Clownfish got sucked up in my powerhead

She didn't have a pebble in her mouth, did she?

--Mike (wondering if your Clownfish has seen Finding Nemo)

I had this happen to a tiny fish a while back, as well as a turbo snail. Lost them both. Now I've got quick filter attachments on both my AC402 PHs - a little fugly maybe (though they mostly blend into the black background), but worth it. What if next time you're not home to shut off the PH?

I'd go with the quick filter - putting mesh over the bottom of the PH won't do any more than the little grate that it comes with IMHO. You want something that will spread out the force of the suction and unfortunately the only thing that seems to fit AC PHs is their big quick filter attachments. Other PHs come with smaller little attachments that are more attractive and perform the same purpose. Like I said though, it's definitely worth it to save the livestock

I just have a hang on back filter... They'd have to be pretty timy to fit through those little spaces! What kind of filter do you have, Blinky?

KobeSumo - my tanks are very low-tech. The 30g has two AC 70 HOB filters, one standard and one modded into a mini refugium filled with Chaetomorpha algae. It's also got a Remora HOB skimmer and a small powerhead. The 65g has a FilStar XP2 canister filter and two AC 402 powerheads. The only places I've got prefilters are on the MaxiJet 1200 PH that powers the Remora and the two AC 402s - the intake strainers on the canister and HOBs pose no threat to anything but the tiniest/weakest fish, but those powerheads move a lot of water through a tiny space and I've lost a few critters, so better safe than sorry

my turbo snail got sucked into a 400gph ph. It ripped most of the tendons holding it into the shell, or it at least looked like it was falling out of the shell.
I supported the shell of the snail with the mag-float, and it healed right up.

btw, this snail is the size of a ping pong ball