The case of the missing tetra

[Auttie_Pie1]

This Thursday a massive algae bloom happened in my tank well I was gone. So bad you could barely see the fish inside. I have 1 betta, 5 tetras and 1 pleco. I was already planning on completely redoing the tank so this was my opportunity. I made small separate tanks to put my fish in and I began emptying the water with my pump. That was taking far too long and hurting my hand from pumping it, and my tank is far too big to dump out. So I brought up one of the red solo cups and began to scoop the water out. Now keep in mind this water is filled with algae making it hard to see anything. Once the water was low enough I began to remove my fish. First the betta, then the Tetras. The only problem being I have 5 and could only find 4, so I removed everything the plants, hideouts everything and I could only find 4. I began to frantically look around my counter, checking the ground to see if he had jumped out but no body was found. I was at a loss of words, I have no idea what happened to my little tetra… I have 3 general conclusions to what might’ve happened. 1) He died while I was gone and my other fish ate him, the only problem being I thought I might see remains such as skeleton or flesh but nothing. 2) This one is probably the worst in my opinion, because the water was so hard to see through leaving little to no visibility I might have accidentally scooped him up when emptying the tank with the red solo cups… I don’t feel like this happened because I feel like I would’ve see or heard him flap around in the sink but it also sadly seems like the most reasonable considering the evidence. And 3) my tank is right next to a sink, one I use often for hygiene purposes. He could’ve jumped out of my tank and lands in the sink drain. Now this brings up the question of rotting flesh smell if he had died, well like I said I use this one very often and the first thing I did when I got back was washed my hands which inevitably would’ve pushed him down the drain. And so that’s the sad but true story of my missing tetra. May he swim in the beautiful waters of fishy heaven

If you have any advice or similar story’s comment below I’d love to read them

 

[Chrie yang]

你可以用专门的水族箱换水器抽水，价格也不是很贵，大概在 15 到 50 美元之间。这样你就可以很好地换水，而不需要用一次性杯子舀水。
或者，您可以给您的鱼缸加一个透明的盖子。

 

[Auttie_Pie1]

你可以用专门的水族箱换水器抽水，价格也不是很贵，大概在 15 到 50 美元之间。这样你就可以很好地换水，而不需要用一次性杯子舀水。
或者，您可以给您的鱼缸加一个透明的盖子。

谢谢你的建议！我很想给我的水箱盖上盖子，但由于有过滤器，我无法这样做。我肯定会考虑购买更好的泵。谢谢！

 

[GaryE]

That's an excellent exchange and a good discussion for a private message, but when we see a message in Mandarin or any language other than English, we have to check it because it's an old spammer's trick. It's time consuming for the mods. Posts here are generally in English, as the vast majority of members use English to communicate, even if it isn't a first language.
We have an enormous number of languages other than English represented here, and it will get very confusing if we use them all on the forum.

As well as writing in English and following the Mandarin advice above, I'd suggest increasing water changes to get at the root of the bloom. If you don't have a timer for the light, I'd get one.

It's possible the tetra died and its decomposition fed the algae bloom.

 

[Auttie_Pie1]

That's an excellent exchange and a good discussion for a private message, but when we see a message in Mandarin or any language other than English, we have to check it because it's an old spammer's trick. It's time consuming for the mods. Posts here are generally in English, as the vast majority of members use English to communicate, even if it isn't a first language.
We have an enormous number of languages other than English represented here, and it will get very confusing if we use them all on the forum.

As well as writing in English and following the Mandarin advice above, I'd suggest increasing water changes to get at the root of the bloom. If you don't have a timer for the light, I'd get one.

It's possible the tetra died and its decomposition fed the algae bloom.

Okay I understand, thank you for the advice

 

[GaryE]

Aucun problème. C'était mon plaisir.

Yes, it can get complicated.