Worst thing about keeping fish

[caz27]

The only job that does my head in is testing the water every wk .....

 

[Eelzor]

I find fish keeping a easy and rewarding job, but it is EXTREMELY frustrating and sad at the same time when they are sick or die. Not a good feeling at all.

 

[millym]

i hate when you have an obviously dying fish that you know you have to 'help' stop its suffering (euthanase), esp when other fish are starting to nip it. horrible.
i never thought id get so attatched to our finned friends but always feel sad when we lose one.

 

[platypus]

Caz,

I must be weird because I love testing the water with all those pipettes and chemicals and test tubes! I think there is a lab technician inside me trying to get out...

But my least favourite part is the constant paranoia that goes with the hobby - especially when something changes, like the temperature goes up, or you add new fish, or when you can tell the fish aren't quite happy and you can't figure out why. Whenever this happens I always dream about my fish every night and count them obsessively and talk about them all the time! As my boyf says, if I'm like this with fish god help me when I have children!

Oh, I also hate handling bloodworm because of the smell

 

[caz27]

I do the same thing count each of them in morning and at night to make sure there all ok....My other half thinks i'm bonkers no one else that i know enjoys keeping fish so this place is a god send

 

[Moe]

It's nice to know I'm not alone in the counting thing. I haven't seen two of my ottos in three days. I'm beginning to fear the worst. I hate that helpless feeling when you know something is wrong with a fish but can't fix it or figure it out. It is so frustrating. My favorite part is when you bring a fish home from LFS and its color really brightens up.

 

[platypus]

Moe, I've had fish go missing on me for WEEKS and turned up cool as a cucumber, so fingers crossed for you.

I do the same thing count each of them in morning and at night to make sure there all ok....My other half thinks i'm bonkers no one else that i know enjoys keeping fish so this place is a god send

Couldn't agree more although I think it's making me even more obsessed! I keep checking out those 180 gallon pics *dribble*

My favourite part is hearing my clown loaches 'bite' - how does all that noise come from such a cute little fella?

 

[CFC]

The thing i hate most is if i see a fish that i "must" have and then realise that i have no room in any of my tanks for it and no space left in the flat for another tank Other than that carrying 100 litres of RO water up the stairs once a week is a pain in the you know what

 

[Alien Anna]

Add me to those that hate the paranoia of "knowing" something is up with your fish but not knowing what or how to fix it.

 

[MAM]

water changes and gravel cleaning (still getting the hang of that vacuum) drive me batty. takes me 20 minutes to get the vacuum going (though i'm getting better at it every week), and then, just as i'm making some progress, i'll slip and screw up the suction. that, and since its a little 10 gal full of easily stressed mollies, i always feels so bad and worry that i'm overly stressing them and will wake up the next morning to find one floating.
i also hate that i live in a little second floor apartment and i want a couple of bigger tanks but know that if i had some, they'd probably go crashing through the floor some night onto my neighbors below (old apartment building), that, and i can't afford anythign new right now, and i'm just dying to expand my fishy family!!!!!!
the best part is definitely bring home a new fish and seeing it thrive.

 

[cassandra]

The only job that does my head in is testing the water every wk .....

i was woundering i never tested my water and now i hear all this talk to test water is it worth all the money i never tested my water and the fish are living well for a year now !

 

[skiltrip]

I also do a headcount, morning, and before bedtime. I'm always doing the headcoat to make sure everyone is accounted for.

Constant paranoia... me too. Seems there's always something to worry about. I can say that right now, knock on wood, everyone seems stable.

The one most annoying thing I find is technically, you should always do a complete gravel vacuum once a month or whatever, but if you do that, you pretty much have to dismantle your whole setup. This includes caves you have put together, and gravel sculpting. I have high levels of gravel in some spots and low levels in other spots.

I've tore thing completely up a couple times, but i really hate to do it. Does anyone have any ideas on this? The best i can come up with is only dismantling half your tank each time you need to do a big vacuum job.

 

[wuvmybetta]

count them obsessively and talk about them all the time!

me too!! I take roll call every morning just to make sure everybodies accounted for , glad I'm not the only paranoid one , and I could talk fish alllll day

 

[freshmike]

I would take a roll call every day as well......... ) but I can't count that high!!!

 

[FloridaFishGuy]

I would say the worst thing about fish keeping is waiting so long for my first tank. And its probably gonna be boring when i have to wait for the fishless cycle to end but in the end its better than just putting fish in the tank and letting them die.