What's the dumbest thing you have done in the hobby

DanATL

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Speed Kills / Water Change Embarrassment. Tried to get in a quick water change on my 6g pico after vacuuming out my display tank. Only using the ½” tube (not vacuuming) my focus was on water level in discard bucket which already was half full from vacuuming my display tank. Following day couldn’t find my Neon Dotty. Looked all over in tank, moving rock structure and outside tank thinking it might of jumped out somehow even though there is only a small 1 ½ x 1 ½ triangle opening in corner of glass top. Can only figure out Dotty got sucked up and was tossed with the dirty water. R.I.P. Dotty
Reminds me of last month. I added a neon dotty back and a week later was changing the filter pads in my sump cups and the little dude just flopped up on top of the filter pad. Two mins earlier I was watching it eat in the main display. Guess it made it through the overflow combs in those two mins. He doing well now!
 

Budman93

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When I was 14 I had a 72g FOWLR bowfront that was actually doing great for quite awhile. Bought an anenome one day then I think I had a sleepover or something. Came home and the anenome got shredded by a powerhead and nuked everything in my tank.
 

Budman93

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Listened to others' advice without doing my own research when just getting started. I was told "you HAVE to have a skimmer" "you NEED your nitrates and phosphates to be 0" and then BAM, fighting dinos for the next 2 months. Keep a skeptical mind, people want to help but they're not always helpful.
Was this like 5-8 years ago? I feel like the narrative then was 'GO AS BIG AS POSSIBLE!!!' on the skimmer with people even recommending skimmers rated for like 100+ gallons on 30 gallon tanks. Same thing happened to me. Funny too because I don't remember seeing dinos being as much of a problem before that.
 

Daddio64

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Early on in the last build I had purchased some aquacultered live rock to seed the previously live rock I already had and there was a Purple Dottyback hitchhiker. Which I tought was cool till I did some research on what a bully they are especially since he'd be one of the first inhabitants. So, I spoke to the LPS and he said he'd take him and give me a little something which was cool cause I'd of just donated him. Well I tried everything short of removing everything to net it. Including a bottle trap with a fishing pole which my teenage kids and wife found hilarious as many of you just have! After doing a little more research I decided to buy the Tank Matez trap. Most of the fish would go in it except him. One night after bed I went down when I looked in the tank he was in it I closed the trap. I figuered he'd be fine till morning, I'll go in to work late and take him to the LPS in the morning. Woke up in the morning to find him belly up not sure if it was stress or lack of oxygen in the trap :crying-face: either way I'd commited involuntary fish slaughter.
 

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Keko21

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WHen I first started I read the instructions on Ocean Magik wrong and dumped the entire bottle in. Big bacterial bloom, but everything was fine.

I've also let my RODI overflow more times than I can count haha!
 

Crustaceon

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I drilled a half-filled tank thinking the reduced water level would also reduce the load on the panels, allowing me to be lazy and found out the hard way that the back glass of this particular tank was tempered. I had about twenty gallons splash onto the carpet and had fish swimming on the kitchen floor. Luckily, all critters survived.
 

EliMelly

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"A couple of gallons of water on the floor" may as well be my nickname at this point. I ALWAYS forget to turn off my RODI. The worst part? I bought an rodi float valve shutoff kit and can't be arsed to install it yet
I’m in the exact same boat as you
 

ClownSchool

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Most recent mistake?
Added this guy to my tank thinking he’d pair-up with my goby.
He’s actually an unsociable loner, snapped at any fish that slept in the same rock work he chose as his lair, and he wiped out a third of my cleanup crew in less than a week.
There was a boneyard of emerald claws and cracked crab and snail shells under his rock.
…not my photo. I returned him to the fish store.
8B92D906-0F05-4DCF-A05E-F6DD3589B937.jpeg
 

Garf

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Wife bought some new lights for her tank with the beefiest brackets I’ve seen. The brackets were not quite at the right angle so I took then to the vice and tweaked them. Still not quite right so I put the bracket against my chest and gave it a heave ho, snapped my rib, lol

925BE91F-5A68-4B7D-93FD-D7DF8CDE1902.jpeg
 

nuxx

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Nothing terrible... mostly large water spills when I left the RODI on filling 50 gallon drums and forgetting about it...

Only happened a few (maybe 8 times...) before I installed a float and then stopped doing large water changes and automated them...
 

HankstankXXL750

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I had a set up where I collect RODI in a 50 gallon trash can with heater then pumped into a 50 gallon brute in wheels when mixing. I forgot the heater when the barrel was empty and went about my water change. Next thing I know I had thick plastic smoke rolling through the basement.
 

Sink_or_Swim

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I have never had an AIO before but I picked one up for my first saltwater tank. Never having had components like heaters hidden in a chamber before I would constantly forget they were back there when doing water changes. I can't tell you how many times I have forgotten to turn the darn heater off while doing a water change. A heater out of water is not good. Doh! Thankfully nothing happened but I finally bought a smart plug where now one tap of a button shuts everything off. :) If I hadn't purchased that I would probably still be forgetting to shut it off. LOL
I had this exact problem with my AIO! Always forgot about the heater - doh! So what do I do? Run a canister filter on my new tank, with an integrated heater. I still have no easy reminder there's a heater in there to turn off, lol.
:grinning-face-with-sweat:
 
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