How to transport fish in a car for 9 hours

[maria]

Hello Gwapites,

I have a question for a friend, she has a fish she is attached to, she swears it has a personality, responds to her presence, blows fish kisses at her, etc.. It's a large goldfish, koi type fish. It is the solitary inhabitant in a 20+ gallon non planted tank. She called the tank an "orb" I imagine it's the bio-orb.

She is moving 9 hours away, and will be driving the whole way and wants to keep the ms. pink alive, (she also has a three year old son, a dog and a husband that want to make it to the promised land alive). I imagine they will be stopping alot and overnight depending on the traffic.

Do any of you experienced fish movers have any advice? Let me know if you have any additional questions.

[chris_todd]

Probably the simplest thing to do is get a battery operated air pump and a sponge filter (the sponge filter would need to be fully primed before the trip to be completely effective, obviously). Since it's a goldfish and not a tropical fish, you don't have to worry too much about keeping it warm, but don't leave it in the car when you go into a sit-down restaurant for dinner, or you'll come back to poached fish.

[Ltrepeter2000]

Agree with most of what Chris said. As for leaving it in the car, it depends mostly on air temps on whether you could leave it in the car. If the temps are below the 80s you would be fine to leave it in the car for an hour or so. Anything above 80 would put stress on the fish, above 90 and as Chris said, you are probably coming back to boiled ms. pink. If she cant find a sponge filter, than tell her she will need an airstone and probably need to place the filter pad from her aquarium into the tank without washing so that the bacteria in the water remains as stable as possible.

[Cristy Keister]

And don't feed the fish for 2 days before the ride so it won't put out so much waste in it's container.

[DonkeyFish]

And there's no need to move all 20 gallons of the water for the fish either. I've heard from several fish show/transport gurus that less water is better. Clearly you need enough for the fish to swim around in comfortably, but depending on the size of the fish a 5 gallon bucket from Home Depot filled half-3/4 of the way should be good.

Of course this is all a little subjective without knowing how big the fish is...I'm basing on the fish being a good sized Koi.

[FrannyB]

If the fish is big, get one of those blue tuperware containers from HD or Lowes. One of those with a locking top to keep the fish in the container. Might not be a bad idea to drill a couple holes in the top. Run the airline through one of the holes and duct tape the pump to the top. She can do the same with the bucket if Pinky is 6" or less.

[Ghazanfar Ghori]

Extra large breather bag?

[Cristy Keister]

Extra large breather bag?

Goldfish and Koi have spines that cut through bags.

[maria]

Thanks so much for all the help. I guess the battery operated pump will make a good farwell present.

Im hoping to get to a meeting soon.