Describe your schedule

[medge00]

I'd like this to be more than the basic, 'how often do you do water changes' question. Frequency of water changes is an important issue, but there is, in my opinion, so muh more that goes into it. Discus require more water changes that most tetras, a 75 gallon with mostly plants and some apistogrammas is much different than a 75 gallon with one ginormous (that's gigantic + enormous) oscar and a plec. Factors include: plants or no? ferts or no? fish load? type of fish? how often do you feed? what do you feed? etc etc. i hope y'all are as interested in this thread as I am.

so i'll start! I'm listing my tank specs/fish load only because its not in my signature...

tank: 20gal long, 60 watts, [acronym:2226f27c8f="Do it yourself"]diy[/acronym:2226f27c8f] co2
Plants: tons and tons
Fish: (3) cories, (4) cardinals, (1) loach, (1) temporary black molly
Feed: 2-3 times a week. I rotate and mix the following foods: Omega flake, omega veggie flake, frozen brine shrimp, frozen blood worms, algae wafer, shrimp pellet.
Fertilizers: Iron, potassium - once a week... flourish - twice
Water Changes: 20% once a week, vac once a month


ok, your turn!

[Toirtis]

What....for all 52 tanks?!?

[DanW0007]

haha, seriously, how do you manage that?

[Toirtis]

Originally Posted by DanW0007

haha, seriously, how do you manage that?

A few at a time... Really, I just make sure I do about 10 each day, that way within a week I can get 70 tanks changed...works out to about once each 6 days for each tank.

[mattrox]

I try 30% twice a week. My tank is about 76 gals and planted lightly. I have 3 Rams, 3 Apistos, 5 Cories, 3 Otos and 2 Bristlenose. It will get tetras and more plants and maybe more cories too when the budget allows.

When I had Discus in the tank bare bottom I did 30% daily most days and when busy 40 3 times a week. This was because I was growing them up and feeding heavily. I had to move because of work so they got almost fully grown before I had to go.

[TomK2]

Well, I do a 20% water change two or three times a week. In the past I was such a bad overstocker, overfeeder, and rarely did water changes. I knew it was bad, so I set up some plumbing, pumps and a holding tank in my "new" house. It is now painless and fun to do a water change.

I vacuum the gravel once a month.

I plan on servicing my fluval 404's every two months (one each month at gravel vac time). By servicing, I mean rinse/clean the prefilter sponge, rinse/clean a basket of ceramic mechanical, and change the basket that has filter floss for finer mechanical filtration. Two baskets of bio-media will be left alone.

I feed once or twice a day, what the tank can consume in about 3 minutes, some gets down to gravel, but thats what the pleco and cory's are for. once a week the pleco gets an algae wager, once a week the bottom feeders get a few shrimp pellets.

So far, after 3 months of running, I have pH=7.8, [acronym:d998efe2e4="Ammonia"]NH3[/acronym:d998efe2e4]=0, [acronym:d998efe2e4="Nitrite"]NO2[/acronym:d998efe2e4]=0 and [acronym:d998efe2e4="Nitrate"]NO3[/acronym:d998efe2e4] between 0 and 5ppm.

I am going to add a school of 6 tetras (?type?) and one spiney eel, maybe two more juvenile angels in the future.

[Fishyfanatic]

tank: 150 [acronym:47db8d0586="Gallon"]gal[/acronym:47db8d0586]
Plants: tons and tons of plastic plants
Fish: Lake Malawali Cichlids
Feed: 1-2 times a day. I rotate and mix the following foods: Flake, Veggies, frozen brine shrimp, frozen blood worms, algae wafer, freeze dried blood worms, tubiflex worms.
Water Changes: 25% once a week, vac once a month

[medge00]

hehe, no, not for all 52 tanks please. choose an example tank! I've got 3 tanks, I used the one that takes the most time.

[ChileRelleno]

75gal
Oscar get a fed 2-5x per day, small portitions & never the same thing twice, Plec gets veggie every night, I often spike his food with algae tabs and/or carnivore sticks for extra protien.
Full water chemistry test weekly, [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Ammonia"]NH3[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8], [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Nitrite"]NO2[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8], [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Nitrate"]NO3[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8], [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="power head or Measure of the concentration of hydrogen ions, depending on context"]PH[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8], [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Carbonate Hardness"]KH[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8] and [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="General Hardness"]GH[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8].
[acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Nitrate"]NO3[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8] gets tested twice a week.
20-30% [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Partial water change"]PWC[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8] & GV twice a week.
Rinse filter media & media box weekly.

10 [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Gallon"]gal[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8]'s
Bettas get fed 1-2x's daily.
Full water chemistry test weekly (same as above)
20-40% [acronym:4f1eb1bfb8="Partial water change"]PWC[/acronym:4f1eb1bfb8] & GV every other week average.
Rinse filter media & media box once a month.

[Blucat]

Tank: 24 [acronym:ffaa8fc61e="Gallon"]gal[/acronym:ffaa8fc61e]
Plants: Light, two swords and an aquatic palm
Fish: Two dwarf gouramis, 1 female betta
Feed: Pinch of flake every day
Water Changes: 25% once a week, gravel vac once a week

Q: I noticed that most only gravel vacs once a month. Is it bad to do gravel vacs once a week?