Fish are freaked when approaching the tank, how to rectify?

[Scottfree]

How is your tank situated when you walk into the room? If you walk in so that they suddenly see you, then I think any fish would dart away. If the tank is at the back wall of a room, where they see you approaching from the door, then they should be less skiddish initially.

As others have said, teaching your fish to associate you with food is the easiest way to not have them be scared of you. This normally occurs just by virtue of feeding them a couple times per day.

It isn't immediate it's an approach, they are down in my basement and see me when I'm coming down the stairs, I try and gingerly (not Maryann) approach them..

 

[Carefree_Dude]

what happened to the fish in your avatar? Did it survive?

 

[Scottfree]

what happened to the fish in your avatar? Did it survive?

Wrath of a Redline Snakehead, not it didn't survive...

 

[ecoli73]

Dithers works well...if you have the space, a school of silver dollars will get the cichlids out in the open

 

[Yellow_Perch]

id say spend more time by them..my fish see me everyday since its by my bed

 

[insanity0x1]

no its just simple really. when theyre smaller, large things scare them out of no where, but when theyre larger and used to your activites of maybe quickly going by a tank, they wont shy away, just stare at ya and check it out! how my oscar and parrot were last year when they were like 5 inches, but once they grew to 8 inches, (well the oscar) they just swam strait to the glass!..