By Jennifer Corr and Julia Prisco
Often when people think of goldfish, they think of round fish bowls, carnivals and a low maintenance pet.
And that’s what Jennifer Corr, an editor here at Anton Media Group, thought about goldfish too, until 2017 when her life turned upside down.
“It started with getting in a car to head to a Christian camp in Upstate New York as a camp counselor,” Corr said. “Another counselor was driving, and I looked down and saw a giant plastic bag of goldfish in a tote bag. The counselor planned to use them in a game for campers. I was worried for them, but the other counselor had assured me he had a tank ready for when we got upstate. Driving upstate on a hot summer day is hard enough for humans, but imagine being a goldfish stuck in a sealed plastic bag. Fish started floating to the top, lifeless, one by one.”
Once they all got to the camp, it was revealed there was no tank. All there was to use was some old containers.
“The other counselor told me to save the dead fish for the game too, so I started separating the fish by dead or alive in the containers inside the chapel,” Corr said. “When the game was over, the counselor brought the live fish to me and told me they’re my responsibility now. And it was my duty to toss the dead fish in the dumpster. As the days went by, the fish died one by one, and on the last day, I was told I had to take the last fish home. I named him Hope.”
Hope had quite an excruciating ride home in a car with no heater, but he made it through. He went from a food container to a round fishbowl, to a five-gallon tank and eventually a 10-gallon tank.
“I didn’t want him to be lonely, so I got another one, but then Hope got sick and died, so I had to buy another fish, and so on,” Corr said. “This went on for seven years.”
But eventually, with a fish named Razorback, Corr decided not to buy another fish to end this fish dynasty. But Razorback decided to live for four years.
“Being alone, besides having some tiny cory catfish and snails share the tank, Razorback grew huge,” Corr said. “He also seemed too smart for his lifestyle, as he would get excited when he thought he was going to be fed. So when I heard my fellow editor’s father had a koi pond, I thought I would ask if he would be willing to take it.”
(Photo by Julie Prisco)
“While the majority of the fish are koi, some are goldfish or a mix,” said Julie Prisco, an editor at Anton Media Group. “[My father Charles Prisco] started out with a small pond in his backyard with only a few koi fish. After learning more about how to maintain a healthy pond environment for koi, he expanded his pond. The new and improved pond is about 16 feet wide, goes as deep as four feet, and is as shallow as 18 inches. The pond has two waterfalls, bubblers and a filtration system to keep the water clean. The pond has been running smoothly for six years now, with some six-year-old fish and a few four and five-year-old fish that were born in the pond.”
April 3 was moving day for Razorback. Corr, with the help of her father, put him in a travel container. Both were splashed in the process. And Corr set him down on the floor of the passenger seat.
“I was seven minutes away from work, exiting onto the Meadowbrook State Parkway, and while I was inside a tunnel, all of a sudden all the cars in front of me came to a screeching halt due to an accident up ahead,” Corr said. “That’s when I heard the splash.”
Corr looked down and saw the travel tank was on its side, and Razorback was flopping around. She put the travel tank on her lap, while navigating Nassau County traffic, and began emptying any water bottles she could find in her car. Luckily, due to her laziness in bringing things in at the end of the day, she had enough to sustain him.
After making a frenzied trip to Target, and then PetSmart, for treated fish water, he somehow survived and became the most popular guy at Anton Media Group that day. After the editorial meeting, Prisco brought Razorback to his new life.
Since that day, Prisco reports that Razorback is doing very well.
“Razorback is the newest addition to the pond and has blended in smoothly,” Prisco said. “He darted around the large pond in a frenzy for the first few days, becoming acclimated with the new space and new fish friends. After about a week, Razorback adjusted to the size and has mellowed out. [Charles] Prisco often spots him following the largest fishes closely, presumably learning their routines and the ways of the new pond.”