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Well 3 weeks into our tropical adventure with fish and we got a 13 hour blackout

Is there anything available that will cut in to replace the electricity that doesnt cost the earth to buy???

Also do we have to keep the pump moving every hour to keep the good bacteria active or will it last without manual pumping??? Hubby sat up all night pumping it

Hi Linnie

All night? that's dedication for you! I hope all the fish survived the night and are grateful for his efforts.

I recently saw this inverter in a catalogue and immediately thought that at that price it might be a good investment for powering filters etc during our fairly frequent wet season power outages (you know you're hooked when looking through an electrical catalogue and the first thing you think of is - how can I use that to benefit my tanks? ). Only problem I can see is you'd need to be home when the electricity goes out, or not long after, to hook it up and you'd also need access to a car battery.

Other options might be a generator (they can get a bit expensive but can also be used to run other appliances which is handy for extended periods without power), a solar setup of some sort, a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) for brief outages or if you just want to be able to get some aeration into the tank as an emergency measure you can buy battery powered air pumps from a lot of fishing & camping supply stores.

Good luck, hopefully your fish will show no adverse affects from their 13 hours without power. Try to test the water regularly over the next few days for ammonia & nitrite so that if you do experience a mini-cycle you can recognise it and are able to act quickly to minimise the effects.

G_T

Never be afraid to try something new. Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark. A large group of professionals built the Titanic.

I saw a video on householdhacker.com where they powered a tv with some batteries and some AV cables. I haven't tried it myself, but if it works then you could use it to power a filter.

I have forgotten to turn the heaters back on longest 48 hrs. The only true and safe way is to get a good generator. You also must have food to consider as well as the fish. Our power often goes off but only for an hour or so and all I ever do is double dose with Seachem Stability for 2-3 days depending how long the power goes off.

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Keith

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GT I am sure the fish were very happy with him lol
We do have 4 deep cell batteries sitting in the shed ( personally I call it the male dump ) however maybe he can rig up an inverter thingie and even if we are not home my daughter only lives a kilometre away so they could change it over.

Keith 48 hours with no heat and the fish survived??

Thanks everyone for answering
The water seems stable and the fish seem happy, well as happy as a fish can look Is there a way to test the bacteria???

I had power go out in a snow storm while I was at work one night... Total time without power was possibly 18 hours. I set up a portable airstone (from the fishing department of walmart) when I got home, left the tank covered with a blanket to simulate darkness and night so the fish simply rested and curled up under a blanket myself!
By the time the power came back on it was 48F in the house, tank was likely similar.

Did a water change and dose with Cycle and let the heat come up gradually. I didn't lose anyone, my stock at the time was mostly hardy fish that had wide temp ranges.

^_^

Linnie

It was during the summer months and the temp naturally dropped, but I never lost a fish.


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Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
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An average car battery will only run a cannister filter for something like 6-7 hours. So I don't think an inverter is going to fix everything. Heat isn't a major concern, throw some blankets over the tank and it'll be fine for quite a while as long as your house doesn't get below freezing. Even without airation a tank that isn't overstocked should be fine for 5-10 hours without a problem.

Big thing I do is about an hour after the power goes out I unplug all the cannister filters. That way when the power comes on they don't dump all the nasty toxic water into the tank. Once it's back on I give the filters a quick clean, plug them back in and they're good to go.

There's enough bacteria in the tank itself that you should only get a minimal ammonia spike, if any at all. I've tested after forgetting to plug my filter back in for 24 horus and there was no ammonia reading at all. But, depends on stocking levels and a lot of other details.

Ira
That could be a good idea about cleaning the filter especially if it is a canister.
I always have on hand 45lt of prepared water as well.
Plus Double dosing of Seachem Stability for a few days.
Also I would reduce the feeding for at least a week or until you can do a big water change.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info
Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

I have 18,000 liters of prepared water on hand.

On tank water Ira?

^_^

Yup.

I also recently had a 13 hour blackout, whike I was away at work. When I got home I cleaned the filters right away and tested the waters with no trouble at all. All the fish were just fine. I had just done a water change, and did another one when I got home just to be sure but everything was fine

I have suffered long power outages at work (petstore) and we went to the extent of using generators to power the tanks. However their are battery operated air pumps out on the market. Also correct me if im wrong but plants in the dark have a differnent chemical reaction to make food which creates co2? which means if you have plants in your tank its best to take them out.