Fish CPR

[Larry Miller]

Just thought I'd share this experience. 

I had my biggest male tilapia jump out of the tank yesterday and when I found him his skin was dry, he was covered in ants, his eyes were milky and he was not moving. I was sad to loose my biggest fish, but as I picked him up I noticed that he was not stiff and I felt a slight twitch in one gill covering. With the knowledge that he was not completely gone yet I got him back into the tank as quickly as possible and shoved one of my water inlet lines into his mouth to let the water circulate through his gills. I sat there holding the hose in this lifeless fishes mouth for about 10 minutes before he made his first gulping motion. another 20 minutes and he was actually breathing on his own and his eyes would move every once in a while, but still no body motion. Finally after a total of 40 minutes of trying to reoxiginate this fish I took the hose out of his mouth and let the running water wash over his body and amazingly he started moving his fins and making feeble attempts to swim. I slowly let him go and he swam down to the bottom of the tank keeping himself upright and went to his favorite corner. 

I know it's just one fish, and he will one day be dinner, but it felt good to know that I was able to intervene with his untimely demise. What made this event even better was when I opened a fathers day card later that night and it was covered in pictures of fish with a bunch of fishy puns. 

[Eddie Beuerlein]

Nice Larry! Great story and great outcome... Those tilapia are very hard to kill!