The Lowest Point Of My 5 Year Fishkeeping Hobby

[emilythestrange]

So, it started at just a regular planned w/c, a simple "two buckets in, two buckets out" ....

Yet its taken 2 hours, left me dirty, tired, smelly and my arms ache like no ache ever before. and ill need to re siphon and re clean tomorrow as now its worse than it started before, and i doubt ill ever be able to siphon up all the c*&p in the sand.

This is all for 7 fish, of which 3 i am fond of.

Totally fed up right now, wasted two hours. It all went wrong when i tried to re plug in my 4month old U2 filter, and it wouldn;t come back on. which is precisly what was wrong with my old fluval 3+ filter. I only squeezed out the sponges 2 weeks ago, maximum. Me pulling out the media out of the top of the filter sprayed loads of poop everywhere back over my once clean sand, only 10 x worse! after re squeezing again, i re tried to power the filter, with no prevail. So then i had remove all the media, hook the wire from under the heavy lid being careful for the plug not to touch the water etc, ran to the sink to wash it out. i havent ever stripped down the motor on the U3, let me tell you it isnt at all easy. the "squeeze to release" mechanism on the sides of the filter are useless and i had to prize it open with my expensive false nails. after wiping the impellor down and restling with the wires again, i tried to hold the filter with one hand and "slot" back in the media in the top of the filter, however one of the sponge sections clip at the bottom kept jamming in the bottom of the canister.
The U3 is not wide enough to get your hand down to prize the blue clip back out (which i had to do twice , as i couldnt push one of the sponge inserts back in without the jammed piece sorted out)

After all the faffing about my water is now cloudy, theres the most rubbish dirt and pest snails on the sand i have ever seen and my arm kills now. To totally top it off i now too have my bf lecturing me about "is it all really worth it?!? do you really get any enjoyment out of them... etc"

of which i can say at the moment... no its not worth it. all they do is die, get diseases, which im currently treating with para guard. If i find one of them dead tomorrow, it may be the last straw now. the tank i have spent £120 on in july, £40 on filter. countless money on replacing fish after fish.. im just fed up.


Has anyone else had a moment in fishkeeping like this, or worse, and come through the other side?

p.s sorry for the rant.

 

[JenJ]

Sorry to read that. I'm new to this game, so haven't yet had a real disaster, but I too have a U2 filter, and often it doesn't restart after I've done a w/c.

I usually now give it a bit of a clean each w/c, so if I have to jiggle it about a bit to get it restarted it won't release much dirt into the water, but I have found that the water clears quickly - I bet when you wake up tomorrow it'll be crystal clear.

 

[CezzaXV]

It happens to most of us at one time or another.

My disaster was when I had a fry tank set up for some newborn cory fry I had. The HOB filter I was using was terrible and leaked EVERYWHERE. I woke up in the middle of the night and it was terrible.

 

[Wei_pad]

Yep. I've had such moments like this. There was this one time (quite recently actually) in my fish keeping life that really made me want to bash my aquariums. I had this big exterior filter (the one where the powerhead is in the water and the filter box is on top outside) on the top of my tank. I thought all was well and I hit the hay for the night. The next day, DISASTER. The filter had collapsed and sunk in the tank itself. The water was extremely dirty and there was poop, dirt, and several other unknown things that were floating about. The whole ordeal killed my precious (and quite expensive!) discuses and gave long term consequences on some of my fish. It took me hours to clean everything up to the way it was again. I had to spend more money on meds and replacement fish. It wasn't a good way to start a day.

But still, it was worth it. I persevered and learned from my mistakes. I became more careful and wary of what I was doing with my aquariums. Now, it's one of the most rewarding things in my life!

 

[thereverendturtle]

Get a good hob filter so much easier to maintain.

In 30+ years I've given up on the hobby two or three times, only to come back after finding a fish I've longed for.
I would say stick with it a while longer, if in a couple of months you still feel the same, return your livestock and store the tank. The bug will most likely bite again.
Sorry you're having so many problems.

 

[UKSPEED]

I had this problem with two U3's, which is why I just replaced it. There used to be so many good reports about the U series, but now I just seem to hear bad ones. I think fluval need to take a look at what they are building.

 

[KCB]

It sounds like you're having quite a bad day! I wouldn't write the whole hobby off because of it though, I bet you'll feel a lot better the next day.

Does it usually take 2 hours to do a w/c? If so there are ways to make it easier and you won't have to lug buckets around. Have you tried a python siphon? They connect to the tap and can suck the water our of your tank and also siphon tap water back in. They can be quite expensive but there is a nifty guide on this site that tells you how to make your own for half the price

. It should make things a little quicker and probably a lot easier. You would have to dechlorinate the whole tanks water volume before adding the tap water though.

With the filter, if you can't get on with it just replace it, there's no need to put up with all the hassle if you don't want to

.

 

[NickBFC]

Hope you feel better soon, I think this sort of thing happens to everyone, in any hobby. Heck, I feel like this 24/7 with most things ha ha

Sure you'll feel better soon enough.

 

[balajake]

Can't go wrong with an internal filter from all pond solutions. Think they have discount codes knocking about too.

 

[PrairieSunflower]

I've had worse, unfortunately. The plague wiped through my biggest tank and I lost around 60 fish (a lot being various stages of fry... not big fish and thus not overstocked). Never could identify the problem as there were SO many different symptoms. I thought after trying various desperate attempts at treatments that one fish had made it... but a week after my tank seemed stable... that fish died too.

