Cichlid Lives in Filter for 1 year?

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Wildcat157

Wildcat157

Plecostomus
MFK Member
Aug 2, 2019
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157
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NY
Has anyone ever heard of fry being sucked into a canister filter and live there for a significant amount of time?

I have two Fluval fx4 filters on a 125 gallon aquarium. I haven't had African cichlids for over 1 year.

I was way over due on my routine maintenance on one of the FX-4's. I last changed and cleaned the filter July of 2020 and I had written that on a piece of paper and taped it to the filter.

As I was hosing out the bottom of the bucket I noticed a small 1 in white colored cichlid. Appears to be a zebra cichlid that I know I have not had in my tank for at least 10- 12 months.

Is it possible for a fry to survive in a dark environment for that amount of time?

I was shocked to say the least.

If anyone has seen or heard of this happening I'd be interested to hear about it.

Thank you.
 

Never ceases to amaze me.

Cleaned out my Eheim classic filter. Had 5 fry in the bottom level. 2 of them are a decent size suggesting they have been in there awhile.
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I have had fry multiple times in the filter. I have not however waited one year to clean it out so I know they were not that old.
 
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Wildcat157 said:
Has anyone ever heard of fry being sucked into a canister filter and live there for a significant amount of time?

I have two Fluval fx4 filters on a 125 gallon aquarium. I haven't had African cichlids for over 1 year.

I was way over due on my routine maintenance on one of the FX-4's. I last changed and cleaned the filter July of 2020 and I had written that on a piece of paper and taped it to the filter.

As I was hosing out the bottom of the bucket I noticed a small 1 in white colored cichlid. Appears to be a zebra cichlid that I know I have not had in my tank for at least 10- 12 months.

Is it possible for a fry to survive in a dark environment for that amount of time?

I was shocked to say the least.

If anyone has seen or heard of this happening I'd be interested to hear about it.

Thank you.
Click to expand...
Heard of someone who’s bgk had babies and one got sucked into filter and found live at I think it was like 4” of something. Don’t remember
 
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This is interesting, not because a fish survived in your canister, because it's quite common, also in sumps too.

Interesting in as much that your canister was left for a year without maintenance! Either you are extremely busy, extremely lazy, or canisters, as widely reported, truly are an absolute pita to maintain.

I honestly can't recall any threads where hobbyists have been praising them. What camp do you lie in regarding canisters?
 
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Love them.
Have two FX-4's and
two eheim classic 600's on a 125 gallon.
Usually, clean one canister every three months in rotation.
But due to illness let it go much longer than usual.
The classic 600's or 2217 Ehiem models are both over 16 years old and never had to replace anything other than rubber seal/gaskets.
 
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This is not rare.
I have had fish end up in filters for years (especially in sumps), and in cans, before I stopped using them.
And because I often combine many tanks to a single sumps, had fish swim upstream thru outflows into other tanks.
After filling a sump quite high, this fish (a migratory species of the genus Agonostomus)
73CAD8B8-4F12-4BF7-8C75-E9EF88974544_1_201_a.jpeg
swam up the influent pipe of a filter (that was temporarily below the waters surface in the sump) into the main cichlid breeder tank where the spawning pair of cichlids took it as a threat, and assinated it after a few days.
 
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