Tapping on the class

[con con]

Is tapping on the class bad for the fish?

 

[rufioman]

You're in the photo gallery...and it's not something I would do or advise doing. And I'm assuming you mean glass lol Welcome.

 

[Rbishop]

thread moved...

 

[spypet]

tapping on the glass potentially startles fish and inverts into jumping OUT of the tank.
but the real danger is how tapping could aggravate a glass stressed tank into failing.

 

[Rbishop]

more of a startle issue than anything else...never heard of massive stories of tank jumps from it or cracking tanks...geesch....

 

[andyjs]

It can scare the fish possibly into darting and injuring themselves on the glass or tank decor. At work, my friend once slapped a tank REALLY hard. It actually kind of rippled the glass and I half expected the tank to break. It startled a sunfish so bad that it went into some sort of seizure and convulsed on the bottom of the tank. I've never seen anything else like it

 

[BettaFishMommy]

the sound of tapping on the glass may not seem loud to you, but the sound reverberates as vibrations through the water, which can stress the fish. i'd never tap on the glass on my tank of skittish australian rainbows but do occasionally tap very lightly on my oscar's tank to get his attention in a hurry if i need to (like for checking on a scrape, etc).

 

[con con]

Hey thanks for moving my thread. I'm new so i'm still trying to figure out how everything works on this website lol.

 

[Khemul]

This is the way I've always understood (i'm sure someone can correct it if it is wrong)....

Fish hear by sensing the vibrations sound creates in the water. Sound travels much differently in water then in air. Now even in the air, a loud enough sound close enough to a person can do some serious damage. In water that same sound travels much faster so while it is a light tap to you standing in front of the glass it is a loud bang to the entire water column of the tank.

Tapping is probably more of a simple stress/startling on the fish (still unpleasant for it). Banging on the glass could possibly do more then just stress/startle though.

 

[GuppyGirl1230]

the sound of tapping on the glass may not seem loud to you, but the sound reverberates as vibrations through the water, which can stress the fish. i'd never tap on the glass on my tank of skittish australian rainbows but do occasionally tap very lightly on my oscar's tank to get his attention in a hurry if i need to (like for checking on a scrape, etc).

Agreed! I also tap lightly to get the attention of my fish. The OB I tap so he stops picking up the ropefish and moving them where he thinks they should be. Ya, he really does this, and the ropefish don't even care, they just swim back to where they were and it starts again... lol