At Aquafest2007 I picked up a pair of Montezuma Swordtails among some other fish.
Both went into the 55 holding tank until I decide where they shall live permanently. 2 weeks ago on a Sunday I decided the 55 had been uprooted enough by the angry syno. and culled a bunch of the various Val I had in the tank.
All of that went into a fishbag which I had laying on the floor.
Flash forward 5 days, I laid down to watch the 55 for a bit while I was waiting for to something to happen (forgotten what by now). As I am watching the tank I am mentally ticking off the various fish in the 55 and their conditions.
Both salmon reds check
Single Male Boesmani check
3 no 4 of the baby ancistrus check
paradise fish looking mad check
both flagfish check
female montezuma check
large syno making a pit underneath all the val, *grumble* check
30 mins later hmm no male montezuma....
1 hr later hmm STILL no male montezuma...
start shifting val around to try to spook the male into the open, 30 mins go by STILL no male shows up.
OH CRAP, did I scoop him when I pruned and is he in the bag o plants on the floor?????
Dump bag in 55 assuming I will pull his corpse out of the bag and out comes a slowly swimming, skinny montezuma..
WTF!
As of last night the Male is still alive and makes sure to show up when I am around but has become very skittish otherwise.
OR
When I first started keeping fish about 20 years ago I had a 10 gallon tank and for awhile I paid very close attention to everything I could about the tank (I changed the water, I turned the light on and off, I fed the fish etc).
After a few weeks I got off on another "hobby" and forgot about the fish. A few weeks later I remember "OH CRAP THE FISH!" and proceed to run downstairs to be sure I will be cleaning out a foul smelling tank of dead fish.
Lo and behold, the fish had not only lived but had also bred like crazy (danios, and a raphael)..
WOW I bred fish somehow! A water change later, the tank was back to being full and the front glass didnt look like a green mat anymore (yeah I left the desk lamp on for like a month straight).
1 week later the heater failed and put the tank at 100F for a day, cooking everything but the raphael.
Flash forward about 10 years, same raphael in a 55. I pulled out the plastic hollow rock thing to rearrange the tank and do a thorough water change. After carefully inspecting the hollow rock thing(this hollow rock thing was awesome, it was plastic, with little fake plastic plants, and the entire thing was shaped like a cross between a castle, a log and a pile of poo) to ensure that nothing was taking a snooze inside it I pulled it totally out of the tank and proceeded to do a thorough cleaning of the entire tank.
About 2 hours later as I am watching TV I hear a faint croaking noise coming from the fish tank area. After being confused for a few minutes, I went over to inspect the area and notice that I forgot to toss the rock thing back in the tank. After staring at the now croaking plastic rock thing, I decided to toss it back in the tank since some of the fish loved to hide in/around it. Almost as soon as it hit the water, out swims a very angry and slightly irritated Raphael.. That fish would probably still be alive if it wasnt for the 3lbs of pellets that got poured into the tank by my ex fiancees parents when they thought the fish looked HUNGRY.