Preparing your fish for vacation
(not theirs, yours!)

By Terry Quinn, AnimalForum.com staff
Copyright 1999, Terry Quinn. Used with permission.

If you keep fish, preparing for vacation is very different than for the family dog. For one thing, it usually isn't practical to take your fish with you on vacation. Your dog, on the other hand, usually considers it his god-given right to go with you wherever and whenever you go someplace.

So you can't take them with you. What will you do? If you let your "fingers do the walking" and start calling commercial aquarium maintenance services, you will quickly find out that they really don't want to care for your fish while you are on vacation. When they tell you this, don't think they are being mean or vindictive. There are many of really good legal and technical reasons why most of these services don't take on temporary contracts, mostly involving liability issues.

That leaves you with the situation where you need to make some kinds of arrangements yourself. First, you need to recruit a caretaker whom you can trust to take care of your wet pets. I have had very good results from recruiting older scouts (as in Boy Scouts of America) who already keep and take care of aquarium on their own. They usually know all the basics, are trustworthy (one of the points of the scout law) and responsible. You should plan on paying them pretty well (depending upon your local market) at a price agreed upon in advance of your trip. You should also count on having them work with you doing routine maintenance for a couple of weeks before you leave.

Now that you have recruited your caretaker, you should next prepare your system for your trip. Begin by writing down a detailed list of the care your fish will need during the time you are gone. Be sure to cover feeding, tank maintenance (including water changes) and special instructions concerning what to do if something goes wrong. You should be sure to include a phone number of a local fish store owner or other experienced aquarist to back up your caretaker in the event of a real disaster that is beyond their abilities. It also would not hurt if you leave them an itinerary with phone numbers for where you will be staying on any given day.

Next, there are several things you should not do. First of all, do not acquire any new livestock during the month before you plan to leave. Second, don't plan on using vacation feeder blocks (which will actually do more harm than good). Your caretaker should be the one feeding the fish. Third, don't add any new equipment. Instead, perform whatever maintenance is necessary in order to ensure that the equipment you have is works perfectly.

When you perform your last maintenance before you go, you should change all chemical filtration media (if you use any). Also make sure all filters, pumps and other components are working perfectly. Make sure there is plenty of makeup water (labeled as such) available and easy to reach. Make sure all the foods are also handy. Finally, lay out a large supply of towels in the event of spills.

It helps if you can put both the tank lights as well as house lights on timers. Believe it or not, putting aquarium lighting on a timer is beneficial whether you are going on vacation or not. A consistent day/night cycle will help maintain their health while reducing stress.

Finally, perform a last minute walk through of what you expect them to do on the day before you leave. If your preparations are adequate, your pets will be just fine when you return.