Over And Over!!! Most repeated mistakes & their fixes

[Oddball]

It seems that all too often I'll have a senior moment and leave the water on after refilling tanks. I like watching soothing babbling brooks but, not the ones coming out of my hatchery. Not to mention the great fish I've lost to temp and chlorine shock.

I finally came up with a simple solution. I mounted the valve handle and the hatchery key on the same keychain. Now, when I try to leave the hatchery and find I can't lock it, I discover that, once again, I left the water running on some tank or filter.


Now, what blunders have you all experienced more than once that you've either found a fix for or can use help finding a permanent solution against history repeating itself yet again?

 

[Sab_Fan]

even though I always do a quarantine period for new fish (or new plants), I always have a hard time waiting . . . sometimes I don't wait long enough, and then all hell breaks loose . . .

 

[FSM]

Planning ahead helps.

 

[pacu mom]

Now, what blunders have you all experienced more than once that you've either found a fix for or can use help finding a permanent solution against history repeating itself yet again?

We have repeatedly overfilled our tank by not paying attention. Our hardwood floors are ruined and will need refinishing once the fish are moved out of the 300 gallon tank. New equipment room cement floors slope slightly toward two big floor drains. Fish viewing room will either be bare cement or have waterproof flooring over the cement in case of a catastrophic tank fail. (this is still under debate)

In our current set up, the Hammerhead pump was set in a metal tray. While the pump itself is very quiet, the vibration of the large metal tray on the wood floor makes a very loud hum that is magnified through all the pipes coming and going from the tank. I can even hear this noise in the bedroom farthest away from the tank. New set up will have all the pumps sitting on rubber mats. All the walls of the equipment room will be well insulated to hopefully keep the sound from pumps and filters to a minimum and confined to the equipment room. BTW, the metal tray does not serve its intended purpose of protecting the pump because many times we've overflowed our holding tank, sending hundreds of gallons of water onto the floor and completely filling up the metal tray. Once the water was left running for four or five hours.


For us, there is no correcting our problems in our current set up, short of an alarm that would sound when water hits the floor. Or we could stand in front of the main tank and the holding tank until they are filled. (not going to happen though) All we can do is take steps to minimize damage in our next set up.

 

[Red Devil]

Since i am a routine type of person with quite a few pets and responcibilities .. i have a definite routine for almost all my daily chores right down to my fish care... sometimes even a person who maintains a pretty consistent feeding schedule can have a day where things don't go to smooth.. a sudden visitor or a important phone call or just about anything can shift your schedule.. well i would feed the fish anyway.. just rush through it.. and because of this i was not always aware of who was eating and who wasn't.. and leaving uneaten food in the tank for any length of time is just asking for trouble.. so how i fixed this... i do not feed at all if i am in a rush.. better to have hungary fish then a tank full of dead fish .... because i wanted their little tummys full..fish can go awhile before hunger hurts their health..i needed to change my way of thinking..