Anyone else have success with small filters?

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dulcisveteranus

Aquarium Advice Activist
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Mar 1, 2015
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So I have been in the hobby for 2 years and I have already kept a variety of fish tanks. Turtle tanks, betta tanks, planted tanks, FOWLRs, and reefs. In the beginning of my hobby I have always been under the impression of needing big filters for your tank. I usually had a rule of thumb on buying filters. The rated size needs to be 20 gallons more than the volume of your aquarium. But I started with a small internal filter rated up to 10 gallons for my first tank (which was a 10 gallon). This is the Cascade 300 internal filter and I have used it for a lot of tanks. I've kept it in my FOWLR, 20g Reef tank, and even for a short time in my 55 gallon planted as an emergency filter because my other broke down. As a matter of fact, I am still using it today in my 29 gallon planted tank! It provides ample surface agitation, enough space for media, and my SAEs play in the current a lot. And yes everytime I've used this filter it has successfully cycled my tanks within a month! Maybe there is a reason I missed as to not use small filters, but all my fish seem to be happy and my tank is looking healthy.
 
The size of the filter plays also into the load you keep in the tank. Personally, I take filter media from one tank to another and have it cycled in a day or couple days not a month. If it really takes that long for your tanks, I suspect it's because the filter is not moving enough water through it to keep up with the bioload in your tank.
That all said, 2 years in the hobby is not really all that long for you to have all the potential long term tank issues that many of us old timers have gone through. ;) In some cases, 2 years might be just the beginning of problems for a tank that has not been kept up well all along.
Back to filter size, you really want a filter that turns the water over a certain amount of times per hour or day. The amount will be based on the fish you keep however. No need for a high volume filter if the fish don't like high water movement. So that's getting down to the "nuts and bolts" of fish keeping and there is no "1 size fits all" for this. So when it comes to setting up, you really need the specifics of what you intend on putting in the tank so you can know what size filters you should have.
Hope this explains things. (y)
 
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