Power outages

[russrimm]

How long can my fish live if our power goes out? I'm planning on buying a battery powered somethingerother, but right now we're having a REALLY bad storm and i'm nervous. Is there any workaround if you dont have one? Can you just kinda make your own bubbles with a stick or something every so often?

 

[jsoong]

I suppose it all depends on what fish you have .... & how big a tank, etc.

I've not have to deal with a power outage, but people on this forum had reported doing the following during prolonged power outages:
1. keep the temp up by wraping the tank in a blanklet, and doing water change with warm water <that's assuming you can make hot water with somekind of heater> ... This was from one of us in Canada when a tank will turn into a big icecube with power out at this time of year ... You prob won't have to worry about that in Huston
2. keep up aeration by making waves in tank <best way - a battery powered airpump ... I supposed you can do the same with a stick or something>, if you have a HOB filter, you can take a cup & manually move water through the filter every so often ... This will keep your filter bugs alive. ... just keep the filter wet.
3. If you have a really long power out - like days - you might have to do water changes to keep your levels in check ...
4. If you have a canister filter, it is important to disconnect it from the tank with a prolonged power out. The bugs in the filter will die without water circulation & start to make bad stuff (like H2S) without O2. This will get flush into the tank & possibly kill your fish when the power comes back on. For canisters, it is best to disassemble the filter & clean it out after a prolonged powerout before using it again.
5. There were also a few threads talking about using UPS from a computer to power a filter or air pump ... But the general consensus was that it won't last very long .... so the best bet is a generator if you will have frequent power out.

 

[Toirtis]

Consider one of those small generators or chargeable power inverters...they can run a filter and small heater for quite a while.

 

[MarkLehr]

Very very simple solution:
Buy a small battery powered computer fan. If power goes out, place it on top of aquarium so that the fan blows across water surface. The rippling effect will oxygenate the water.

Obviously, wrapping the tank in a blanket to keep temperature stable in cold weather is a #1 concern also!

 

[Kasakato]

Why not take a straw and BLOW?

 

[Toirtis]

Why not take a straw and BLOW?

Because exhaled breath is high in CO2?

 

[BrianNY]

For those with alot of $$$ invested in multiple tanks and fish, Jehmco has an excellent back up power source for $279.

 

[Kasakato]

You breath out CO2..I forgot

 

[jsoong]

Nah, it's the water movement that oxygenate the water, not the air in the bubbles ... so the fact that there is CO2 in exhaled breath won't do much .... the CO2 will just escape into the air.

So, I would say, blowing air through a straw will work just fine ... but really, would you like to do that for hours or days? I would rather have a mechanical device to do the job for me!

 

[revhtree]

When my power has went out in the past, I make sure I take a gallon container, and dip and pour every so often to keep the water oxygen level up.

 

[FishLover14]

Buy a generator or something they are really good and can run for a while.

Dan

P.S.

I leanred the hard way Ivan Killed of the first fish i ever bought my first 3 Cories and 3 Cherry Barbs.

 

[Toirtis]

Nah, it's the water movement that oxygenate the water, not the air in the bubbles ... so the fact that there is CO2 in exhaled breath won't do much .... the CO2 will just escape into the air.

But about 10% will be dissolved into the water....good for plants, not so much so for fish.

 

[jsoong]

But about 10% will be dissolved into the water....good for plants, not so much so for fish.

Your exhaled air has about 5% CO2 < room air is 0.03%>, that's not much considering that plant people inject 100% CO2. The 5% CO2 has much less gradient to diffuse into the water compared to the typical CO2 injector, so I doubt if even 10% will be dissolved. Also, dissolved CO2 will quickly come out of solution into the room air with all the aggitation created by the bubbles. If you were to inject CO2, you'd need some sort of reaction vessel to contain the bubbles & minimize aggitation, otherwise you won't get any CO2 in your water even if you want to. So I don't see much problem with the straw approach except I would get tired after jsut a couple minutes!

I think a battery operated fan or airstone would be best. Although the aggitation with bucket method sounds good too.

 

[Toirtis]

Yes, but with the fatigue factor, just how much agitation would that water see? So I see adding any additional CO2, no matter how little, to bepossibly making a bad situation worse...even if by only a tiny amount.

Buy one of these....it will run your filter and heater for quite awhile:
http://www.canadiantire.ca/assortme...<>ast_id=1408474396670271&bmUID=1101601567223[/url]

 

[Kasakato]

I have a smaller one that I use for back-up power at my cottage, it really help if you done have any food or heat for km's around.