Miss Wiggle
Practically perfect in every way
oh boy did we have a fun night last night, got in from work and went upstairs to hoover the bedroom, plugged the hoover in the wrong socket and the fuse went (useless electrics 
) sorted the fuse out and realised it had turned one of the tanks off when it went, so stuck my hand in the tank to check the filter had started again properly, it had so I just went on to carry on hoovering. Looked up and saw a drop of water come off the bottom of the tank, just thought i'd sent a bit over the edge when i put my hand in the tank but something posessed me to just go and check, as I walked across the room it started dripping properly, then another bit about an inch along started, then another........... ooooooh @~!!$&*%.......... so I quickly ran and stuck a load of buckets under it, rang Ian, he was at work but nearly finished but it'd still take him a good half hr to get home at the earliest.
So I had to sort it by myself, now there's a load of things we had in the house that I'm really lucky we had lying around, and some things we'd done that i really wish we hadn't..... I'd strongly advise you all to go and check that you haven't done the same and that your prepared in case it happens to you.
Basically I grabbed as many buckets as I could and stuck them under the leak, then got our 'oscar recepticle' which is an enormous bucket/tub thing that we got when we had to move Oscar's tank and realised he wouldn't cope in even a big bucket for any period of time, stuck that under a leak and also started siphoning water into it. Then I realised there was water pissing all over the electrics so I'd better unplug them, oh bugger we've set the hospital tank up infront of the plug suckets so I couldn't get at them. So I had to mvoe the hospital tank, now don't ask how I managed cos it's a 25g tank, full of water, rocks, fish etc, I moved the whole thing still set up, by myself
it's true you find extra strength in a crisis!! My back's buggered now but ah well!
Anyway I got the tub half full then removed all the decor from the tank and started catching fish (on a side note endler fry and amano shrimp are fuuuuun to catch
) and putting them in the oscar recepticle, only lost one neon to the floor but I got him back in and he was Ok this morning. When I'd caught them all I then started the slow siphon going into the tub with them to top up the water level, when it was nearly full I dragged it (no chance of lifting that bugger!!) across the room and threw a big towel over the top, then the kitten started getting curious so I shut her downstairs!
Then I thought the quicker I can drain the tank the quicker we can get the spare tank on the stand and get the fish back in and sorted, so i got the uber quick siphon. This is a really big fat gravel vac someone gave us, it's absolutely useless for vaccing as it goes so fast, you'll fill a 2g bucket in about a minute using it. Rubbish for vaccing, excellent for when you need to drain a tank.... and fast. So I got it drained, runnign back and forward with the buckets to the bathroom. Little tip for getting the last few cm's of water out of the tank, when you've just enough water still in to get the vac started probably about 2/3 inches, scrape a big hole in the substrate so you can put the end of the vac straight onto the bottom of the tank, the water will all automatically drain there and you'll get much more water out of it and not have to scoop the last bit out. so I drained what I could of the tank, just as I was finishing Ian came home.
So he picked up the tank and held it over a bucket so I could scoop out all the substrate into it. Then came the really lucky part..... we had a tank the exact same size sat in the basement empty. If we hadn't then Angelis who was in the hospital tank after he got hurt scrapping with someone would have had to go back into his proper house and we'd have had to cram all the fish into the hospital tank for a day or so until we could re-seal the tank. So we got the new tank, put that on the stand, filled it back up with water, rigged up the filter and heater on it and after it had warmed back up, put the fish back in.
Amazingly enough we seem to have done it with only 1 fatality...... I have a bad back from a car crash years ago and I've just finished (about a month ago) a course of acupuncture which had fixed it completely. Well my back is well and truly dead now, I've been in work about 40 mins and I'm already in agony, even with my special orthapedic chair
ah well, all the fish are OK and if I'm still bad tomorrow it's off to the acupuncturist so i'll be reet.
So a little checklist for you all please take a few minutes to make sure of the following and there's some stuff I'd really advise you to seriously consider getting
- Go and check all your plug sockets, can you get at them, can the smallest weakest person in the household move whatever's in front of them if they needed to unplug them in a crisis, you can guarantee it'll be them in and left to cope with it if it goes so don't rely on someone being there to do it for you.
- How fully stocked are you, if you needed to move fish around, house them in another tank for a day or two could you do it? Another definate argument for understocking. Just have a few thoughts in your head of who is compatible with who so if you were suddenly 1 tank down you know who could go where.
