Do you wash your hands before working with your tank?

[Masha]

When I was a teenager, I worked in a pet shop for a while and the woman there taught me to scrub my hands with aquarium salt before I did anything with the tanks.

What do other people do? I worry about soap residue, perfume, or anything else I might have been touching getting into the water.

 

[Tuck]

When I was a teenager, I worked in a pet shop for a while and the woman there taught me to scrub my hands with aquarium salt before I did anything with the tanks. What do other people do? I worry about soap residue, perfume, or anything else I might have been touching getting into the water.

I just use hand wash :/ just rise my hands and towel dry.

 

[nereksnad]

i use hand soap and rinse it off thoroughly. furthermore my hand soap is without perfume or colour additives so there souldn't be any problems.

 

[Lynx99]

I rinse my hands thoroughly before putting them in the tank and if I've to reach to the substrate I rinse my arms too!

 

[Masha]

Geuss I need to get myself some unscented soap

 

[Fishfur]

I usually use unscented vegetable glycerin soap to wash up before I go into my tanks. Even if some gets in, won't hurt anything, but I rinse obsessively anyway before I stick my hands in. Read one horror story where someone treated the family dog or cat for fleas, using one of those 'one drop on the neck' type products. Then went to work on the shrimp tank. Next day, not one live shrimp left.

So I'm careful, even though I don't use any flea stuff. My cats never go out , so they haven't any fleas. They also ignore the fish. Elderly ladies both of them, the most they do is watch now and then.

 

[Khuligirl93]

I just scrub my hands and arms with hot water, no soap, and dry them.

 

[Oscarr19]

I just rinse and I've never had any problems.

 

[Mebbid]

I

i use hand soap and rinse it off thoroughly. furthermore my hand soap is without perfume or colour additives so there souldn't be any problems.

The perfume or color additives are the least of your worries with a tank. Soap itself is dangerous to fish. I seriously suggest that you stop using it before touching your tanks.

I usually use unscented vegetable glycerin soap to wash up before I go into my tanks. Even if some gets in, won't hurt anything, but I rinse obsessively anyway before I stick my hands in. Read one horror story where someone treated the family dog or cat for fleas, using one of those 'one drop on the neck' type products. Then went to work on the shrimp tank. Next day, not one live shrimp left.

So I'm careful, even though I don't use any flea stuff. My cats never go out , so they haven't any fleas. They also ignore the fish. Elderly ladies both of them, the most they do is watch now and then.

Glycerin soap is the same thing as regular soap. The only difference is that the lipids are coming from vegetable oil rather than animal oil. I would also highly suggest that you stop washing with soap before touching your tank.

I would like everyone to think about this for a second. Human skin is naturally antimicrobial. There are very few types of outside bacteria that can live on our skin for any length of time. Bacteria is also constantly raining down from the ceiling into the tanks and on everything. Anything that is on a random surface of your house is also inside your tank.


As long as you haven't touched abnormally gross things there's no need to wash your hands.

 

[Masha]

From my fishtank's point of view, lotions, sun-block, dog-flea-stuff, onions, chocolate, or any other random thing might be considered abnormally gross

I'm thinking more of getting my hands "fishtank friendly" rather than clean, or worrying about bacteria

Best way to do that? Just rinse?

 

[Mebbid]

From my fishtank's point of view, lotions, sun-block, dog-flea-stuff, onions, chocolate, or any other random thing might be considered abnormally gross

I'm thinking more of getting my hands "fishtank friendly" rather than clean, or worrying about bacteria

I see fish tanks more as being horrifying cesspools filled with rotting meat and dying organisms. They really are disgusting.

If there's anything that might leave a residue on my hands I definitely go out of my way to remove it though. But it's rare for me to have anything like that on my hands.

 

[Wy Renegade]

I would like everyone to think about this for a second. Human skin is naturally antimicrobial. There are very few types of outside bacteria that can live on our skin for any length of time. Bacteria is also constantly raining down from the ceiling into the tanks and on everything. Anything that is on a random surface of your house is also inside your tank.

