Trusting people with your tank

[Shekki]

I recently went out of town for 10 days and had my neighbor watch my house, complete with one cat and two fish tanks. They are both equipped with ATO units and besides feeding them, should be no fuss, no muss. The JBJ ATO on my 75 gallon sometimes doesn't fill the sump all the way. I'm not sure why, but it's the second JBJ that acts like that. All you have to do is turn the switch off, wait about 15 seconds, and turn it back on. I explained this to him and how important it was to make sure the proper water level was maintained in the sump. I have a line on the sump so it's easy to see where the water level should be.

10 days later I walk in the house and notice there's no surface water movement. I open the cabinet and find that the sump was empty! There was no water even getting to the pump! I don't know how long this had been an issue but surprisingly the little giant pump did not burn up. I quickly switch on the ATO and it started refilling the tank. I think my sump holds around 13-15 gallons. The ASM skimmer somehow made it as well. He also managed to turn off a powerstrip that controlled the powerheads in the tank.

My leathers were slumped over and my bubbles were all shriveled. All the fish, clam, and shrimp seemed to be OK. It's been 5 days and things are looking better now.

I asked my business partner to feed my fish in my office and make sure the top off water tank was filled. He did neither. My 24 gallon nano was 5 gallons shy of water and the pumps were running dry on that also. He never fed my fish. Everyone is still alive but I'm not sure if I can ever leave home for more than a weekend again.