Some Days I Just Feel Like Giving Up
Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2010 3:46 pm
This week, and in particular this month, has not been very good. And after today, I just felt like giving it all up.
On the 28th of July both of my Figure 8 puffers died, it seems that some ferns I put into the tank might have poisoned them. I tore down the tank and now have it as freshwater with my dwarf puffers in it, and they are all doing fine.
Then on the 2nd of August, Jerome my Kenyan pygmy chameleon died. I don't think he had eaten anything since I had gotten him. For some reason, I've learned, some chameleons aren't able to reel out their tongue and without being able to do that, they basically starve. I suppose that could have been what happened to Jerome. Then just 2 days later, one of my baby Bearded pygmy chameleons died, leaving me with one (at that time, got another now). The very next day I found my Nefastus puffer dead, killed by those evil darn algae eaters (which I promptly got rid of by taking them to the LFS).
And then yesterday I found my lovely male salivator puffer dead. No ideas why he died. He was all puffed up at the bottom of the tank. That gutted me, as I really loved that little guy and had him for quite a while, so was attached to him.
And today was like the straw that broke the camel's back. I have 2 weather loaches (or dojo) in my tank, and I've had them longer than I've had any of my puffers. Got them when they were just tiny and now they are quite big. One was brown and the other a white colour (but not albino). Since getting my Fire eel (in the same tank), I put a long PVC tube into the tank to give the Fire eel a place to retreat to, as I know they love hiding places like that. I knew the weather loaches would probably go into the PVC tube as well, since they like to hide too. And they are very social with each other, often cuddling up to one another and laying together. Really cute with their beady eyes.
Well, for some reason I got down on the floor and decided to look inside the PVC tube and what I seen baffled me. I could see the face of the weather loach looking at me, but I could also see the tail. I knew it wasn't the other weather loach because I could see the other one in a different part of the tank. I asked my husband to come and have a look and he thought there were 2 of them inside the tube. I had a bad feeling at this point and asked my husband to reach in and dump the loach out of the tube, which he did. What came out really made me feel both saddened and sickened at the same time. The weather loach was literally bent in two, with a huge gash in the middle, like he's been broken in half. We think he tried to turn inside the tube and got stuck and tore himself up trying to free himself. That's the only thing I can think of. The poor guy was still alive, but I knew there was no way he could survive that. Nothing I could do would heal that and I suspect his back was broken. It was very sad and I could not stop crying just from looking at him. I suspected he was probably in a great deal of pain, and the only thing I thought would be the right thing to do, the humane thing, would be to euthanise him. I happened to have a small bottle of that Koi sedate I used to use when I had my SAP's .... and I put a very large dose of that in a bucket of shallow tank water, and as I wasn't able to do it myself, I had my husband put him in there. The poor guy lived a short while, but then went to sleep and died. It was all very sad and I find myself even crying now just typing about it. I know he was just a "loach", but I had him a long time, and I thought they were very cool.
I've since removed the PVC tube from the tank, just so the other loach can't do it. Thing is, those loaches aren't long, but they are wide and thick, and that's where the problem comes in. I feel badly for the remaining loach because they are very social and do enjoy the company of other weather loaches. I could get another one, but it would be very small compared with the size of the white one that's still there.
It's just that after all this death, it leaves me feeling very screwed up and a bit numb. I've got a horrible headache from crying (crying always gives me a bad headache, which is a good reason NOT to cry if I can help it). My husband never knows what to do when I cry and he's running around saying " maybe we should get rid of all the fish if this is the way it's going to affect you" ... but what does he expect? I don't like to see things suffer, and to die before their time. That poor little loach was in such a state, and I felt horrible just looking at him. If there had been any way to save him I would have, as I only put something down when it's my absolute last resort. I don't think that poor guy would have lived very long on his own, but I felt it would be cruel to leave him to suffer until he died naturally.
But goodness, how much can a person take? I just want to go a few weeks without something dying. It's starting to affect me. I'm not going the self-pity route .... it's just that seriously all this death is messing with my head.
