Thermometer broke in fish tank

[dr2b]

I got the otos and Flair out. It DOES NOT contain mercury. I found that out. So how do I clean the live plants?

[dramaqueen]

I'm glad your fish are ok. I don't know anything about plants, though.

[dr2b]

I hope they are okay. I got them out as fast as I could. I just moved the plants to the empty tank for now. I also have gotten almost all the water out. I need to get the glass and beads out of the side of the tank they broke on. I did notice it went straight down - didn't go floating around the tank. I am really REALLY happy it isn't mercury!

[dramaqueen]

I think everything will be ok since you acted so quickly and that the thermometer didn't have mercury in it.

[dr2b]

Yeah I think so too. My mom is going to take care of cleaning the gravel for me when she gets home while I am at work. Then when I get home, I'll get the tank back together. So I will leave my 4 gallons sitting around getting to room temperature until then.

[Jynx]

i think if you just run the plants under running water for a while that should clean them ok- probably

[dr2b]

Um well I was in such a chaos when it all happened (I was getting ready for work when it happened). While mom was cleaning the gravel, she realized the bulb didn't break - just the tip. So it lost the little pellet things in it and some glass.... but the bulb never got damaged. So I think that everyone will be fine. I bought a digital thermometer so I can't break it lol. I also bought more gravel - I have needed it and been procrastinating on buying it haha.

[BakaMandy]

D: Something like that happened to me a few days ago too, the bottom of my thermometer broke and all the beads at the bottom split everywhere >.< thankfully at the time I was cleaning my tank so Shota wasn't there to try and chomp them up.

[dr2b]

That's what mine did...the tip broke and about 1/2 to 3/4 of the metal beads or whatever sent straight down lol. Flair thought it was a good time to play fishy games...I was quite irritated haha. And the darn oto we had such a hard to catching at the lfs - that was a whole other story. It took me fooooorrever to catch him!