Jumper alert

One of my babies jumped ship! I just happened to find him stuck to a piece of posterboard behind the bookcase on which the baby tank sits! My heart is still in my throat. He was medium-ly dry when I found him, so I quickly dumped him into a little fishbowl that I found. After ten minutes or so he was active. I think I hurt his fin while I was trying to free him from the posterboard. He swims weird. I hope it's just from being dry and not because I maimed him. But I'm so glad I found him in time. I read a post about something similar happening to someone else. The freaky thing is that I read it this morning. If I hadn't read it, I probably wouldn't have tried to save him.

Should I put him back into the tank or keep him in the bowl?

 

Clown loaches are less stressed when in groups.
Placing him back in the tank would probably be best.

Dino

 

It's a trend! :'(A second baby jumped out today. And it stuck to the same piece of posterboard...which I found freaky. I promptly got a new baby tank. Just a 5-gallon kit from Wal-Mart. All covered now. Now I just have to watch that they don't jump into the filter that's in the hood. Thanks for confirming keeping them all together, Dino and Butterfly. Both jumpers are moving around. The first one was out for the longest. It still only moves when necessary while the other two are playing and chasing each other like nothing happened. Keeping my fingers crossed

 

Yes, I hid and watched both tanks for a few. It's so much fun! The bigger clowns do it and the babies did it for a little bit. They are still trying to find the parameters of their tank.
It's like that one scene in Finding Nemo when the children are trying to see who can swim farthest out from the reef and closest to the butt (boat)...(have I watched it too many times?) Anyway, the babies are seeing who can swim closest to the surface of the water in the 5-gallon. One makes it halfway, then swims back down. Another one goes a little farther, then swims back down. I love it!

 

Touch the butt! ;D

 

Injury report
I think one of my jumpers lost part of its tail in being stuck to the posterboard. It's been wriggling more than baby clowns should wriggle, so that's when I took a closer look. Sure enough there's an astonishingly clean vertical cut. You know how the clown tail has a fork in it? Well, this guy's tail is cut before the fork. So basically his main source of propulsion is hampered. And when he swims he doesn't go far, though you can tell he's using a lot of power. His "butt" drags too. I don't think I bought him that way; I'm prepared to take the blame for hurting him. So now I just hope the rest of his tail will grow back.

My other jumper has lost some of the skin above his eye, probably in his fall too. He has a black stripe there, which is only interrupted by that portion of his skin that is light colored, so that makes me think he got cut or scraped or something. However, despite having thrown themselves behind my bookcase, the two jumpers act fine now. The one that was out for the longest is as active as he can be with that shortened tail. I swear, sometimes I feel like this is just like having real kids. Visual aids below!

Here is a normal clown, from this site's fish profile:

And here is and example of the draggy butt clown:

And here is an example of the eye scrape clown. I couldn't match the color of the fish, but just pretend that the butter yellow is the same color as that orangeyness of the rest of the fish:

Hosting by xs.to

 

They'll be fine!As Carol says, they are very resilient - just like kids ;D

 

poor babies, i hope theyll be okay... :'(

 

Yet more jumpers! I can't believe so many people write their fishies jump! How do they jump out of the tank!? How large is your tank Janmitch22? How large are the clowns? I hope that this tail grows back and that this eye heals! Do fishies' tails or fins grow back when cut? Isn't there an increased possibility of an infection where there is an open wound in the fish's skin? (Which could result in various diseases)

 

The first loach jumped out during the summer when I had them in a quarantine tank. It didn't have a top. This one jumped out during the night, so it was nice and crisp when I found it the next morning. The second and third loaches were just little babies and they jumped out of the same tank! This was a few weeks ago. I'd covered the top with saran wrap, but there was the tiniest of gaps where the filter hung onto the side of the tank. They found it. One jumped out and fell behind--well, you read the story!
The eye cut has healed. The one with the severed fin died last week, but I think his fin was growing out. Yeah, I had to guard against infection, I just kept up with water changes. I was going to see if I needed Melafix or something, but the cut healed on its own.