I'm fairly paranoid about germs in general, so I wash my hands carefully after I've done any tank cleaning, feeding, etc. Well, I'm at home for Thanksgiving break. The first night I was home, we were eating dinner and my mom realized she hadn't fed the fish in the 37 gallon yet. So she got up, scooped up some water from the tank to soak their food in, fed them, then sat back down, picked up a slice of bread, and kept eating. Being a germophobe, I was somewhat bugged by this, and wasn't sure whether to say anything. This got me wondering how careful we're supposed to be with this sort of thing. It also got me curious about how all of you are with this.
I wash my hands occasionally after cleaning, lol, but I'm not a germophobe. I'll happily play with the fish and work in the tank, then dry my hands and sit down to do something else like school work. Of course I wash my hands before eating and such, but tank water doesn't bug me if I don't wash my hands right away... there was only a certain amount of times I can get tank water in my mouth to spit out while trying to siphon before I stopped being disgusted by tank water (that was until I got better at it :) )
It's funny, I can basically pick out gunk from my cat's ear or kiss him and not care, but whenever I interact with my sister's dog or my fish I need to wash my hands after! I always wash my hands after cleaning the tank or getting my hands wet. Well, that's because whenever I clean my tank it's right before I want to eat dinner since I get home late. Back then I didn't care so much since I did it during the day.
I don't care so much about after feeding him pellets, but I definitely need to wash my hands after I feed him anything FD. It's weird because normally I'm a pretty messy person.
I rinse my hands with plain water and dry them before I put them in the tank. I'm more worried about my effect on them then I am about their effect on me. I should think about it because I'm sick all the time. But that's been going on since I was a baby. It's people I need to stay away from! :P
I scrub my hands with soap, rinse them thoroughly, run them under bottled water, and then I stick my hands in the tank. I'm very cautious about my fishies' health.
I think you really only need to worry about getting sick from your tank if you have an open wound and get water in it. Just so it doesn't get infected. That's really the only thing I worry about.
Your tank water is probably cleaner than lake, ocean, or river water, so I'd say you would have to drink a lot or something weird like that to get sick.
I don't always wash my hands after tank cleaning, but I do wash them before dinner just because I can smell the tank-water-smell on my hands and it bothers me to get that near my food :P
I am sooo NOT a germaphobe!
My boyfriend is a TOTAL germaphobe! I drive him NUTS.
just the other day when I was cleaning the tank, I sucked in fishwater when I was geting the gravel vacuum going and he wanted to vomit.
I never wash my hand after touching the fishtank, just dry them off. I do wash my hands after I feed bloodworms, but I am super allergic to the freeze dried ones.
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Fish Germophobe?
This got me wondering how careful we're supposed to be with this sort of thing. It also got me curious about how all of you are with this.
