Dead pleco

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Mcor

Aquarium Advice FINatic
Joined
Jan 8, 2013
Messages
759
Location
UK
How long does a fish take to decompose? I had six little bn plecos in my tank (2 inches max), and I didn't notice one was missing. They are always so busy all over the tank it's only at feeding time that they all congregate together at the front. Seems I wasn't paying much attention recently. Anyways, changed the water today and cleaned my filter. I have a trickle filter that hides in the hood of my tank (4 trays with different media in each and covered with a sponge). Cleaning the sponges, I discovered to my horror, a skull and part of the skeleton of one of the plecs. There was still a little bit of flesh on the bones but not much. He'd swum up the outflow and ended up on top of the sponges in the filter. (I've seen them swimming up the tubes before). Tested my water, zero for ammonia and nitrite, somewhere between 20-40ppm for nitrates.
So my question is, how long could he have been up there? (No longer than 2 weeks - that was the last time I cleaned the filter). And how might I attempt to prevent such a tragedy occurring again?
 
Thanks for your suggestion. I shall have a look into it. There are 4 outlet tubes - one for each compartment, so ill try with one or two to begin with just to make sure it doesn't inhibit the flow before doing the rest. Don't want to back my filter up. :)
 
I had a problem with hosiery as a pre-filter on my tubes, they got clogged with gunk too fast, and I had to clean it daily... Finally I found that a larger mesh like cheesecloth worked better.
 
I had a problem with hosiery as a pre-filter on my tubes, they got clogged with gunk too fast, and I had to clean it daily... Finally I found that a larger mesh like cheesecloth worked better.

That's my concern. If it clogs up, my filter will flood and that will be a disaster. I'll look for some open mesh fabric. Thank you.
 
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