Have you ever noticed your fish seem twice the size when they are out of the water?

While they are in the tank, you fish may seem large-ish, but if you net them to re-tank them or re-home them, or for any other reason, they come out of the water and they seem like giants!!!

So many times i've said to my self or aloud, "wow this thing is huge"! when I get them in the net and out of the water.

I wonder if the tank glass and water cause an optical change so that you don't fully appreciate the size of the animal?

Have you taken notice of this before?
 

Chub_by

Redtail Catfish
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Jan 30, 2012
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Yep. Last winter I found a dead goldfish next to my pond. Always thought that that goldfish was 8" and my koi around 12". Turns out that the goldfish was over 10". My two tench both looked around 3", one was killed by a cat (again..) and it was 5". In my tank, it's not as much of a difference.
 

shelbybmc

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Mar 12, 2013
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YUP! I just moved some smaller bass I thought would fit nicley with my bigger ones and there was a ridiculous size difference lol. Basically I have a divider up now.
 

blindkiller85

Jack Dempsey
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Feb 22, 2013
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Have thought and experienced the same things with fishing. What looks like a 3-4lb bass in the water when sight fishing turns to be well over 4. And at the right time of year, there's a chain of lakes connected with canals and I see schools of bass that look enormous in the water. They look like 6+ and there will be 5-6 of them together. I'm always so tempted to just scream "screw my boat I'm going in with a net!!!!!!!!"

As far as fish in my aquarium, I have seen a difference but it's not a terrible amount. Maybe takes off 10-20% of the fish's true size if that.
 

shelbybmc

Blue Tier VIP
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Mar 12, 2013
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IDK if anyone ice fishes but through the ice you get the opposite effect. I swear Ive had some record size perch coming up through the hole that turn out to be 11 inchers lol.
 
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