple of weeks, I decided that I would enjoy him more in a bigger tank and went out and bought a 5 gallon with lid, gravel, a couple of rocks and an artificial plant. I know that fish jump, so I kept the water level down about 2 inches from the top, and kept the lid on the tank. There was a 1 inch gap at the back of the lid, though. I fed him as usual one morning, then an hour later I walked by...NO FISH. Just gone. I moved the rocks in the tank. No fish. I tore the room apart looking, thinking he jumped and must be on the floor somewhere. Still, no fish. I came to the conclusion that the dog ate him (the dog will eat anything). I was so sad! How could he have jumped out of that little space and jumped so high to get out? Damn that dog! A couple of days went by and I decided to get a new betta. I just put him in the same tank, no water change or anything. A week went by. This morning, I woke to find the new fish's fins in tatters. Then, I noticed TWO BETTAS in the tank! The first fish was in there!!! and they had been (of course) fighting that morning. The first betta had been stuck under a rock the entire week! The rock that I had even moved to look for him! If I had picked it up, I would have found him, but I had only slid it over and he must have slid with it. He looks pretty tattered and weak, but I think he will make it. Poor little guy. Needless to say, the rock is gone.

  • ILuvGinger
    18 years ago

    The worst I've had was fish jumping out. And I have a hood... I can't figure it out, I know I'd see a fish sailing past my head. But then my dad also helps to keep the tank...

    A couple of days ago I almost stepped on one of my hatchet fish that was dried out on the floor. I yelled at my dad... twice. Once when I told him not to leave it open and half an hour later when I found the poor little guy. What a slow death.

  • docno
    18 years ago

    Yow - I have another heater tale of woe.... my mom came yelled down the hall early one morning "hey, the fish tank is REALLY hot!"...

    I saved everyone but my large Bala Shark :( the tank was between two chairs in my parents living room, and if you were sitting in a chair, he would come over and spit gravel at the side of the tank until you ran your finger along the glass - and then he would chase it. Have never had a non-chichlid with so much personality since....

    I just set up a 75 in my living room and have one big heater in it now. After reading this thread, I think I am going to go get two 50 watt heaters - good advice and reminder. I may even just get a good, high quality external thermometer/switch to use as a high-limit backup monitor. Unfortunately it gets too cold here in the Winter for me to chance no having a heater....

    and to those who mentioned to have a thermometer - duh! Unfortunately Murphy was an optimist and the heater picked the middle of the night to malfunction :( It helped me confirm the problem, but didn't do anything to alert me to the malfunction. Hmm, a cheap external electronic thermometer with an alarm - will have to go google now....

  • triple_b
    15 years ago

    This is an old thread I see, but what fun! Me thinks I will bump it.

    I am merely reiterating a story my friend told me. But it is a doozie.

    He had a room mate with two cats. He himself (I will call him Gary, to protect the guilty) had a big tank with 5 black pirahnas in it.
    They came home one day and found the door would not open quite right. Under it were fish remains. They looked all over but could only find one kitty, who was hiding behind the couch and shaking with fear.
    Upon checking the fish tank, they found bits of fur and gore and one less fish.
    The conclusion (My dear Watson):
    Kitty number one snagged himself a pirahna. Dragged it by the door, ate it, and went back for another. Having blood on its paws from the first, it stuck its paw in to grab a second and set off a feeding frenzy and got itself devoured.

    Gross.

  • Dragon_Fire_Blaze_yahoo_com
    12 years ago

    My goodness. The stories I can tell. But ill just stick to fish. When I was around 7 I won a goldfish at a event. Inamed it Nala, (from Lion King.) I loved that fish. Eventually we built up a community of fish. One day the tank needed to be cleaned. My dad had the honors.It was rather traumatic to see all of the fish floating there. And I found out recently that he thought it was the water. But the dish soap he used is more likely.

    Now for something more recent. I have a betta named Coro (full name Coro Coro Ticah Santos). When I first got him I was excessively paranoid. Anytime I felt something minutely off I went to question the pet store. They now know me by name. I've dropped him at least twice. One time he hit his head on a hard surface... He was ticked off for weeks. Now he is in a 5 gal hex Marineland... I. May have overdone it.

  • hald
    12 years ago

    1. In 1989 after being in an accident I moved in with my sister and her family while I recuperated. My aquarium, a big hex at the time, sat in a corner of her dining room. One night my golden retriever got into a fight with her great dane and the aquarium came crashing down on them. Many fish were saved, most perished.
    2. In 1996 I did a water change and the tap water was contaminated with something, I've never figured out what. The family of guppies I've had since 1968 was decimated. I was down to 5 males and one female that had a genetic defect - a badly curved back. Now I occasionally see the genetic defect again in the new generations of babies. It's a recessive defect apparently, because I've seen it only a few times since '96. I always think back about that female in '96 and how thankful I am her offspring survived.

