Neil's News

Fishy Behaviour

4 June 2005

I walked into the office at 6am and nearly stepped on a dead fish lying on the floor. The fish was almost a meter from our aquarium, staring up at me with a lifeless eye. His designation was 1 of 2, and had been with the company for five years. 2 of 2 (the smarter of the pair) was swiming around as if nothing had happened. Was it suicide? Or murder?

I scooped up the corpse in a static-free bag (not that I was worried about static discharge, but it's what was at hand). Half way to the toilet there was a slight twitch. I poked the body dubiously. No results. Then there was another twitch. So I turned around and returned him to the tank. He floated on his side at the top, stiff as a board. A few minutes later he slowly sank to the bottom, still on his side. Encouragingly, the starboard gill had come online. Over the following hour one fin after another started moving. By noon he was managing to maintain attitude control, though with a slight list. By evening he was eating.

I don't envy him the headache he must have.

Update: After 36h of steady recovery, 1 of 2 suddenly died. :-(

Update: Found this image on Fark which shows the correct way to exit the tank.

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