My swordtail jumped out of the tank

HI guyz,

I recently introduced a red swordtail female into my tank and she was very active. Always grazing the sides of the tank. I could never notice her closely because of her swift movements. The first day, she was fine. The next day when I saw the tank, I was shocked to see her missing. I searched all over the tank. But couldn't find her. Having read that swordtails has a tendency to jump out of the water, I checked the surroundings of the tank.

There she was!... lying on the floor. I panicked. I picked her with my hands and threw her into the tank. She was very bad in shape. All her fins were dusty. She was breathing hard. I thought that she had no chance of surviving.

I covered the tank with a cardboard.

The next morning, she was as clean and beautiful as I had bought her. I was so happy to see her swimming swiftly again.

Any similar experiences?...

 

Hello Lokky,

I am a new member. I was reading your post and I must admit that late last year, we lost a swordtail female (orange) and we searched for her for days. We finally found her in a nearby basket all dried up – it was very sad. Our tank was covered but there was a little 4 by 3 inch space at the back of the lid and that is where she must have jumped out.

I also remember that about 20 years ago, there was a mild earthquake in Trinidad at around 6 in the morning. About 10 minutes later, my brother and I were checking on our fish when we noticed that 3 swordtails and 2 young Kois had leapt from a tank that we had carelessly left uncovered. They too were all dusty and were not moving. Well, we did just what you did and threw them back into the tank. Most of them survived. I learned the hard way to always keep tanks especially with HellerI covered.

Maybe you should try covering your tank with mesh or netting or even gauze. It is important to cover your tank to keep the fish in and it helps to keep out stuff like dust, bugs and even cats – yes, I have seen cats try to pull fish out of tanks before and I lost some turtles that way once too.

Cardboard may not be the best thing because if you completely cover the tank, you may decrease the amount of oxygen unless you have an air pump.

Well, good luck and I hope that your swordtail is doing fine.

Buzz

 

Buzz just gave you some very practical info It's best to have a tank cover if you have fish that are able to jump out (aren't all fish able to do that?). Tank covers are easily available at fish stores - you can get a plastic one or a glass one. You can also get a mesh, but I don't think a mesh has an opening for a filter - unless you make it yourself. I'd take care not to leave the edges of the mesh sharp (especially if it's one of those metal meshes ... if you know which ones I am talking about) because if any fish attempts to jump out through the opening, it may scratch its body against the sharp edge. And that would not be a good thing. For your fishies' safety, get some type of cover.

 

Yes, these swordtails are known for jumping out of the tanks. I have seen the LFS people covering the swordtail tank with a mesh. But I saw that just yesterday.

The cardboard is a temporary solution. I'll have to get a good cover for the tank b4 anything unfortunate happens again.

Friends, thanks for your time & comments

 

Welcome

 

as a reply to the coment about the cat gitting turtles out of the fishtank,
I have a young cat and sheis always trying to watch my fish, and about7 or 8 months ago, I noticed that my pleco was nowhere to be found. I looked around all over, and didn't find him. about 2 months later, while I was clearing out my room, I found him in a box that I had put there only about a week before I started cleaning up, and he was all dried up and stiff as a rock. then about a week after that, I noticed that one of my catfish was missing, and as of today, about 5 months later, I still have not found him.

 

This also happened to my Albino Barb.......

We went to the church one night. When we came back home, we saw a street cat has entered our living room, where our aquarium is placed. Later on we saw our Albino tiger barb and our common pleco on the floor, flipping about. We took both of them and threw them into the tank. The barb didn't make it.......when it was in the tank it was already floating, as if gravity is being defied...........it was my sweetest fish at that time........we can't find any available cover that can fit our tank(we already have a small one), so we just used old papers. Things had gone well after that. I wish that cat would be punished.

 

one of my killis did this and ended up passing away but it did it right after we bought it so it was already extremely stressed out.

my black shark did it just recently when I was cleaning the tank I had taken him out and put him in a 5 gallon bucket. I found him almost completely dried out on the floor and threw him back in the bucket. he sank sideways to the bottom and all I could do was cry cuz hes my favorite fishy :'( but to my surprise hes never been better. in less than an hour he was back swimming around! yay!