On the 28th of July both of my Figure 8 puffers died, it seems that some ferns I put into the tank might have poisoned them. I tore down the tank and now have it as freshwater with my dwarf puffers in it, and they are all doing fine.
Then on the 2nd of August, Jerome my Kenyan pygmy chameleon died. I don't think he had eaten anything since I had gotten him. For some reason, I've learned, some chameleons aren't able to reel out their tongue and without being able to do that, they basically starve. I suppose that could have been what happened to Jerome. Then just 2 days later, one of my baby Bearded pygmy chameleons died, leaving me with one (at that time, got another now). The very next day I found my Nefastus puffer dead, killed by those evil darn algae eaters (which I promptly got rid of by taking them to the LFS).
And then yesterday I found my lovely male salivator puffer dead. No ideas why he died. He was all puffed up at the bottom of the tank. That gutted me, as I really loved that little guy and had him for quite a while, so was attached to him.
And today was like the straw that broke the camel's back. I have 2 weather loaches (or dojo) in my tank, and I've had them longer than I've had any of my puffers. Got them when they were just tiny and now they are quite big. One was brown and the other a white colour (but not albino). Since getting my Fire eel (in the same tank), I put a long PVC tube into the tank to give the Fire eel a place to retreat to, as I know they love hiding places like that. I knew the weather loaches would probably go into the PVC tube as well, since they like to hide too. And they are very social with each other, often cuddling up to one another and laying together. Really cute with their beady eyes.
Well, for some reason I got down on the floor and decided to look inside the PVC tube and what I seen baffled me. I could see the face of the weather loach looking at me, but I could also see the tail. I knew it wasn't the other weather loach because I could see the other one in a different part of the tank. I asked my husband to come and have a look and he thought there were 2 of them inside the tube. I had a bad feeling at this point and asked my husband to reach in and dump the loach out of the tube, which he did. What came out really made me feel both saddened and sickened at the same time. The weather loach was literally bent in two, with a huge gash in the middle, like he's been broken in half. We think he tried to turn inside the tube and got stuck and tore himself up trying to free himself. That's the only thing I can think of. The poor guy was still alive, but I knew there was no way he could survive that. Nothing I could do would heal that and I suspect his back was broken. It was very sad and I could not stop crying just from looking at him. I suspected he was probably in a great deal of pain, and the only thing I thought would be the right thing to do, the humane thing, would be to euthanise him. I happened to have a small bottle of that Koi sedate I used to use when I had my SAP's .... and I put a very large dose of that in a bucket of shallow tank water, and as I wasn't able to do it myself, I had my husband put him in there. The poor guy lived a short while, but then went to sleep and died. It was all very sad and I find myself even crying now just typing about it. I know he was just a "loach", but I had him a long time, and I thought they were very cool.
I've since removed the PVC tube from the tank, just so the other loach can't do it. Thing is, those loaches aren't long, but they are wide and thick, and that's where the problem comes in. I feel badly for the remaining loach because they are very social and do enjoy the company of other weather loaches. I could get another one, but it would be very small compared with the size of the white one that's still there.
It's just that after all this death, it leaves me feeling very screwed up and a bit numb. I've got a horrible headache from crying (crying always gives me a bad headache, which is a good reason NOT to cry if I can help it). My husband never knows what to do when I cry and he's running around saying " maybe we should get rid of all the fish if this is the way it's going to affect you" ... but what does he expect? I don't like to see things suffer, and to die before their time. That poor little loach was in such a state, and I felt horrible just looking at him. If there had been any way to save him I would have, as I only put something down when it's my absolute last resort. I don't think that poor guy would have lived very long on his own, but I felt it would be cruel to leave him to suffer until he died naturally.
But goodness, how much can a person take? I just want to go a few weeks without something dying. It's starting to affect me. I'm not going the self-pity route .... it's just that seriously all this death is messing with my head.
