how about a fresh water stinky, do not try this at home:
take a pack of frozen blood worms out of the freezer, proceed to feed your fish, then put the pack down on top of your nice toasty warm light fixture, and go to work. ***important step: forget to put the bloodworms back into the freezer!! Peeyeww
Years ago I had a large turbo that I didn't know if it was dead or not. Of course, I take it out and stick it up to my nose thinking taking a sniff would tell me - I will never forget that moment in my life, I almost get a headache thinking about it . . .
Shipment of fish, corals, inverts that got LOST by the airline and turned up a week later.
Live rock was RIPE!!!! We did not open the bags of dead fish....we had ONE cleaner shrimp that survived the whole ordeal.
The WORST was the 2 lots of 50 snails. We did have to open the bags to check for survivors, and that stench was enough to clear the room. I don't think there were any survivors, either snails OR humans.
I'd call it a close tie between dead snails and rotten chicken liver sponges on live rock. Both are VERY nasty. :x
I've not had the pleasure of catching a whiff of dead anemone, but I've heard that's seriously nasty too.
Xenia stinks (and so do shrooms) whether they are alive or dead!
Three day old lake trout sitting in a bucket under the summer sun............oh you wanted reef related, picked up shell upgrades for hermits from the beach, two days later realized one was already occupied.
Wow... how about this one... I have a plenum in my 55 that is 18 months old. When I set it up originally I ran airline tubing all throughout the very bottom and out the top of the tank. About a month I drained about 2 gallons through the tubing after not drainig it for about 9 months... that water was SO rank... about 10 drops into draining my wife went outside.
Hydrogen Sulfide. Worse than acros, worse than dead turbos, or flat worms, and i would rather eat xenia. Cleaning out a sandbed scooped into a bigass pocket of the stuff and nearly passed out
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I've got a hobby, i can't afford a life to!
I didn't have one until tonight. Dead, decaying flame scallop. (Bought as a newbie--now I know. . .)
I decided to give the livestock one last check before bedtime tonight. It must have given it up today sometime. It was so nasty, the hermits weren't even cleaning it up. . . Luckily most of it was still there, and I don't seem to have had an ammonia spike.