- Have a spare tank in the house. Tank's (generally speaking) are actually not that expensive, all the equipment is but if one broke you could still use the old filters etc on it. Go and get a tank that's big enough to house the fish from your biggest tank, or anyone you couldn't move around for a day or two.
- Oscar recepticle, I'm so glad we got this, it's just a big gardening type tub, about 2 foot across, got it from a garden centre and I think it was only about a tenner. Every time we've had to move a tank or had a crisis all the fish from any tank have gone in it. It's a lifesaver!
- Buckets. Lots of them. As many as you can, but realistically speaking you probably need at least 4, 1 to put fish in if you haven't got an oscar tub, 1 to put any internal filters in as they shoudln't stay out of the water or if the tank's draining really fast put your heater in too, it may not have had time to cool down and then could blow, then 2 to go under the leaks and also be used for re-filling etc.
- Fishy towels, they just stink and you' never wanna use them on yourself, we have about 3 old bath sheets that are just dedicated to fishy stuff now, they live by the tanks.
- Super quick siphon, again not an expensive piece of kit but very very handy. Get the siphon with the biggest fattest tube on it and it'll go a million times quicker than your other ones.
- Spare equipment, right if the tank goes, and you've nowhere to put the fish so they're gonna have to live in a bucket overnight then your gonna have to give them some stuff to help. Get an air pump and stick and airstone in there to keep the water oxygenated, have a small internal filter running on a tank somewhere, then if you need it it's always there and mature and you can stick it in the big tub if they're gonna be there for more than a couple of hrs, a small heater, same as before.
- Trawler net, we bought a really big net for moving Oscar and the other big fish. It's actually great for if you have to move all your fish and fast. Every sweep of the community tank and I got someone, more likely 3/4 fish at once. Definately a worthwhile investment!!
- Wooden floors - Ok so at a guess you probably can't all get these, but I'm bloody glad we've got them!!
So there you go, please everyone give this a moment's thought, it could just make the difference if it happened to you. We can't all be prepared for every eventuality but if you've even half of the stuff I've put above then you should be fine. Those of you with mts have probably got most of it already, just make sure you know where everything is so your prepared for an emergency.
) sorted the fuse out and realised it had turned one of the tanks off when it went, so stuck my hand in the tank to check the filter had started again properly, it had so I just went on to carry on hoovering. Looked up and saw a drop of water come off the bottom of the tank, just thought i'd sent a bit over the edge when i put my hand in the tank but something posessed me to just go and check, as I walked across the room it started dripping properly, then another bit about an inch along started, then another........... ooooooh @~!!$&*%.......... so I quickly ran and stuck a load of buckets under it, rang Ian, he was at work but nearly finished but it'd still take him a good half hr to get home at the earliest. So I had to sort it by myself, now there's a load of things we had in the house that I'm really lucky we had lying around, and some things we'd done that i really wish we hadn't..... I'd strongly advise you all to go and check that you haven't done the same and that your prepared in case it happens to you.
Basically I grabbed as many buckets as I could and stuck them under the leak, then got our 'oscar recepticle' which is an enormous bucket/tub thing that we got when we had to move Oscar's tank and realised he wouldn't cope in even a big bucket for any period of time, stuck that under a leak and also started siphoning water into it. Then I realised there was water pissing all over the electrics so I'd better unplug them, oh bugger we've set the hospital tank up infront of the plug suckets so I couldn't get at them. So I had to mvoe the hospital tank, now don't ask how I managed cos it's a 25g tank, full of water, rocks, fish etc, I moved the whole thing still set up, by myself
it's true you find extra strength in a crisis!! My back's buggered now but ah well! Anyway I got the tub half full then removed all the decor from the tank and started catching fish (on a side note endler fry and amano shrimp are fuuuuun to catch
) and putting them in the oscar recepticle, only lost one neon to the floor but I got him back in and he was Ok this morning. When I'd caught them all I then started the slow siphon going into the tub with them to top up the water level, when it was nearly full I dragged it (no chance of lifting that bugger!!) across the room and threw a big towel over the top, then the kitten started getting curious so I shut her downstairs! Then I thought the quicker I can drain the tank the quicker we can get the spare tank on the stand and get the fish back in and sorted, so i got the uber quick siphon. This is a really big fat gravel vac someone gave us, it's absolutely useless for vaccing as it goes so fast, you'll fill a 2g bucket in about a minute using it. Rubbish for vaccing, excellent for when you need to drain a tank.... and fast. So I got it drained, runnign back and forward with the buckets to the bathroom. Little tip for getting the last few cm's of water out of the tank, when you've just enough water still in to get the vac started probably about 2/3 inches, scrape a big hole in the substrate so you can put the end of the vac straight onto the bottom of the tank, the water will all automatically drain there and you'll get much more water out of it and not have to scoop the last bit out. so I drained what I could of the tank, just as I was finishing Ian came home.
