The Strange Thing You Find Inside Your Filter

[Frank the Tank]

ok i currently running an extra external filter along the current internal filter because i am about to set up a new malawi tank and going to put the cycled external filter straight in the malawi tank when it ready, anyway its been in for a month and today i thought i would give it a clean and found these 2 wee guys INSIDE the filter

one was at the top on the coarse pad and the other was swimming amongst all the crap at the bottom of the filter, what amazes is how hardy these 2 are to survive amongst all the fish poop and food debris and they must have been in there for some time to get to this size.

how did they get there? ok well my cory's are laying eggs every few weeks now and i've stopped saving the eggs as i don't have time to hatch them anymore so i am guessing some eggs hatched they got sucked into the filter and been surviving and grown in size inside the filter

bad news is the one on the right of the pic doesnt like like it will survive he was the one on the coarse pad i think he may have been out water for too long when i was cleaning filter

 

[LucyB]

They are huge! They much have been in there for ages! I guess when they were tiny fry they must have got sucked in and have been living off bits of food which got into the filter? They are lucky to be alive!

 

[Frank the Tank]

the pics maybe make them look a bit bigger than they are but they are still a decent size. yeah i have seen tiny fry in my tank before a few days after eggs hatch but most disappear or die off after a while. the bigger one on the left was happily swimming at the bottom of the cannister amongst all the debris and he was almost black but i am guessing that because it never saw light before and as you can see in the pic he has got lighter already

 

[ninjacheesefish]

I just found a molly fry in my filter. He's so tiny

 

[Inchworm]

How wonderful, Frank the Tank! Best of luck with them.

Perhaps the very best food for young fry are the microorganisms that grow in the filter mulm. I recommend that breeders just rinse out their filter media in the fry tank as soon as they hatch.

 

[Kizz]

good save ! i too once found about 7 neon's 2 cory fry a few guppy fry and platy fry in my canister filter totally amazed me they could survive in that !

 

[wirralbull]

neons on youre filter? does it not have a guard of any sort?

 

[Akasha72]

I have found platy fry when rinsing my sponges - never found any cory fry though. I'd be super excited and as amazed as you are if I did

I hope they both survive

 

[Harlequins]

Congrats on your find....i do hope they survive

I've found cory fry and guppys in my filters before now

 

[Baccus]

Congrats on finding the cory fry, my filters tend to collect BN fry (they swim over the return lip on my hob filters ) and cherry shrimp.

 

[Salam]

That's so cool, hope they pull through. Looks like they are fighters.

 

[Frank the Tank]

Good news , the smaller one on the left looks to have perked up quite a bit, it was not moving much and i saw it upside a few times but today he is swimming about and active, his top fin was closed over yesterday and it open today

As for the other bigger on the left, well he manage to break free from the fry trap i had them it (must have jumped) and i found him amongst the bigger corys

 

[Akasha72]

glad to hear they are doing well. They both sound like little battlers - determined to survive no matter what