Rookie Mistake - Substrate

[Robbie]

Hi everyone! First time posting here, long time Aquarium Co-op follower. 

 

I recently made a rookie mistake while upgrading my 3 small fancy gold fish from their 100 litre tall tank (I am from Australia) to their new 300 litre long tank. I have set the scape as a kind of freshwater river scape with 1/3 of the substrate covered in large river stones, split by some wood then the other 2/3 is small river stones from their original tank. (Stupid mistake I know) as tonight I noticed my largest goldfish (perhaps 2 inches) had a stone stuck inside her mouth. As it is 10pm I couldn't exactly call a vet for advise so I jumped online and was able to remove the stone with a pair of tweezers and gently holding the fish just below the water line... 

Obviously I never want this to happen again, but without completely removing the substrate and replacing with large river stones I am not sure of any other option. 

Does anyone have any ideas to perhaps cover the smaller substrate to not add much more weight to the tank, or should I bite the bullet and tear it all out?

 

I am still semi new to the hobby so I would appreciate genuine help and if I am not doing something right I am open to learning the right way 🙂

 

[Scott C]

sorry for your pet emergency. In my experience goldfish aren't the smartest, 😝, i'm not sure covering it will guarantee no more problems, that being said, it wouldn't actually add much weight to cover with larger rock, new rock will displace water.

Personally, I wouldn't be too concerned about a re-occurrence, hopefully they learn as i'm sure they would in nature, but if you wanted to be 100% sure, for peace of mind, i'd remove the substrate, depending on the size of the tank, a small dustpan works great, if it's smaller a kiddie sandbox shovel.

[Robbie]

Thank you! I never considers a dustpan to remove substrate before so that's a great hack.

I did consider covering with a thin layer of the pebbles as I prefer a thick substrate and the plants hold better with smaller stones. But these fish will dig through anything haha so I may need to re think the entire scape....,

Appreciate your advise very much tho!

[Okayestaquarist]

I would also not be worried about this happening again. I had a similar thing happen with goldfish trying to eat a big snail. It never happened again.

 

[Tanked]

Even fish have eyes that are bigger than their stomachs, or in this case their mouths.  I have seen my barbs spit out tiny pieces of gravel while foraging.  On two occasions I have found larger pieces of gravel where no gravel should be.  The logical explanation is that the fish carried it for some time before finally dislodging it. They do learn to avoid certain situations rather quickly, so your goldfish is not likely to repeat that mistake. 

[Tanked]

Okay, I got it half right!  Some of them aren't that quick to learn.  About an hour ago I fed the barbs some thawed peas without mashing them first. They gobbled them like candy as expected and then they suddenly stopped eating.  A closer examination revealed that each of them had a pea in it's mouth.  I just checked them and 3 still had a pea in its mouth.  While I watched, one spit the pea out only to have the nearest fish grab it. Hopefully I won't need the tweezers for a peaectomy yet