ok so i found my eel on the floor...

[the Undone guy]

last night before i went (around 1:00am) to bed i took a peak into my tank...and there was no eel. So i assumed he was in the overflow again. Take the canopy off, no eel in the overflow. To confirm my worst fear i look to the left of the tank and he's on the floor drying out. I snatch him off the floor and he starts wiggling so my heart slightly settles, i get him back into the tank ASAP.

He swims head first directly into the sandbed and spazzes out for like 30 seconds. He then settles behind the rocks where he usually stays. I stayed up for 30 more minutes watching him and he's breathing pretty heavily. I go to bed praying that Mr. Eel would make it through the night. I wake up this morning (9am) and i am overjoyed that he is still in the same spot, breathing a little bit less heavy, but only a little bit.

So at this point, he's alive, and he's breathing very very heavy. The salinity is @ the right level, and everything else is normal (the nitrates are a little high, so a water change is comming soon). I need to know from you guys what your advice would be to ensure Mr. Eel's survival. Tonight will be spent eel proofing the overflow to make sure that this doesnt happen again. But i want to do everything in my power to ensure his health at this point. Thanks guys~ :(

[GinaSofia]

I would do that water change sooner rather than later.

I've read of an eel that was out of water long enough to look like leather and it survived.

[opihi]

they bobby, good thing you checked on him before you went to bed. eels are pretty tough, and i'm confident Mr. Eel will live. just give him some extra attention and TLC.

i would also do the water change sooner, it may help make recovery less stressful.

[desert_reefer]

I knew this guy that had an eel escape and was dried on the floor to the point when he picked him up it was stiff like a board and he had heard how tuff they were and threw it back in the tank and the dang thing sunk and then swam away! Weird those eels are!
Jeff

[VegasMike]

I had a Snowflake "flake out" on me like that. I found him on the floor about as dry as it gets. The salt water on the counter where he jumped out of the tank had already crystallized so he had been out quite a while. I thought he was dead and put him in a bucket with thoughts of throwing him out after work. I put fresh tap water in the bucket so he wouldn't start stinking during the day while I was at work (I was in a hurry). Damned if he didn't start wriggling around in the bucket. O put him back in the tank and ended up returning him to the pet store when I moved from Atlanta to LV.

[TippyToeX]

I hope he is doing good this afternoon Bob. :) It's really amazing how resilient some animals are.

[dallast]

good latenight catch, bobby! that is one of my big fears when we leave the office at the end of the day. my wife thinks i am crazy and up to something because i am always saying i need to go check on the tanks.
do the water change!

good luck!

[the Undone guy]

well he's still going at it. His Circular Gills are either swolen or just really enlarged...so im still quite worried about him

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v321/mons00n/fish/Morayeel_bw.gif
picture of what i mean by circular gills.

I have to wait another hour or so for the RO water to finish comming out of the filter, i didnt get to turn it on until this morning when i left.

[EvilInSin]

wow those stories are kinda creepy! Eels that come back from the dead! eww

I hope he makes it Bobby!

[orionsmamma]

Sorry to here that Bobby. It sounds like these guys are pretty tough though.

Do keep us updated.

[the Undone guy]

ok so 24 hours...he seems in the same heavy breathing conditon, i just did a 25~ish gallon water change so we'll see how things pan out.

does anyone know what the recover time is like for these carpet surfing eels? I'm just trying to figure out if he's making progress. Thanks so much for your support guys~

[the Undone guy]

it doesnt look like he made it through the second night =(((( my tank is pointless right now. I built the freaking thing for him....this is horrible

[opihi]

sorry man. a painful lesson, but these things happen.

[the Undone guy]

could the activated carbon i put in last night have contributed to his death? =/

i should of put up a damn quarantine tank to more closely monitor his health =((((

[opihi]

i doubt it's the carbon. it may have been the volume of the water change you did. a sudden shift in temperature, or pH may have been too stressful for him to handle in such a weakened state.

[dallast]

bummer, bobby! but don't worry, you now know what to do next time. that's the worst part about learning, it usually comes at some cost. but we never forget these hard lessons learned.

i've had all of my fish in my tank die within one week and had my tank emptied out clean in frustration.....but don't give up. i stuck with it and it paid off, and it will for you too!

[the Undone guy]

it just sucks to know that somehow it may have been prevented or even caused by me


he was my first expensive fish...and i wanted him to last up until the point where i owned my own house and could give him a giant tank to live in, sigh.

[dallast]

not your fault, man! how could you know he could wriggle through such a tight space? you've seen my tank....there is about a two inch open gap at the top....i have had at least three jumpers! you try your best, and go from there.

if you are determined to keep an eel, then make a few modifications and try again. but if you are not sure, then realize that you have a brand new horizon of possibilites at your feet! things you couldn't keep with mr. eel, you can now look at!

so either way, you can't lose!

[opihi]

so true. if you're interested, i saw a pair of yellow leaf fish over at GVA last night. those would be cool in a species tank.

[VegasMike]

Sorry to hear about that, but if you are up for another Zebra, ATM II had two plus a snowflake yesterday when I went by there after lunch. They weren't huge either. Just make sure and get the tank coverd securely with egg crate next time.

If they weren't such messy eaters, i'd put one in my refugium. I may still put a small snowflake in there just for fun.

Mike

[the Undone guy]

which one is ATMII? i get I and II confused

[VegasMike]

Corner of Sahara and Ft Apache, in the same shopping center as the Movie Theater.

[TippyToeX]

Sorry to hear that Bobby. :sad1:

Listen to Dallas though, his words/advice are spot on. Plan for the next one if can/are willing. :)

[LVfishguy]

Hey man it happens to the best of us. I really doubt that it was anything that you directly did. I never would have bet that he would have gotten though a tight spot like that.