Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap!

For Christmas Paisley got one of those little Disney fish aquariums from her Great-Aunt and Uncle. Ron & I set it up a few days after Christmas and we took her to the pet store and she pick out 2 fancy goldfish and we put it up in her room, we thought we could trust her with them up there. On 2 occasions she was caught feeding the fish and EXCESS amount of flakes so we confiscated the aquarium and put it downstairs. The water got all cloudy and after a week of it being up, Ron had to drain 1/2 the water and put fresh water in it again. We went back to the pet store a few days ago and we got different food for them, some goldfish pellets. Ron thought this may be easier for Paisley when feeding them. I really didn't think they liked them too much, but every morning I would come down and it looked as though they had eaten them all. The water still had a slight cloud, just as it always had but each day it seemed to be getting worse. Last night I noticed that the black bubble eye fish that Paisley named Roxy seemed to be struggling, he wasn't swimming around and just acting strange. I took the lid off and looked into the water and the smell was unreal, it smelled like a stagnant pond, there even seemed to be "things" floating around in the water. After talking on the phone with my mother, she recommended me to check the filter. I pulled it out only to discover that it was CAKED with slim and and food. This stirred up all the grime in the water even more, poor fish still struggling. My next step was to get them out of there and into something clean because the tank needed to be COMPLETELY cleaned!! I found a very large and clean bucket and filled it with water that was about room temperature. Lucky for me from days of working in a darkroom, I had a thermometer so that I could make sure that the water was indeed okay to drop the fish in. Paisley and I searched through the kitchen to find some thing that we could scoop the fish out of the dirty water with and transport them to the clean water. Finally with quick thinking on Paisley's part, she grabbed a slotted spoon which did the trick and we got them in. The black fish immediately started swimming about and acting more goldfish like. They seemed happy again, confused I'm sure but happy! We even got the snail that Aunt Valerie and Dave bought for Paisley into the clean bucket of water. Next was getting that fish tank cleaned and nice again. Using HOT, HOT water and some vinegar (I didn't want to use soap), I scrubbed everything down, rocks and all. There was a thick layer of scum underneath and on everything. I scrubbed out the grubby filter unit and got all the rocks, Ariel, the tree and pump all set up. It was time to transport the poor fish into the cleaned tank. I slowly dumped the bucket of clean water fish, snail and all gently back into the aquarium then I plugged everything back in and got the pump running again, all I had to do was add a little more water just to topped it off. I got the water to an appropriate temperate then added it and it was complete, aquarium IS Clean!! I really wish I had've taken a before picture of this mess. EEAsssh!! :-) Alot of precious knitting time wasted, but innocent lives were spared. Sadly, I really think that Roxy would have died over night, sally (orange fish) was doing better then Roxy but it was still not a good scene. Today I'm on a mission to get them goldfish flakes. :-)