Toilet Commandeered by Alien

[RichardS]

We arrived at the boat a couple of hours ago after the strangest May drive down we've ever had. It started snowing heavily around Munich and the snow continued to fall and settle all the way to Ljubliana, so that's about 300 miles looking like a Christmas card. We even passed a snow plough. If this is climate change I've had enough of it already.

The snow turned to torrential rain as we got into southern Slovenia and the heavy rain continued for another 200 miles with temperatures between 3 and 5 degrees until about 30 miles before we arrived at our marina when the temperature started to rise. We arrived at the boat in sunshine and 18 degrees although the rain seems to have caught us up in the last 10 minutes.

Anyway, first thing SWMBO did on arrival was go to the marina toilets but she soon returned to say that they were closed for refurbishment. The other toilet block is a long walk away so she asked me to open the valve on the boat toilet so she could go. I opened the valve and gave the Jabsco a pump just to check it. A few drips of water appeared and then the handle jammed and wouldn't go down again.

I thought that it might be a stuck valve in the pump because it was so completely jammed in the up position but decided to check the inline filter filter first.

This was waiting for me:

It's flapping from side to side so it's alive, whatever it is, but I can't pull it through and I can't push it back so I'll need to take more drastic action.

I can't face it tonight so I put the lid back and opened the other toilet which, thankfully, had not been commandeered. :ambivalence:

Richard

 

[AndrewB]

So its toilet fish on the menu tonight?

P.S. Try removing the filter mesh and then pumping like hell.

 

[anoccasionalyachtsman]

Look like a Mediterranean Moray to me. How far away is the outlet from your other loo, because that's where it's probably got its head.

 

[vas]

if it is, make sure you keep your fingers away from it's mouth, allegedly amazing sharp teeth can cut through a finger in a single bite...

 

[RichardS]

Look like a Mediterranean Moray to me. How far away is the outlet from your other loo, because that's where it's probably got its head.

Good grief ..... I just thought that it was a "tentacle" of some kind as it certainly isn't a fish but I reckon that you are spot on and it's the tail end of a baby Moray eel.

I wonder if it can swim back out if I cut its tail off? I guess that it will die but at least it might swim out first?

Richard

 

[JumbleDuck]

Now that's what you call a bottom feeder.

 

[Sea-Fever]

I think I won't be sharing this thread with the wife.

 

[johnalison]

Reminds me of my favourite quote from 'Quote, unquote', though non-boaty.

Seen in a toilet cubicle in an Oxford college - 'Let us hope that Excalibur does not choose this stretch of water to make his expected return'.

 

[Skylark]

That’s gross, Richard.

I don’t think that I would have been allowed to walk away until it’s been killed or freed. My wife would be asking if fish have feelings and can feel pain from starvation and so on.......

Do let us know the conclusion.

And while you’re down there, the hoses and clips could do with a clean

 

[[70521]]

As a child I was always convinced that things lived in the drainage systems. Now I know it to be true.

 

[anoccasionalyachtsman]

He's gone awfy quiet hasn't he?

 

[vyv_cox]

I have it on good authority that they don't like it up 'em, so should be easy to solve.

 

[RupertW]

I suspect they have both been eaten and part of Dalmatia will soon be sealed off and nuked for “unknown reasons”.

 

[RichardS]

I suspect they have both been eaten and part of Dalmatia will soon be sealed off and nuked for “unknown reasons”.

A gross update. :ambivalence:

I put off dealing with the intruder until after lunch today when a few beers with my steak in Trogir had given me sufficient courage. I removed the filter plastic cover and it was clear that the tail was now dead. It also stank to high heavens.

I tried to pull the tail out again but it was still stuck tight. As I was doing this I suddenly thought that it might be better if I closed the sea valve because, if the tail had come out, I would have had another problem to deal with.

After closing the sea cock, I decided to remove the white pipe which goes to the sea cock. I have replaced all the hoses after the filter with decent grey butyl rubber hoses but I left that short length of spiral PVC stuff but now I was regretting it as that stuff goes rock hard in 10 years so I had to pour boiling water over it to make it soft enough to pull it off the filter barbs.

The hose is 19mm ID but the hole in the filter housing is probably only 5mm diameter so I reckon that the eel had been scuppered by the filter housing restriction and the rest of it would be inside the white hose.

When I finally pulled the white hose off, there was nothing!

It was alive last night but it would appear that that small orifice in the filter has actually severed off the tail, presumably because the eel was thrashing around inside the hose last night and has actually broken its own tail off. I don't know whether it can live without the tail bit? Perhaps it can grow a new one?

Anyway, it became clear that the reason that the tail could go no further is because it jammed where the bones started so I was able to stick a screwdriver into the filter barb and crunch up a few bones until they were small enough the pass through the hole and follow the soft part of the tail.

Apart from the stick of rotting fish, it's now all clear. Luckily I always have my lemon toilet block in the filter housing (see photos) so that should soon disinfect everything.

On a side issue, those lemon toilet blocks are a marvel of science. That same block has been in that filter for about 3 years now and, coming back to the toilets for the first time since September 2018, there was absolutely no bad egg smell from either toilet. Before I discovered the toilet block trick, the first few pumps always stank.

Richard

 

[anoccasionalyachtsman]

You realise that you've trumped every single 'we had a rat on board' story ever written?

 

[Cardinal]

Perhaps the lemon was too tasty a bait to resist?

 

[Resolution]

I presume that you follow the usual Med rules that nothing goes into the toilet bowl that has not been eaten?:disgust:

 

[RichardS]

I presume that you follow the usual Med rules that nothing goes into the toilet bowl that has not been eaten?:disgust:

No we don't .... but I'm not sure why that's relevant to this thread?

Richard

 

[keithb]

Well, I am tempted to tell wife and teenagers that story in the hope that heads use is reduced or even ceases altogether.........

 

[vas]

Well, I am tempted to tell wife and teenagers that story in the hope that heads use is reduced or even ceases altogether.........

how can you possibly use a boat without using the heads?
typically with 6 on board I have to empty the 100lt black water tank every 2 (max 3) days...

V.