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I have resisted putting covers on my tanks. However this evening i found two 5" L240 well desicated on the floor of my tank room. What do others do? Thanks. -Barry

Hi Barry,

Sorry for your loss.

As for my tanks, most of my tanks are covered tightly. About 1/3 are open-topped, but water levels are kept low in those tanks.

Regards,
Eric

Evaporation can cause house humidity levels to rise which can result in all sorts of problems. If one has many tanks, this will likely be an issue with which one mist deal. For this reason I cover 100% of my tanks with glass tops which also have the back side plastic piece. This practice also prevents most jumping. I say most because I have had an SAE leap out of the small space where the power filter return was on a Q tank. It must ave taken some true contortionism to pull this off, but the fish managed it.

Well, that sounds uniform. Now to find/make/buy covers.

b.reder wrote: 27 Jan 2018, 17:58 Well, that sounds uniform. Now to find/make/buy covers.

I use greenhouse siding - the clear plastic with ridges/ripples in it. I totally stole this off a guy on YouTube, but the ridges allow you to insert cables under the lids easily, there's some air exchange, and they definitely reduce evaporation. And they are cheap if you need more than one lid, since you normally have to buy the siding in something like a 4' x 8' sheet, and once you split those into tank-sized lids the price per lid ends up being just a few dollars a lid.

Theoretically something could jump out of these lids, but I have one tank of gobies in the teaching lab that's never actually had a fish hit the angle right to get out.

One of my two L177 managed to get out through the filter inlet aswell... I didn't see it coming at all... was really frustrated

I use real glass or acrylic glass.

Yup!! I have lost a 9" L025 and a L024 from jumping as well. Now all my tanks are covered. I actually went to Lowes and bought the plastic tarp in clear for $25 and covered all my tanks and I added a small piece of tape to the end of the vapor barrier to hold them in place. So far so good. Its been about 4 months now and my water temps stay warm, not fighting evaporation loss or humidity anymore, and not losing fish from jumping out the tanks
-Tony

Tony4143 wrote: 29 Jan 2018, 17:05Its been about 4 months now and... not fighting humidity anymore

Not fighting humidity? Dude, you're in Florida!

Just kidding.

Cheers, Eric

bekateen wrote: 29 Jan 2018, 17:20

Tony4143 wrote: 29 Jan 2018, 17:05Its been about 4 months now and... not fighting humidity anymore

Not fighting humidity? Dude, you're in Florida!

Just kidding.

Cheers, Eric

Well this is true but my garage is Air Conditioned lol

-Tony

Mission accomplished.