worst weekend ever

[liverock27]

Well, it was a very bad weekend down here in Georgia for my tank. We lost power all weekend (friday at 1am until Sunday at 8pm) due to the ice storm and I lost my breading pair of Maroon Clowns

. I also lost both of my large feather dusters. The only things that survived were 9 snails and 7 scarlet hermit crabs. Acouple of my snails are going to my my Dad's nano (10g) and the rest of the snails and the hermit crabs are going back to the LFS for store credit. Hope everyone else had better weekends than I did.

 

[dsorge]

That sucks bro. That happened to me a couple of years ago, fortunately I didn't lose any fish. I ended up buying a UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) to kick in if I lose power again. Looks like you lost power for a couple of days, so it's hard to say if a UPS would lasted that long. Doesn't sound like your weather is gonna get much better. Hang in there.

 

[thegrog]

I feel for you! Good luck in the future!

 

[liverock27]

Thanks yall. I looked into a few of those UPSs, but like you said I don't think they would have lasted long enough this weekend and the only thing I found that would have were generators and I don't have the funds for one of them right now. I spent today also cleaning out my tank and all of the equipment and now I am doing some research on what I want to try next.

 

[howardcu]

I feel your pain, I lost almost my whole system to that power outage in August of '03 that hit half the country. It wasn't nearly as long of an outage, but I was out of town that weekend. The day I came back was one of the worst days of my life, which I guess means I am way to into this hobby.

 

[liverock27]

I understand. A year ago when I started this hobby there was no way that I could have imagined being upset about acouple of stupid fish, but now I understand.

 

[cowfishrule]

Originally posted by dsorge
That sucks bro. That happened to me a couple of years ago, fortunately I didn't lose any fish. I ended up buying a UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) to kick in if I lose power again. Looks like you lost power for a couple of days, so it's hard to say if a UPS would lasted that long. Doesn't sound like your weather is gonna get much better. Hang in there.
what if you were to just hook it up to an air pump just to aerate the water until the power kicks back on?

 

[howardcu]

I have a UPS hooked up now and a battery powered air stone that turns on when the power goes out. They had the air stone back up systems at my LFS after that power outage. I have been fortunate to have not lost power since so I haven't had to put these backup systems to the test.

 

[liverock27]

I also have those battery operated pumps, try the fishing section of a store you can get them for like $3 and the two I have are more powerful then the more expensive ones at the LFS. But the water movement wasn't the problem, it was the fact that the temp of the tank dropped to about 50 couple degrees. I typed in UPS into a search engine, but all the UPSs I got looked like they were for Computers or that they delivered packages. If someone could recommend a good site or a good model or company I would be greatful. Thanks

 

[bkh_sd]

The UPS's for computers will also work for anything else. Whats cool about them is that you can plug them into a computer and customize the settings if you like then plug your fish tank stuff back in.

 

[scsinet]

A UPS might keep a powerhead or an air pump running for a while, but it won't keep your heater going, or your main pump if you have a wet/dry filter to keep alive.
In your case, a 19 hour power outage, especially due to an ice storm (meaning it's cold outside), is only going to be solvable with a generator. Even my 16KVA UPS in computer room couldn't power a 300 watt heater for 19 hours.

 

[surfinusa]

that would be a sucky weekend

 

[ridomart]

$800 saves a lot . I've got abput $6,000 in my tank & I know theres a lot of people have twice that so I bought a portable generator for $600 & had it hooked up to a special power box for $200. Money well spent!

 

[ridomart]

Plus I can stay warm ,Eat, & use the bathroom,lol.

 

[scsinet]

That's totally what I'm saying...
It amazes me that people have no problem tying up thousands in their tank then completely jury-rig UPSs, car batteries, whatever and trust their tank to that... besides, the short outages aren't what's gonna kill you... it's the LONG outages, where you'd need a generator anyway.

 

[nigerbang]

Anything worth doing is worth doing the right way...
SCSI...Where abouts in GA are ya..besides north of ATL

 

[mscarpena]

I live in NY and we had a very bad storm as well and here's what I did. I have some 2 liter pop bottles laying around. I turned up my hot water heater(only works if it's natural gas) and I filled up the 2 liter pop bottle with hot water and capped them. I then submerged them in the aquarium to keep the water warm. Three pop bottles keep a 75 gallon aquarium at 75-76. Change them every 30-40 minutes. Then get yourself a battery powered air pump. It's a lot of work, but it was worth it to save what I have and love. You could also get a generator, but they can be costly. Sorry for your losses.