I decided to take a risk and rather than sterilize the lot (I don't know if I cared to try quite that hard at the moment)... I removed ALL the sand (which was a pain anyhow, would much rather vacuum gravel twice a week), scrubbed the inside, filter casing, everything, trimmed the plants, scrubbed the remaining leaves even.... then replaced it, put it running and stuck 2 guppies from my other tank in there praying it was the end of it.... And it was! Those two guppies are still there and thriving. I added a couple other guppies, the last few babies were born... I kept a few and re-homed the rest... then decided to try different fish and added neon tetra and a platy.

We've been doing well since... changed what I wanted from my fish... used to enjoy the breeding and rearing... but now I just want fish that will stay at a constant number... so I now have female guppies that are all either empty or virgins and neon tetra along with assassin snails in that tank.

I have recently re-homed all my male guppies that were being kept in a separate tank as I was getting frustrated that they always seemed so fragile and coming down with something.... moved my two platy in there... they don't get along on their own so moved a peace maker guppy in with them... then my only fish who can give birth did... I have 25 platy fry who moved into the shrimp tank for now.... and I added 2 more virgin female platies.... after the quarantine period (as I put the new ones straight in) the peace maker guppy will be moving back to the community tank.

So there you go... fish keeping sucks sometimes.

Maybe you'd prefer a change of stock to something you can keep just 1 or 2 of... or maybe get rid of those few you don't like.

I'm not a fan of sand... maybe a change back to gravel?

 

[balajake]

The only sand I'm not a fan of is play sand, had no end of problems with it until I changed to unipac. It's very important to go through it with your fingers every water change to release the nasty gas build up.

 

[garethp]

Sorry, meant to post in your other thread....

 

[emilythestrange]

It sounds like you're having quite a bad day! I wouldn't write the whole hobby off because of it though, I bet you'll feel a lot better the next day.

Does it usually take 2 hours to do a w/c? If so there are ways to make it easier and you won't have to lug buckets around. Have you tried a python siphon? They connect to the tap and can suck the water our of your tank and also siphon tap water back in. They can be quite expensive but there is a nifty guide on this site that tells you how to make your own for half the price

. It should make things a little quicker and probably a lot easier. You would have to dechlorinate the whole tanks water volume before adding the tap water though.

With the filter, if you can't get on with it just replace it, there's no need to put up with all the hassle if you don't want to

.

It usually takes around 40 minutes, maybe 30. As i have to pick up the three mopani wood pieces, stack them up, siphon up the poop, now im swirling the sand as much as possible and smoothing it out, as the cory digs a little in the sand.

I was going to add a couple of platies or 1 cory today, but i thought id best leave it a little. The 2 platies i have seem to go from swimming around normally, then hanging around the back of the filter.. Ill test the water tonight. The 1 black guppy seems absolutely fine, no fin damage or loss of weight, and the cory is swimming top to bottom like crazy

The only sand I'm not a fan of is play sand, had no end of problems with it until I changed to unipac. It's very important to go through it with your fingers every water change to release the nasty gas build up.

Have you had it before? as i did once and i had problems then and ended up shutting the little tank with sand in down, i thought it was just me, as lots of members appear to have sand and praise anyone to do the switch, it looks nicer and i am shocked how much mess a few fish make! i noticed not so long ago, there were a few green patches in the sand. like algae?

with gravel, doesn't the waste get drawn to the bottom of the tank? therefore making it harder to clean?

I've had worse, unfortunately. The plague wiped through my biggest tank and I lost around 60 fish (a lot being various stages of fry... not big fish and thus not overstocked). Never could identify the problem as there were SO many different symptoms. I thought after trying various desperate attempts at treatments that one fish had made it... but a week after my tank seemed stable... that fish died too.

Oh this sounds a heck of alot worse! 60 fish! how did you manage to deal with that? Its so sad to find one dead all the time, makes it feel like a chore..

Get a good hob filter so much easier to maintain.

In 30+ years I've given up on the hobby two or three times, only to come back after finding a fish I've longed for.
I would say stick with it a while longer, if in a couple of months you still feel the same, return your livestock and store the tank. The bug will most likely bite again.
Sorry you're having so many problems.

I am going to stick with it a little while longer, just seems the fish i like are so weak, they look half dead in the shop, so what luck will i have? I personally love endlers, guppies and platies, they are never two identical (maybe the endlers) and have such personalities, explore all depths of the tank, and it doesnt take too many to look like you have a full stock

 

[PrairieSunflower]

I find gravel easier to keep cleaning because I can get the vacuum right in there to the bottom and stir it around and move and suck, etc.

Yeah, losing all those guppies was really discouraging. I only took courage in that my water stats were fine... but it isn't fun at all to not be able to solve the disease problem. No one on here was able to get to the bottom of it either.

 

[spongy]

I restarted back in June after a 21 year break, the technology has moved on a lot, there was no Internet or forums back then either, and I didn't know about cycling either....and I'm only 34 now.

I've lost several fish and another recently after a mystery injury.

I had trouble with my fluval 205 external filter, whenever I restarted it after a vacuum and water change it would spit out loads of wool media and other crud into my tank after all the hard work I'd just finished so I know your pain.

I got the hump and just binned it and got myself an Aquamanta 200 canister filter and its much much better.

If you can afford it I'd recommend binning your filter and getting a decent external, they are a lot easier to use and maintain even if it is new,

Hang in there, it gets better the more you learn and more rewarding when you get it right.