Jai

Marc

Probably seeing my Pearl Gouramis die in front of me. They were from PetCO and unbeknownst to me they weren't exactly in the best of shape. Sadly, I had never seen a healthy Pearl and bought them anyways - 1 of them survived and is looking absolutely amazing.

0morrokh

Wel, my worst experience was when I was younger and knew nothing about fish and killed several goldfish and a betta. Since I set up a real tropical tank and actually did some research, nothing too bad has happened, except that my Otos keep getting sick/injured.

Butterfly

When I had to haul a huge piece of driftwood out of my 75G tank with a Clown Loach stuck in it.
Hauled it out, laid it out on the floor, chiseled him out with a screwdriver, watched him flop all over the floor. Eventually the driftwood with all holes blocked and the Clown went back into the tank. The first thing he did was go back and check out the hole he got stuck in. go figure!!
Carol

dahly

When I first started into this hobby I added fish way too fast and killed 4 innocent, beautiful panda cory's. I felt sick! Patients is key to being successful in this hobby.

newbie101

I'd say when my bucket overflowed onto the floor
and also I did the same as 0morokh when I was like 6

0morrokh

heh heh I hope my parents don't know how many times I've done that...not to mention the end of the siphon falling out of the bucket onto the floor while siphoning... : :P
hehe don't tell anyone I admitted that, especially my mum...

fish_r_friend

that and having ICH twice

batattack

my angel had white spot but he is still alive cause of me

Gwenz

My worst experience must have been the day after I bought my first fish and one of my Zebra Danios got stuck in the filter and I had to take the whole filter apart to get him out. He's ok now but he did split his fin and it took a while to heal. It hasn't happend since! (Touch wood!!!)

Gwenz

Craig

my 1st go with my 20gallon all my fish died off it was a nightmare

C W

Isabella

Omorrokh, lol, that happens to me a lot actually, haha. I often find myself so absorbed with cleaning my tank's bottom that I forget about the other end of the siphon tube. Oftentimes the other end ends up spilling dirty water directly on the floor. One time I didn't notice the water spilling out until I felt a wet floor beneath my feet.

Skadunkadunk

My first water change, dam that was painful

Jason

me too and also an ich break out which killed 3/4 of my fish which was b4 I knew about all tips

Joe G

Having all my fish die in 2 days because I did not now about nitrite.
I just though you by a tank kit and feed fish . boy was I wrong.


1 male and 2 female Mollie
1 male and 1 female Swordtail
3 neon tetra
1 baby Mollie
1 Albino Corydoras Catfish.

All DEAD

0morrokh

glad to hear I'm not the only one... :P

chickadee

My worst experience was watching Azul die of dropsy after suffering from one thing and another for 2 months and then finally having kidney failure.

Rose

0morrokh

I'm sorry That would be so sad.

mistycheri

My worst experience would have to be when I was raising my baby platy's. I was down to two babies and decided to let the bigger one swim around outside the net. Well, he was not big enough as it turned out. My female beta took off after him within a few minutes, she managed to get most of him in her mouth with me chasing her around the tank with the fish net trying to stop her. The baby didn't survive, and I ended up putting the beta in her own 5 gal. tank. I have one baby that survived to make it to the community tank and she is doing wonderfully.

Gwenz

This doesn't seem so bad now that I have actualy lost one of my fish. I lost him around 4-5 days age. Whaen I say I've lost him, he is actualy not there any more. I took everything out and checked everywhere, even the floor (just in case). He's just sort of vanished....

Gwenz

Miss Mouse

My worst experience was about a year ago when I was filling up my pond; when it was done I switched off the hose but left it in the pond and somehow it caused a vacuum and sucked all the water out - i only found it late the next afternoon - the fish were all lying very still in the mud at the bottom in the scorching sun.. I thought they were dead by the smell but amazingly when I prodded them they were all still alive so I filled it up sharpish and they're still all fine today!

0morrokh

Holy cow they survived all that??!!!!

Miss Mouse

I know! It just goes to show how hardy common goldfish are lol

ncje

Id say there are two... recent one: Buying 4 angels from the LFS to find one was on its way out before it even entered the tank. I tried to get him going but I think it was just too late.

Earlier experience. Setting up a 180 Gallon tank for one single pair of Bifasciatums... equiped with escape grate for female. I placed her in first and made sure she knew the escape route... there were a few options to choose from... so a little chase with my hande a few times confirmed she knew where to go. Then in went the male, a big boofhead of a fish about 14 inches long. So i chased her to one side and plopped him in. Straight away I could tell she was a bit fearful and she did the wise thing sticking to her side. After a week there was some mating behaviour going on but she was still sticking to her side. One fine day I went off to work and returned home latish, busy day, to find her dead with a bite mark to the head. That was pretty upsetting. I was pretty mad at him, but how to tell a fish off? Plus at that stage Id had him for the full 3 years of his life so was kind of attached to him. That by the way was his second victim. I should have given up but I tried again... this time getting a hold of the largest female I could find (cost me a fotune to bribe it away from the owner). This girl was so big I had to readjust the escape holes in the grate. Lo and behold a day after her arrival she had gone to the other side and spawned a week later. They were great parents too. I have a scar to prove it.

Which brings me to a kind of silly story to end my sad tail in a little joke..... I had a curious friend that was intrigued by these guys and their fry swimming around like one big happy family. I told him how aggresive boofhead was (yeah that was his name) and no matter what I said I couldnt convince him that he would attack should he put his hand in the water. Boofhead would attack me for trying to touch a particular rock he was in love with? So when he had fry he was outright scary. Anyway eventually he stuck his hand in to disprove my theory...then came blood.

Thinking back about boofhead now.. makes me realise how much I miss the old fella. It was seriously the worst tank you could have though.... there were no plants at all , anything placed in the tank would be attacked severely... I tried many times. Every intake, outake tube, heater were all under heavy protection. But once he found the right partner she lead him around by the you know what :P

inari

" But once he found the right partner she lead him around by the you know what"

well most males in general are like I had a dog that wouldn't let anyone near him unless u had food we got a female and they got along just fine some1 had some say so and after we got that female he was as kinda as can be idk what she did him but it helped

kerryve

Killing my Poor pleco by mistake!!! some of my guppies got ich and i immediately treated with white spote meds, methylene blue. He was floating the next morning! I only found out why he died when i went onto fishlore.com! shame i still feel terrible!

wolfman21

tank leaked about 5 gallons of water. That ruined a lot of stuff, homework included

betsy_n_loves_JRC

When I had first started keeping my own fish, I had a bad experience.There was a storm and the electric went out for a week.All of my fish dies from not having heat.

Tom

That has happened to me so many times because I watch t.v. while changeing the water in my two largest tanks.
Tom

COBettaCouple

Other than losing our first Betta to dropsy (not knowing he wasn't constipated), probably when I added some algae-removal stuff to the tanks and a few hours later found our 1st Betta almost dead in his tank and all the platys almost dead in theirs. about 6 or 8 hours of hard work, a run to walmart and seeing our betta look like he was ready to die a couple times, we finally got things back to normal by some miracle. I wish we'd been participating & reading here at fishlore then & not been so ignorant. Ironically, losing Mario (our 1st betta) was what LED me to start really getting into the fishlore community and realize what a great resource we have here.