Top Ten Worst days in reefkeeping

[Lev F.]

1. My octopus eggs hatched. The isolation containers were ready. The tank was cycled. The food... This is when I discovered that no one ships Amphipods to Canada.

2. A very smart cowrie decided to crawl into the skimmer outflow in the middle of the night. The result was something comparable to a volcano erupting, but instead of lava and chunks of rock, it was salt water and chunks of dirty skimmate.

3. I had carefully re-done my aquascaping to my specific needs. There were numerous carefully sized nooks and crannies at the bottom so shrimps and other small animals can hide. I wake up and find it buried in a foot of sand, with an eel goby popping out, with his smug little grin.

4. My Midas Blenny jumped out of the tank. I had kept it in a net breeder for five minutes. It seemed healthy and alert. I let it into the tank and it darted right into a reef lobster's den. it was never seen again.

5. It takes me 2 hours to separate a bunch of small octopi into individuals breeding containers, which I spent $70 on. In about 20 seconds they were sitting on the outside and laughing at me before swimming away. They sure have a sense of humor.

6. I never knew the tern "Frogfish" should be taken literally until I found a daring individual sprawled upon my coffee table.

7. I bought 3 tube worms, and placed them carefully in the rockwork. The next morning I find them in random places on the ground.

8. The day my refugium disconnected from the tank and flooded. I wanted to have an aquaculture facility, not have a room that smelled like an aquaculture facility.

9. I ordered $150 worth of stuff online with my credit card. I live in Canada, so when asking for shipping location, i chose "Canada."
I get an email the next day with a short simple message: "Sorry, we don't ship to canada"

10. I decided to fix my 6000 GPH pump while it was functioning, underwater. I now call it: "The Geyser Vent 2000"