Went fishing today (in my tank)

[Zimmer]

Well today is a glorious day! Finally got a fish out of my tank that has been a thorn in my side for a few weeks now :celeb3:
Tried multiple traps, sneaky night time netting, netting while feeding, tank draining, everything I could think of besides pulling out all my live rock.

The perpetrator was a lunar wrasse. If you don't know, they are a type of wrasse that does NOT belong in a peaceful mixed reef! He was sold to me as a melanarus wrasse and took me about 1 hour to figure out that he was NOT. :headwally:Took another few minutes of mad googling to figure out what he actually was, and had been trying to remove him ever since! Lost my whole clean up crew and 2 chromis to him :sad2: Now, had I been more observant at the LFS I probably would have figured this out, but I asked for a melanarus and just assumed that's what I would get!! :angryfire:

The poor chromis were the final straw. Got a size 18 trout hook, shaved down the barb, set a piece of tilapia for bait (dinner was thawing lol), and away we went! Only took about .03 seconds and FISH ON!!! It was epic. Hook came out easy, fish wasn't damaged at all that I could tell, and he's now back at the LFS!!

Moral of the story - don't mess around with all the trapping and/or sneaking and/or draining and/or netting frustration... Unless they are sick, injured, or tiny, I will never get a fish out of my tank any other way!!

 

[TigeBell]

Lol, sorry.

Great job btw

 

[FraggledRock]

can you show pics of the hook?

did you add a bob and a bell too? =P

 

[malira]

How did you keep the other fish away?

 

[pyithar]

that's why quarantining can save you a lot of work.

 

[Dkuhlmann]

This is how I got a very nasty yellow tang out of my old 200 gal fowlr. I was not about to pull out the lr and drain the tank.

I used sewing thread as my line and had to move across the room before he would even get near the baited hook. Brought him back to the lfs that I bought him from and now everyone was happy.

 

[Zimmer]

I set a nori clip up at the opposite end of the tank, so the tang and friends were all down checking that out, but the wrasse was never shy of eating while I had him and was such an aggressive feeder I felt comfortable that he would out-compete anyone else who would think to try to eat the bait before him LOL

My husband is a pretty avid fisher so he told me what to get out of the tacklebox I just held the line in my hand and dunked the hook. 2 or 3 jigs to make it wiggle and he snapped on it no problems! I will post a pic of the hook later today, for now I'm off to work!

 

[toothybugs]

I tie flies (too, I'm assuming) and have gone fishing with 20s on 6x dangling from the tip section of my 1 weight more than once. Funny how a single little Mysis fills up the entire thing

And, BTW, our fish aren't stupid - if the bait isn't drifting freely in the current, most of them won't grab it!

 

[NWoods]

Wish I had tried that with my six line last year. I ended up cornering him and pulled him out with my bare hands.

 

[m0nkie]

Wish I had tried that with my six line last year. I ended up cornering him and pulled him out with my bare hands.

i drained a 100 gallon and removed all LR to catch a yellow wrasse inside the sandbed.. :debi:

wrasse...

 

[DaveRaz]

If one swallows the hook, goner. A fish trap is what I use. Aqua medic I think.

 

[CuzzA]

Yeah, gut hooking the fish would suck. I've found traps to be very effective. Bait and wait. I used a plastic container attached to the glass with a mag float with a zip tie on the lid and fishing line through the other side running all the way down to my couch. As soon as I saw my clam eating yellow tang enter... BAM!!!

Glad to hear it worked out, but probably not the best way for everyone to practice removing fish from their tank.