  • JanieMae66
    11 years ago

    I am so bummed. Did a really stupid thing and lost 6 of my 7 glo fish today. Have had them for about 6 months. Did a water change and I guess the water was too cold. Stupid me, I am usually very careful about that. They all died within 10 minutes. Such an idiot! They really added a lot of activity to the tank! Now, its just empty looking. Have 4 black skirt tetras, 6 cory cats and one candy stripe ple*o left. Oh, and one freaked out glo fish, lol! Actually, they are all acting a little freaked out right now. Just hope I dont lose any more!!

  • skot_watson
    8 years ago

    Many years ago I had a large aquarium that I had filled with a mixture of fairly aggressive cichlids and whenever I bought a new fish regardless of whether I rearranged the interior of the tank or introduced a new fish at night the other fish inside would always kill anything I could find. Snakeheads, Oscars, piranha? Dead, dead, dead. All dead, everything I tried was killed within a day or two. So I gave up on having any new addition to the tank until on day walking through a local pet store I saw what appeared to be an empty tank with a sign that said "free for adoption." It turned out that hiding inside the tank was this tiny little fish called a Tiger Botia. I asked why this little non-assuming fish was being given away and was told that it killed everything in every tank they ever put it in. So this is where the light bulb goes off in my head. Aggressive? Check. Free? Even better! So I figure at best I get a new addition to my tank and at worst the other fish get a nice snack. So I take it home and put him in the tank and in a flash he swims away under a rock. Weeks go by and not a single sign of my new aquatic denizen until one night I walk by and there he was! Just perched on the top of a rock! He paid no notice to the other fish and surprisingly they paid no attention to him. He had actually survived the gauntlet that no other fish had survived! Well as the days pass I began to notice that our little friend had made a new friend. He had teamed up with the biggest, nastiest, most dominant fish in the tank and then systematically proceeded to kill every other fish, one by one until only about 5 fish were left. At that time I was working insane hours and a good friend was looking for some fish for a new tank so I decided that they might do well with a new owner. Well about a month later I got a call from my friend to tell me that his house had caught on fire. It turns out that once in their new home, that little free fish and the big bad boss of the tank continued their systematic elimination of the rest of the fish hierarchy and then there were only the two fish left, my friend put them in a smaller tank and filled the big one with salt water fish. Our aquatic Bonnie and Clyde didn't take too kindly to being in a smaller tank and they began to crash into the glass side repeatedly for days. Finally they did some damage. Instead of cracking the tank and escaping to evolve into flying fish or something, they shattered the tanks heater which promptly electrocuted them in a glorious fish-fry death. It also shorted the wire and the electric socket which promptly caught fire. Eventually the fire burned through to the big salt water fish tank above it and the salt water and a few hundred dollars worth of the cast from Finding Nemo splashed to the floor, putting the majority of the fire out. Everything was covered in a thick layer of soot and ash. I felt so bad that my fish caused the fire that I went over to help him clean up the mess. When I got there, out in the front yard was the partially melted frame of a fish tank with thousands of glass fragments darkened by soot and in the bottom of the tank were two fish corpses burnt to a crisp; the big bad boss fish and the "free to a good home" Tiger Botia. So when you see a sign for an animal that says FREE, it most definity will NOT be free!

  • MrBlubs
    8 years ago

    A long time ago my brothers way over stocked 10gal manged to crack and water began spilling out the day before we were leaving to Mexico for 2 weeks.

    It was - 30 that day so we ran downstairs and put it outside and desperately tried to save the fish before the Cold or lack of water got them.

    We manged to get them all in a plastic bag and we had to surrender all of them to Pet land.

    Also, when I first tried making a pond (was 10) we did the liner way so we laid it all down put rocks and Such then got a bunch of feeder fish from Petsmart. One day I came home and somehow water got underneath the liner so the whole pond liner was floating up. The fish were trapped in nooks and cranies everywhere and some were stuck out of water.

    It was a frantic 10 minutes as I tried to save them all, which I didn't.

  • Jackie Rosen-Chung
    6 years ago
    last modified: 6 years ago

    Bumping this to the top again! My husband and I adopted a betta fish from a friend about six weeks ago. Earlier this afternoon, I was cleaning out Joey's tank, as I do every five days because it's small and doesn't have a heater or filter. I had everything ready - water was treated and I was transferring him via net from his temp bowl over to his tank. But Joey HATES the net and then seemed to get entangled in it. Stupid me - I took him out of the water and tried to get him out of the net by hand when he fell out onto the counter! But that wasn't the worst...When I tried to grab him again, he ended up in the sink which was full of SOAP!! I panicked, got him out of there within three seconds, rinsed him off under the tap and immediately got him into the treated water. I was sure I'd killed him and he seemed to just sink on his side. But after a few minutes, he started behaving normally again. Now, outside of him breathing a bit faster and seeming a little tired, he appears to be swimming around like he usually does. I am just hoping he'll make it through the next few days. My dad - who used to breed betta fish as a teenager - says to change the water again tomorrow, but I'm afraid doing so right now might stress him out.

