Don't forget to turn stuff back on after a water change!

[Brhino]

Did a water change on the tanks in my basement (10 gallon with a crayfish, 10 gallon with platy fry, 70 gallon with pleco, clown loaches, and zebra danios) tonight. Wrapped up around 10:30pm. Came upstairs, took a shower, puttered around my computer a bit, and went to bed at 12:30am or so. My head hits the pillow and all of a sudden I realize that I never turned the power strip that controls the filters and heaters back on. I race back downstairs but it's too late for a few of the fish. One platy fry dead, one danio dead, and worst of all, one of my three clown loaches. I really don't think the temperature dropped very much at all in the tanks, but apparently it was enough. I stay up for another 45 minutes or so, come back to check... and a second loach is dead. The last one - the biggest one - seems to be okay, but now I'm really worried. You may recall that I previously nearly wiped out my loaches by doing water changes with a faulty water heater. These three were all that was left.

I feel terrible... like, too irresponsible to own fish. Pay attention to what you're doing when you're working on your tank. One little mistake, and things can go very badly for your fishy friends that are depending on you to keep them alive.

[talldutchie]

Sorry for your loss.

Your tanks were without power for 2 hours? I thnk there's something else wrong then, that shouldn't cause issues like this. Or is the basement really cold?

[Brhino]

the basement is pretty cold, probably in the mid sixties. My cheap stick-on LCD thermometers didn't indicate much if any of a change in temperature, and the water didn't feel cold, but it must have changed a bit. The fact that I lost two out of three loaches but only one out of eight platy fry is telling... I think the loaches are just really darn sensitive to temperature drops.

[SueD]

This does seems pretty quick for a problem due to temperature, especially for the danio. I was without power for a couple of days last year and while I did a few warm water changes during the daytime hours, the tanks were left at night with dropping temps. Only lost one GBR during those days and one a few days after.

[talldutchie]

65f is 18c. That's about 6, 7 degrees difference. No, this is not the issue. Any temperature drop would have been very gradual and I really doubt it was more than 2 degrees.

The fact that your bottom dwellers were hit hardest suggest to me some kind of pollutant. Did you forget water conditioner? Any big weather events in the area that could have changed your tap water's composition.

[Slaphppy7]

Regardless of the cause, i am sorry for your loss, Brhino

[Strider199]

I'm sure most of us have had a forgetful moment during our time, I know I have. Dont be too hard on yourself Brhino.
Sorry for your loss.

[Brhino]

65f is 18c. That's about 6, 7 degrees difference. No, this is not the issue. Any temperature drop would have been very gradual and I really doubt it was more than 2 degrees.

The fact that your bottom dwellers were hit hardest suggest to me some kind of pollutant. Did you forget water conditioner? Any big weather events in the area that could have changed your tap water's composition.

Didn't forget water conditioner. The fact that I lost fish in two different tanks suggests its not a problem with an individual tank like water parameters.

[Triton]

I think what td is saying is that the new water added could have been the issue, I also don't think 2 hours could have been the problem unless it was lack of oxygen

[Lady10Godiva]

I think temp swing is very bad with clowns. I had a heater stop working one night in their tank and woke up to 10 loaches with ick. I had a temp swing of about 12 degrees.

That just sucks man. I hope you able to find a good batch of loaches in the spring.