What a close call!!

[rjmayes34]

So my wife, baby and me are chilling around the house. I come out on my porch to smoke, she puts the baby up in bed and comes out to say hi to me. She goes in and i hear "Fish on the ground" yelled..
Hugh? Fish on ground? My brains start turning and then O-FISH ON THE GROUND!!! It kicked in. I ran in and my hippo tank jumped out and was laying on the ground still. She says grab it, i say no im not getting stabbed with its harpoon! So i grab a container to scoop him up with and back in the tank he went. He hid for a min then was out, like normal, like nothing ever happened.

Thats amazing that it survived the fall and was out of water for around a minute i think.
I know...my tank should be cover anyways...I have 2 wrasse also, and plan on getting some more wrasse's.
I was worried that covering my tank would diffuse my lights,and since i only have a 4 bulb tek t5 light. I know it wont diffuse the light a lot but i dont have to much light to spare with only a 4 bulb. Will it effect any coral if i make a screen top?

Did you notice any difference in corals with your screen top on? Or does it not make any differnece? Either way i gotta get one made and put on. Next time i wont be so lucky!!

 

[rjmayes34]

the hippo i have had for about 6 months. I got him when he was very very small! It has since tripled or more in size so its been nice to see it grow(like everything) I was so happy to see it out swimming! That was last night and its eating fine and is still fine.
Any thing i should watch for?

 

[jfl14609]

There is a post somewhere gary m posted that I used where he used window screen frames and pond netting that works awesome and looks good to it wont diffuse much light at all if any glad you found the fish in time

 

[Sophie10]

Whoa, scary! Good call on not getting harpooned!

 

[dfjr1981]

I used window frame from H.D. and 1/4" netting from BRS. I see no difference inside the tank when the top is on or off, and the coral are doing fine and growing.

 

[Christine_B]

I like that idea with the screen top! Your story reminds me of an incident I had about 6 months ago with my clown fish from hell (aka Johnny Dep, daughter named him). I was cleaning my 40g and he always attacks so I watch for him and kinda flick him away but this time he snuck up on me and hung on. I flinched and took my hand out of the tank real quick as a reaction and the little jerk did not let go and ended up on my kitchen floor flapping around. I was screaming for my husband because I did not want to pick him up and get bit again so he finally came to my rescue laughing his *** off. You would think that little bastard would of learned his lesson??!! Nope, the next day he was back at it....lol

 

[windyridge]

I had 4 T5 with a glass top that was usually dirty and the corals were none the worse for wear.

 

[NirvanaFan]

I like that idea with the screen top! Your story reminds me of an incident I had about 6 months ago with my clown fish from hell (aka Johnny Dep, daughter named him). I was cleaning my 40g and he always attacks so I watch for him and kinda flick him away but this time he snuck up on me and hung on. I flinched and took my hand out of the tank real quick as a reaction and the little jerk did not let go and ended up on my kitchen floor flapping around. I was screaming for my husband because I did not want to pick him up and get bit again so he finally came to my rescue laughing his *** off. You would think that little bastard would of learned his lesson??!! Nope, the next day he was back at it....lol

I've gotten bit by my female ocellaris close to a hundred times now. She has drawn blood a couple dozen now, and has gone on 3 or 4 trips to the floor. They are crazy!

 

[The J Man]

In my first tank, I had a snowflake eel jump out of my tank and crawl to into my kitchen from the living room. Good thing my cat came meowing like a cat "Lassie" and led me to it because he was drying out. I plunked him back in and watched him for a few hours just to be safe. Turned out fine, like it had never happened. Had him till the day he got too big and then he went to a friend's tank, outlived that, went to ABC, and ultimately to a new home...

Sometimes you just cant kill em

 

[rjmayes34]

thats good to know that it wont effect my lights at all!
So yeah ill be getting my supplies and making it within the next week.
fish are stong little things i guess! A human would be toast at that ratio!
thanks
and thats funny about your clowns!! What ever happened to don't bite the hand that feeds you?

 

[pascal32]

I used window frame from H.D. and 1/4" netting from BRS. I see no difference inside the tank when the top is on or off, and the coral are doing fine and growing.

I'm using the same on both displays, works great. No notable loss of light. I did have some fire fish manage to jump through the 1/4" netting , no idea how, but they did.

 

[Willistein]

Anybody have a good picture on how they make the screen work around the overflow area? I need to be able to get a couple power cords out, too.

 

[pascal32]

for the power cords I leave 1/2" in the back, never had a fish try to make it through. I tried using a rubber stick on piece made to seal doors from lowes, but it started coming off after 6-8 months.

For going around the overflow you can use the regular 90 degree bends like here: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?p=19354782

Don't talk to me about bending for bow fronts, took me 4 tries.

 

[zooman72]

I have glass tops on every tank I have, and no issues to report. Keeps fish in, evaporation down, and dust out (maybe...) - just need to clean it once a week or so. Open top rimless systems look great, but I hate dried fish and all that evaporation!

 

[Jstn]

I run a screen top, after loosing a picasso clown i figured its a good idea. Plus it take work to move it away from the TEK fixture (15 seconds), this keeps me from constantly messing with my tank.

Its a good piece of mind imo

 

[iamwrasseman]

just put ten leopard wrasses and a few tamarins in a 210 and then i thought oops so i had to order some screening from BRS today . cross my fingers that the saran wrap keeps em in until fed ex gets here .