First big mistake

[Cohenjl13]

First of all I'm new to the fish world so i feel soo bad about this happening but a mistake by me is hopefully a lesson to someone.

I got my best friend Zed the Fire Eel from a petsmart when someone gave him up for whatever reason, i fell in love with him and has always been my favorite fishy friend. He was doing amazing! Instant best friends with my Weather/Dojo loachs until one day he disappeared.

After about 3 days of him missing it was the Saturday for cleaning the filter and I found him stuck between the first crate and the thick filter pad but he was still alive!!! Hurt and needing a lot of TLC i gave him meds and moved him back into the main tank. Here are some before and after pictures of his injuries.

Please if you don't know this already mind tank cleanings! I'm sure when i took the pre filter off to clean it, he went right up to explore or he was sucked up I'm not sure, but this was a hard lesson learned, but so far i have high hopes.

 

[Delapool]

Is your eel ok now?

 

[Cohenjl13]

Unfortunately he didn't make it and will be much missed

 

[Delapool]

Sad news

 

[Arthur75]

I do not know how big your container is. But I use in all basins a tscheschichen airlift as a filter.
It is filled with coarse gravel, is easy to clean, and has never happened an accident with the filter.
I have left the big pump filters and implemented this principle everywhere.
If the basin is heavily occupied, I will rinse the gravel filter every week with the water change. It is weakly occupied, every 3rd week. I can see by the color of the wash water, whether it was worth it.
I have strong air pumps. The filter system works optimally.
[FONT=&quot]I can have all very small fish and also shrimps and shrimplets without this accident

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