As long as you haven't touched abnormally gross things there's no need to wash your hands.

Agree with you on the soap ~ although if you wash and rinse well, you have nothing to worry about. But, have to disagree on human skin, it is not naturally antimicrobial. It acts as a antimicrobial barrier to microbes trying to get into our body. Your skin is constantly covered with 100s of different types of bacteria ( including disease causing bacteria) all the time.

Personally, I would be far more worried about normal household cleaners than abnormally gross things. Things like bleach and ammonia (left by cleaners such as windex) can wipe a tank out in a very short time.

 

[Mebbid]

Agree with you on the soap ~ although if you wash and rinse well, you have nothing to worry about. But, have to disagree on human skin, it is not naturally antimicrobial. It acts as a antimicrobial barrier to microbes trying to get into our body. Your skin is constantly covered with 100s of different types of bacteria ( including disease causing bacteria) all the time.

Personally, I would be far more worried about normal household cleaners than abnormally gross things. Things like bleach and ammonia (left by cleaners such as windex) can wipe a tank out in a very short time.

Skin naturally secretes substances that kill bacteria. But that's a whole different topic that will involve a lot of sciency talk

I agree with you on the household cleaners are by far the biggest issue. None of them would ever come anywhere near my tanks.

 

[Wy Renegade]

Skin naturally secretes substances that kill bacteria. But that's a whole different topic that will involve a lot of sciency talk

I agree with you on the household cleaners are by far the biggest issue. None of them would ever come anywhere near my tanks.

While skin has been found to secrete antimicrobial proteins, this effect is extremely minimul and primarily functions to prevent bacteria from infecting cuts, etc. Your skin is constantly covered with bacteria, many of which are disease causing. If this wasn't the case, we wouldn't need to scrub up prior to conducting surgery, we wouldn't need to wear latex gloves in surgery, and hospitals wouldn't have antimicrobial substances in every room in the hospital. Most of the bacteria on your skin are not aquatic, so they pose little to no threat to the aquarium, but they are present. I can culture 100s to 1000s of bacteria off of your skin, simply by having you touch a agar plate. If those antimicrobial proteins were more effective, the bacteria would die on contact, but it doesn't. To say that skin is antimicrobial gives the impression that bacteria cannot survive on your skin's surface, which is incorrect.

 

[Mebbid]

The vast majority of bacteria you will culture off of a person's skin is from their own personal microbiome or bacteria that is naturally found to be living on or in you. Sure, the palms of our hands and other parts of our body that constantly touch other objects have quite a large bacterial load. The rest of our body, not soo much. But any bacteria that we pick up that normally resides in our house is going to be found in our fish tanks as well. Bacteria is constantly and quite literally raining down onto every surface in the house.

Any antimicrobial substance's effectiveness is a measure of contact time. For example, the bleach solution that I use for brewing requires a 10 minute contact time to sanitize my equipment. While the times may be no different the requiring of contact time for an antimicrobial substance to take effect is there. This is the same reasoning behind surgeons not being allowed to take showers shortly before going into surgery. Bacteria, most notably fecal bacteria gets redistributed all over the body at which point it will slowly die off from anti bacterial properties of our skin.

 

[Wy Renegade]

The vast majority of bacteria you will culture off of a person's skin is from their own personal microbiome or bacteria that is naturally found to be living on or in you. Sure, the palms of our hands and other parts of our body that constantly touch other objects have quite a large bacterial load. The rest of our body, not soo much. But any bacteria that we pick up that normally resides in our house is going to be found in our fish tanks as well. Bacteria is constantly and quite literally raining down onto every surface in the house.

