Cloudy Water! Help!

[FreshwaterGurl]

I recently started my 10 gallon fish tank. My ph was starting to climb and the water also looked very hazy. So I got ph decrease liquid and now my ph is starting to go down. But my GH is starting to increase slightly and the water is starting to get cloudier. I have done a 40% water change and switched out my filter media. I put in a activated carbon and ammonia remover for a couple hours then I switched back to a clean new filter media that is made for my filter. I just don't know what to do. If anyone can help me please cause I love all my fish. Thank you.

 

[Autumnsky]

As soon as you can please start reading the article in my signature.

If you are getting cloudy water, it is possible it is from a bacterial bloom. This often happens in new tanks.

If you are using test strips to test your water, get a liquid test kit so you can test accurately. The test strips can be correct one day and the next not work and you could lose fish.

So. Do not change your filter pads anymore. There is a nitrogen cycle. The article will explain it.

Short and sweet you use the same filter pad until it falls apart, usually more than a year!!! Your tank needs BB aka beneficial bacteria to process ammonia from too much food and lower quality flaked foods as well as fish waste.

Bacterial bloom will go away on its own and in and of itself isn't a danger to the fish.

What is a danger is not having a cycled tank, which is a tank that's filter cannot breakdown waste because it doen't have BB and they live in large amount in the filter pad.

So if you throw it away, you throw away the very thing you need to have good living conditions for your fish.

Most importantly you will need to know what the parameters are in your tank.

QUESTIONS

What model/brand filter do you have for your tank?

How long has it been set up?

How long have you had fish in it?

Were they all added at once?

What are the fish kind and number of each kind?

What is the ph, gh/kh of the water from your faucet that you use for your fish?

What kind of dechlorinator/water treatment are you using?

What kind of food? (usually there is too much food fed)

What are your maintenance practices? How often do you do a water change, how much water do you change? Do you vacuum the substrate?

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You probably don't need to use the PH adjuster stuff. It is hard for even experienced fish keepers to use those kind of chemicals and do it well.

Fish can get sick from the changes in pH. More than slightly differing PH to their preferred number or range.

 

[FreshwaterGurl]

Hello thank you for replying to my post!
I did a cycle without fish and slowly added ammonia to my tank for about two weeks.
Everything was fine with my female betta and three tetras in my 10 gallon tank. But after I introduced the cory catfish and another female betta that is when is started to look cloudy. I thought maybe some type of disease or bad bacteria was in the water so that is when I replaced my filter cartridge. I only did a 40% water change thinking that the good bacteria that I created in the beginning would still be there but I guess not. I been doing some research and someone said to do a lot of water changes to help "dilute the bacteria bloom" which I am not sure is the best thing to do. I also have stopped turning on my hood light for a long period of time.
I have a 10 gallon filter from aqueoun that came in a like deluxe combo with the hood and tank.
It has been set up for about a month and half. I have had fish in it for about a week and maybe two days.
The ph of my tap water at home is like above a 8.5 so in the beginning i added Tetra Easy Balance and Tetra Aquasafeplus for dechlorinator
For food I have been giving them betta flakes and freeze dried bloodworms. Then every other a very small piece of a algae tablet.
I started doing every Sunday a like 30% water change.
I use sand as substrate so normally I vacuum just the top then use like a bamboo skewer to like pole holes in the sand to let any ammonia or anything to get out.
Yah its been a fight trying to keep the ph down cause the next night like over 12 hrs it starts creeping back up.

 

[Autumnsky]

The first thing is that 2 weeks of ammonia treatment in the tank to cycle probably wasn't long enough. The bb break down the ammonia, and they really can't live unless they have food (disclaimer -not a scientist maybe the words used here could be better but I imagine you get the idea)

It most always takes 5-6 weeks - approximate depends on tank temps and pH, etc.

If the water is almost shimmery and so cloudy it kinda looks like milky water, then I would think bacteria bloom.

Not the kind of BB you need for breaking down ammonia for the nitrogen cycle. Similar process but different bacteria type.

Make sure you keep up monitoring your ammonia (can spike with the Bbloom), Nitrite and Nitrate in case your cycling wasn't quite finished yet.

Just still don't change the filter pads. The BBloom will go away with out changing the water in a few to about 21 days. (providing the water parameters are safe for fish.

What are the water parameters right now?

You can do some serious gravel vacuuming to help get any excess organics out of the substrate.

Do you have Prime?

To summerize: If you clean the substrate well and the parameters are in a safe level you can just wait and moniter the parameters on a daily basis, and reduce feeding amounts as well. They cycle will continue and your bbloom will go away.

Another thing that is helpful would be to increase aeration. This can be done with an additional air pump, or turning it up if you have an adjustable one. Or if you have a hang on the back (HOB) filter, you can lower the level of the water in the tank a couple inches and make sure that the filter is set to the higher + level, so more water goes through causing more aeration. You can reduce the level after the bloom dissipates.