So he picked up the tank and held it over a bucket so I could scoop out all the substrate into it. Then came the really lucky part..... we had a tank the exact same size sat in the basement empty. If we hadn't then Angelis who was in the hospital tank after he got hurt scrapping with someone would have had to go back into his proper house and we'd have had to cram all the fish into the hospital tank for a day or so until we could re-seal the tank. So we got the new tank, put that on the stand, filled it back up with water, rigged up the filter and heater on it and after it had warmed back up, put the fish back in.
Amazingly enough we seem to have done it with only 1 fatality...... I have a bad back from a car crash years ago and I've just finished (about a month ago) a course of acupuncture which had fixed it completely. Well my back is well and truly dead now, I've been in work about 40 mins and I'm already in agony, even with my special orthapedic chair
ah well, all the fish are OK and if I'm still bad tomorrow it's off to the acupuncturist so i'll be reet.So a little checklist for you all please take a few minutes to make sure of the following and there's some stuff I'd really advise you to seriously consider getting
- Go and check all your plug sockets, can you get at them, can the smallest weakest person in the household move whatever's in front of them if they needed to unplug them in a crisis, you can guarantee it'll be them in and left to cope with it if it goes so don't rely on someone being there to do it for you.
- How fully stocked are you, if you needed to move fish around, house them in another tank for a day or two could you do it? Another definate argument for understocking. Just have a few thoughts in your head of who is compatible with who so if you were suddenly 1 tank down you know who could go where.
- Have a spare tank in the house. Tank's (generally speaking) are actually not that expensive, all the equipment is but if one broke you could still use the old filters etc on it. Go and get a tank that's big enough to house the fish from your biggest tank, or anyone you couldn't move around for a day or two.
- Oscar recepticle, I'm so glad we got this, it's just a big gardening type tub, about 2 foot across, got it from a garden centre and I think it was only about a tenner. Every time we've had to move a tank or had a crisis all the fish from any tank have gone in it. It's a lifesaver!
- Buckets. Lots of them. As many as you can, but realistically speaking you probably need at least 4, 1 to put fish in if you haven't got an oscar tub, 1 to put any internal filters in as they shoudln't stay out of the water or if the tank's draining really fast put your heater in too, it may not have had time to cool down and then could blow, then 2 to go under the leaks and also be used for re-filling etc.
- Fishy towels, they just stink and you' never wanna use them on yourself, we have about 3 old bath sheets that are just dedicated to fishy stuff now, they live by the tanks.
- Super quick siphon, again not an expensive piece of kit but very very handy. Get the siphon with the biggest fattest tube on it and it'll go a million times quicker than your other ones.
- Spare equipment, right if the tank goes, and you've nowhere to put the fish so they're gonna have to live in a bucket overnight then your gonna have to give them some stuff to help. Get an air pump and stick and airstone in there to keep the water oxygenated, have a small internal filter running on a tank somewhere, then if you need it it's always there and mature and you can stick it in the big tub if they're gonna be there for more than a couple of hrs, a small heater, same as before.
- Trawler net, we bought a really big net for moving Oscar and the other big fish. It's actually great for if you have to move all your fish and fast. Every sweep of the community tank and I got someone, more likely 3/4 fish at once. Definately a worthwhile investment!!
- Wooden floors - Ok so at a guess you probably can't all get these, but I'm bloody glad we've got them!!
So there you go, please everyone give this a moment's thought, it could just make the difference if it happened to you. We can't all be prepared for every eventuality but if you've even half of the stuff I've put above then you should be fine. Those of you with mts have probably got most of it already, just make sure you know where everything is so your prepared for an emergency.
Lots of info for people, mixed with a dramatic story so that they'll do what you say!