Any antimicrobial substance's effectiveness is a measure of contact time. For example, the bleach solution that I use for brewing requires a 10 minute contact time to sanitize my equipment. While the times may be no different the requiring of contact time for an antimicrobial substance to take effect is there. This is the same reasoning behind surgeons not being allowed to take showers shortly before going into surgery. Bacteria, most notably fecal bacteria gets redistributed all over the body at which point it will slowly die off from anti bacterial properties of our skin.

How can we have a microbiome if in fact our skin is antimicrobial? Just teasing you a little. Its a great discussion ~ while I agree that bacteria is constantly coming in contact with all the surfaces in our home (including our aquarium), I don't know that I would agree that the bacteria that normally resides in our home is going to survive in the aquarium. Just as freshwater and saltwater bacteria are different species, so are the water-based bacteria seperate species from the terrestrial bacterias which typically reside in our home.

I think the main point, which is what we already agreed on, is that it is far more commonly the things we come in contact with such as household cleaners that are of far greater concern, rather than the bacteria which is normally found in the home or on our skin. Bacteria for the most part is not something we need to be concerned about getting into the tank.

So to refocus back on the OP's original question, depending on what you've been doing during your day, you may or may not need to wash/rinse prior to getting in your aquarium.

I personally am a lot less concerned about reaching into my freshwater aquariums on a regular basis than I am my saltwater tanks, but even then I don't always wash down prior to getting in the tank. In some cases however, I was very thoroughly before getting in the tank. Detergents, household cleaners, perfumes, colongue, sunscreens and even antipersperents are all things to be concerned about and aware of.

 

[Mebbid]

How can we have a microbiome if in fact our skin is antimicrobial? Just teasing you a little. Its a great discussion ~ while I agree that bacteria is constantly coming in contact with all the surfaces in our home (including our aquarium), I don't know that I would agree that the bacteria that normally resides in our home is going to survive in the aquarium. Just as freshwater and saltwater bacteria are different species, so are the water-based bacteria seperate species from the terrestrial bacterias which typically reside in our home.

I think the main point, which is what we already agreed on, is that it is far more commonly the things we come in contact with such as household cleaners that are of far greater concern, rather than the bacteria which is normally found in the home or on our skin. Bacteria for the most part is not something we need to be concerned about getting into the tank.

So to refocus back on the OP's original question, depending on what you've been doing during your day, you may or may not need to wash/rinse prior to getting in your aquarium.

I personally am a lot less concerned about reaching into my freshwater aquariums on a regular basis than I am my saltwater tanks, but even then I don't always wash down prior to getting in the tank. In some cases however, I was very thoroughly before getting in the tank. Detergents, household cleaners, perfumes, colongue, sunscreens and even antipersperents are all things to be concerned about and aware of.

Every day cleaning products aside I'm more worried about what I can catch from my fish tank rather than what my fish tank can catch from me. It's not a rare thing for aquariums to be harboring salmonella. Not to mention that I have a reaction to something in my saltwater tank that includes labored breathing and chest pain if I don't clean my arm off.

 

[Autumnsky]

Wash AFTER being in the tank!

I'm only into FW at this point.

I wash with a natural cleanser, may not really be soap, Jason brand if any body has any interest. Very gentle and I have sensitive skin, and sensitive to soaps. Wash very well, but rinse my hands, arms, rings and under fingernails, two or three times.

I try and wash after being in the tank because of some of the diseases/germs/bacteria/creatures, whatever you want to call it, that could be in there.

Can cause skin disease as in Tuberculosis and illnesses.

 

[Alyxx]

I always rinse my hands well before reaching in, especially if I have been cleaning the house or if I have been at work that day (we use a bleach based sanitizer solution for wiping down surfaces so my hands are in and out of the bucket all day long) and I try to never use lotion until after I am done with the tanks. If I have used lotion, I will scrub with soap and rinse very well. Then of course I wash well again after I'm done messing with the tank.

 

[candymancan]

Na I don't wash my hands before unless I have like motor oil or something on them... I do wash them after though