    I'm such a bad fish mom!!!

  • Jason (Zone 10b, San Diego)
    6 years ago

    This is an almost horror story: My son has always been fond of fish, so we bought him a betta fish and I got one of those plexiglass half-bowls that you can hang on the wall. I hung it near the end of his bed where he could watch it before going to sleep. So fast forward a little bit, my son gets a bit older and taller, my wife and I have a new born daughter, and I get deployed overseas. My wife developed a routine with our son (now about 3ish), he would play in his room while she fed the baby. She could hear him playing and new all was well. One day, she realized that she couldn't hear him anymore, so she walked over to his room and looked in. He was standing on the edge of his bed with one hand in the bowl going "Here fishy fishy!" Thankfully he didn't catch the betta and not too much water was spilled. When I returned home I promptly moved the bowl higher up out of his reach.

  • Dylan Chin
    6 years ago

    My horror story was with snails and shrimp instead .

    So I set up a snug tank with a cherry shrimp and 2 snails a heater and a bunch of plants for filteration.

    Then my snails started climbing up to the top and my cherry shrimp acted out.

    Before I knw it my cherry shrimp was dead.

    I quickly tried to remove them and so I panicked and picked them up into a plastic container.

    They started moving and I hade a glimmer of hope.

    They all died :(

    Especially this all happened in 1 day

  • www_wolfmanjenkins
    6 years ago

    The cichlid pair I have will have babies that are nice color probably the most calm fish they will grow up to 32 inches. But dont underestimate them the will kill your red devil cichlid, Midas cichlid, Jack Dempsey cichlid, purple rosequeen cichlid.and the flowerhorn cichlid. They will be called my (RED PHOENIX KING CICHLIDS).


  • Cait
    6 years ago

    My bf had two heater malfunctions : the first left his dinner plate-size discus frozen solid in the winter. The second cooked his most favorite catfish collection. He was most upset about his 8 year old feather fin catfish. Several months later I got him $100 worth of African cichlids as a surprise..not the best idea since his tank wasn't ready for them and they all died :(

    When I was young I had a plecostomus that started to creep me out the bigger it got. It had a crooked face, bulging/bug eyes, and would chase you as you walked by the tank. Worse: It started to jump out of the water and bark!!! I was ready to give it away, then one morning, although we have a hood, my brother found it dried up on the living room floor, several feet away from the tank. He decided to flush it down the toilet, which resulted in us having to call the plumbers.

    My kids crashed my tank of platies that were gifted to me. The gal had them for 13 years (highly inbred but she loved them, so I loved them). I saved about 7 out of 40+. The kids had accidentally dropped a stuffed animal in there when the lid was partially opened, I think whatever beans/beads were in the stuffed animal leached harmful chemicals into the tank because they died so quickly.

    Lastly, I had an upside down catfish that I really loved, he was shy at first but became so fun to watch. One day he disappeared without a trace. No body, no bones, nothing. I looked under decor, sifted through gravel, and gave up not knowing what had happened. Six months later, I decide to take out my under-gravel filter, and something sharp poked me. There he was!!! Alive and swimming. I'm not sure how he got down there, and I don't use the undergravel filters anymore :)

  • www_jay
    6 years ago

    As for me I'm getting a cichlid called the (RED PHOENIX KING CICHLID). which is from South and Central America and grows up to a large 32 inches and will kill a Texas cichlid. There are Texas cichlid hobbyists on youtube trying to strike fear into certain cichlid hobbyists. I recently saw a YouTube cichlid video of a Texas cichlid eating a baby cuban cichlid I was mad the YouTuber is called (the sarusi) that's why I'm getting a cichlid called the (RED PHOENIX KING CICHLID).that way no one will mess with another valnerable cichlid again

  • www_jay
    4 years ago

    I made a error on how big the hybrid maleREDmale( RED PHOENIX KING CICHLID) gets the accurate size is 28 inches and the female 20 inchesinches. But any purists that own a texas cichlid LETS HAVE A DEBATE ON WHOS MORE AGGRESSIVE MY HYBRID OR YOUR PUREBRED texas cichlid.

  • www_jay
    4 years ago

    There are 6 hybrid KING cichlids the (RED PHOENIX KING CICHLID) is just 1 of them.

  • www_jay
    4 years ago

    There actually 7 hybrid cichlids that are KINGS of the water. So be AFRAID BE VERY AFRAID.

  • www_jay
    4 years ago

    There's actually 7 hybrid cichlids that are KINGS of the water so be AFRAID BE VERY AFRAID.

  • www_jay
    4 years ago

    1 more thing as for the red texas cichlid he will be in a separate tank on the right side in a cave with red coral trees he will be singsingle with 2 flier sunfish ,5 silver dollar fish. The rulers of the tank will be a pair of SMALLMOUTH BASS.

  • Mars SC Zone 8b Mars
    3 years ago

    LOL!

    Poor You!

    Did da fish survive

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