Power outages

[Cation]

Hey guys I was just wondering what you guys do (if anything) to keep your tank(s) warm when the power goes out for an extended period? Last winter 2 of my plecos died because the water just got too cold for them. Luckicly the only other fish I had at the time were goldfish and because they are freakishly hardy and a coldwater fish they were fine. I want to be more prepared this winter because sometime in january I plan to have my mbuna tank finished cycling and with some nice mbuna in it. the only reason I installed a UGF in the soon to be mbuna tank is if the power goes out for an extended period of time (last winter it was out for a week) at least they will have some sort of filter going (it would be ran by battery powered air pumps.) How would you suggest to kep the tank warm? When it went out last winter the house was at one point 45 F in the house (week with no power below frezzing outside....). The Goldfish tank was a 55 gl how cold do you think the tank got?

[merlyn2221]

Get a marine power inverter to run the heaters. They are quiet, clean, and can be run off a car's engine or deep stroke/cycle marine battery. They are relatively inexpensive and you can get one through eBay or mail order if you have to do that.

www.Westmarine.com

Search threads of power outages and blackouts here and you will find some helpful threads on this topic.

[Mbuniac]

Is that hrs. or minutes?

[Cation]

is what hours or minutes?

[2petuniasmom]

Hello,
I live in rural MN and we have regular power outages - several a year. We actually have a generator that we start to run the must haves, of which one is my tank. Since a generator is not for everyone, you can try a couple of things.

A battery powered bubbler is a great help. Make sure you have lots of batteries, and if you have 2 stacks on your UG filter or more, you may want a battery pump for each. I do this for small outages or if hubby isn't home, I don't like to start the generator.

You can purchase UPS- uninteruptable power supply. They are designed to keep your computer or other equipment running long enough to shut it down if there is a power outage. They will run a tank heater for some time.

If you are lucky enough to have a propane or natural gas water heater, you can do small water changes.....gallon out, one gallon hot poured in slowly. We actually got my mothers 75 gal though an outage that way.

If you do not have a gas water heater...this may sound crazy, but a camp stove can work to heat water for exchange. Do not run it in your house because of C02 and fire hazard...garage is a better idea.

If you have a very large tank, you may want to move the fish to buckets, the smaller volume may be easier to keep warm.

Hope you can find some of this useful :)
Julie

[Glaive]

If you go the ups route and want a solution that will last longer, take the ups apart and replace the dinky 12 volt batteries they give you with either rv batteries or deep cycle marine batteries. Wire them in just as the smaller batteries were wired.

Most upses times are rated at 150-200 watt draw....

[Glaive]

Or and if you're on a budget air bubblers on sponge filters and blankets over teh tank may help.

[buttrfli]

My first fish that I lost was while I was out of town. We had an automatic feeder and it was pretty full of food cuz I was paranoid about being gone so long. The power went out for a while and when it came back on, the feeder kept working but the HOB filter couldnt get the water back up into it. So all the extra food was floating in the water and when I came home my dead betta was directly under the feeder with a belly so full he didnt even float. Poor thing...

[Cation]

aww, that's sad :(

It's so weird, I've gotten 3 replies to this post today, and it was originally posted almost two years ago!

[buttrfli]

Ha...thats funny I didnt even look at the date!!!

[Glaive]

LOL missed the date my self :LOL: