Gravel Cleaning Question

[richiestang_78]

Can it hurt the tank to clean the gravel every water change? I know bacteria lives in there and was wondering if vacuuming removes too much of it. I do a 5gal water change ever saturday and wednesday so I remove about 10-15 gals of water weekly out of my 30gal tank and I use a gravel vac everytime, should I maybe only use the vac once a week or am I fine?

 

[shawmutt]

Vacuuming once a week should be fine.

 

[richiestang_78]

So I should switch to gravel vacuuming only once a week but still do the other water changes then?

 

[shawmutt]

Well, the water changes are up to you. I do about 6 gallons once a week, and gravel vac then. If you were set on doing the two water changes, I'd say just vac once a week.

 

[richiestang_78]

Yeah I think Ill do that then, Ill make saturday vac day and jsut change the water wednesday. But does vacuuming too much hurt the tank at all? I read in some book some poeple do it almost daily. I have a 30gal with 1Gourami, 7Danios, 4Rummy Nose, 3 Cories and when I do vacuum i do se alot of gunk getting sucked up.

 

[DeathWarp]

Im not quite sure if its "ok" to do it TOO much; however; if waste is being removed whenever you're vacuuming, then clearly you're not hurting anything, because its infact waste being removed.

 

[RoK]

I think it's fine to gravel vac as much as you want as long as you have sufficient bio-filtration and the tank is cycled.

 

[PauloSilva]

im not sure that by vaccumming the gravel that you are sucking up any bacteria... i would imagine that the bact. adhere to the gravel itself... removing fish wastes is always a good idea... everyday? overkill IMO

 

[richiestang_78]

Yeah I dont do it everyday but like I said every saturday and wednes day. I only take 5 gallons at a time so I dont think its too much.

 

[tropicfishman]

you can't actually remove any beneficial bacteria by vaccuming, it clings to decorations and gravel and is quite hard to remove, as for the vaccuming and water changes, why don't you vaccum the gravel and when your done let the vaccum suck out your desired amount of water and then just refill what you took out, its alot easier than vaccuming and refilling and t then a few days later taking wate out and putting more back in

 

[richiestang_78]

Well thast what I do, I use a siphon vacuum and take one 5gal bucket full of water out in the process, refill with another bucket and Im done.