What's The Hardest Lesson You Learned?

[kiriyama]

Not researching the fish / tank size etc, prior to purchase. Overstocking , adding all the stock to soon, underfiltering, and of course ,,,,, impulse purchases,,, all hard lessons that hopefully will be learned from....

 

[killudead]

I once chose not to unplug my heater before doing a water change because I thought I wouldn't be removing that much water. Yep, you guessed it - CRACKLE POP! I never moved so fast in my life to get my hands out of the water. (I really should have known better.)

I will now never forget to unplug everything when doing water changes.

Most of mine are stupid errors. well they make me feel stupid anyway.
I got that one also, but luckily no fish or my hand were in the tank when it happened.
I had a blue ram in a quarantine tank, thought it would be a good idea to do a water change.
Unplugged the heater to prevent problem mentioned above. But i forgot to plug it back in. He died, but cant be sure if it was cold water or illness. I hope the second, but most likely the first. water was about 65*f by morning.
Oh yea, when you take the net out of the tank, make sure no fish are in there. Had one slip past my one time and found him 3 days later in the net.
Fish and sinks dont mix. nuff said..

 

[Paradise3]

IJust thought about a couple more.

1) Never leave the heater plugged in when doing a W/C. It didn't go CRACKLE POP but it did melt one of the suction caps and now i only have one left till i get another one.
2) Never transfer a guppy to another tank without covering the net with your hand. I was transfering my guppy to quaratine after it looked like she had been fighting with the others, just as she was going in the tank she decided to jump straight out the net and onto the floor. Lukily she is still with us and back in the big tank now.
3) Never collect cory eggs before they have stopped spawning. I found my corys spawning AGAIN so i left them be for about an hour then i went up and they were sat still so i thought they must be done..... NOPE! I collected the eggs in then they started again! All the eggs turned white because i don't think he fertilised them.

Ok i have said enough now!! I will embarrass myself (sorry if i spelt embarrass wrong i'm having a mind block atm)

Xxx~misscosmo~xxX

 

[Mr._Fishy]

Floating bags in a tank with a piranha. Came back about 30 min later to find holes bitten in both bags, no fish or shrimp left in the bags, and a very fat piranha.

Another one would be doing a drip acclimation with sw for fw fish. I still do not know how I did that one. I had some sw and fw fish I was acclimating and I guess I just wasn't paying close enough attention or was trying to do too many things at once. Luckily I only lost about 5 ghost shrimp in the process.

 

[Gazoo]

OK all you youngins' - don't do this one:

Many years ago when I was new to doing water changes, I decided I would be smart by saving some time by filling my tank with an outdoor faucet/garden water.

Needless to say, the water was too cold and within a day all my fish had Ich. Since I didn't know how to properly treat it, all the fish died within a few days.

Booooo me!

 

[Paradise3]

I always fill my adult tank up with water from the tap when i do a water change and when i do a water change on my fry tank i use the newer water from the adult tank. It all gets complicated round here at water change time.

Xxx~misscosmo~xxX