Are Smaller Tanks Easier to Maintain than Larger tanks?

[bigdaddymagnum]

Your confusing the issue guy's, he is here for advice not bickering..........

+1 i agree with you... but theres always 1 person who has to disagree with the masses and use inteluctual language and analogies to proove something... its annoying honestly..

 

[aqua_holic]

Yes and there is no shortage of people who blindly parrot what they hear without a second thought, and get all defensive when questioned.

There's a lot to be learned from discussing ideas, but that can only happen if people check their attitudes at the door.

 

[Ricky 1]

Calm down and give some advice to the poster/thread

 

[aqua_holic]

Calm down and give some advice to the poster/thread

I'm quite calm. As I said in my first post, I haven't experienced size of the tank to play any role in how difficult it is to maintain. 2.5 gallon or 125, it's no different for me. The difference between a 75 and a 50 (the OPs original question) is a matter of time draining and filling, of which they were already aware. Other than that, one will be no easier or harder to maintain than the other. If water change time is a factor, then there are ways to cut that down to a fraction of how long it currently takes. If the OP would like to learn how to cut water change times by at least 50%, I would be happy to explain. That's real world, practical advice.

 

[dalto]

In theory small tanks shouldn't "spike" any faster than large ones because they should be stocked proportionally to their size.

I feel that people who say small tanks are harder to maintain water quality with either don't have experience with large tanks or their large tanks are very lightly stocked.

Overstocked is overstocked, no matter how big your tank is.

I actually agree with this in aquariums where you are not dosing any additives which require specific concentrations. i.e. Your average freshwater tank.

I mean considering it logically, what are you doing that would make your water chemistry change? Almost any other problem, excessive nitrates or too much ammonia too manage during the cycle either comes from overstocking or stocking too quickly. The difference is that adding one more fish in a 10g aquarium might make you 20% overstocked where adding the same fish in a 100g aquarium will only make you 2% overstocked.

It really is about appropriate stocking levels.

Now, it may be harder in the marine case, where you have an inexperienced person trying to set a specific salinity and small dosing mistakes causing larger shifts but I struggle with it really being *that* much harder. But since that is not my area of expertise I don't really know.

theres always 1 person who tries to re invent the wheel... for years veteran tank owners have said small tanks water chemistry can change quicker due to smaller water volume.. that goes for tempeture as well... right away you jump to overstocking issues to try and proove something.. theres more to water than ammonia...btw not one part of my statement mentioned overstocking....

The problem is that a huge part of the knowledge that we aquarists have trusted over the years have turned out to be myths. We need to discuss and question these things to find the truth so we can move forward.

 

[aqua_holic]

It used to be believed and propagated (and still is in some dark corners of the Internet) that small tanks were incapable of being cycled. I was on a betta site once (not long ago) where that was the prevailing view, something that "everyone knew". It took a while, but after much resistance people finally came around and I am proud to say that that is no longer the forums viewpoint.

 

[Mattyfelts]

I think smaller tanks are easier, financially... [lighting, amount of ferts, amount of substrate] and water change wise.

But stocking wise, smaller tanks are much harder.

 

[aqua_holic]

And cheaper to stock. I can say I've never spent $500 stocking a 10 gallon FW tank....

I agree, the list of fish that are appropriate for a 10 gallon tank is SIGNIFICANTLY shorter than that for, say a 55. And the cost of overstocking a 10 is significantly less than that of a 55. In the example dalto used - adding one fish to a 10 could overstock by 20%. Adding that same fish to a 100 (proportionately stocked) would only overstock by 2%. Adding 10 such fish to that 100 would be the equivalent of adding just that one to the 10, and costs 10 times as much.

 

[RussSerio]

Fresh or salt....smaller is never easier!

 

[bigdaddymagnum]

Fresh or salt....smaller is never easier!

thank you...

 

[dalto]

Fresh or salt....smaller is never easier!

I can tell you from experience it is a *lot* easier to maintain a 10g tank than a 200g tank.

 

[leah.stewart]

it totally depends clean up wise you wont see a ton of difference but in a small tank, when and if things go wrong you have much less time to find it amd get it under control

 

[aqua_holic]

I had a large pleco get stuck in a piece of decor and die in a 125. I had no extra time before fish started dying...

 

[Ricky 1]

With all respect to Dalto, I have read larger tanks are easier to cope with water parameters than small tanks.......

 

[trennamw]

With all respect to Dalto, I have read larger tanks are easier to cope with water parameters than small tanks.......

I think where many of us digress is what the OP meant by easier.

My 3 gallon is "easier" than my 29 in that it's a piece of cake to do a water change.

My 29 is "easier" than my 3 in that it's water parameters are incredibly stable.

Both are a little overstocked, the 3 has a betta and a snail, and the 29 is at 110%.

I personally find the 10 gallon the hardest because its water parameters change quickly and I have to haul out the bucket and big siphon to do a meaningful water change.

We all have different ideas of what hard means. Hard to keep stable ... Hard to clean ... Hard to ask questions about without the forum erupting into childish bickering ...


Sent from my iPhone with three hands tied behind my back.

 

[bigdaddymagnum]

lets just all agree that it depends on personal opinion.... im sure we all have healthy tanks so one mans challenge is another mans piece of cake.... apologies if i came off bickering....

 

[Eggheadfish]

Sorry to hear about the situation OP...it's unlikely your dorm will let you keep a sizeable tank, as one post mentions typically 10 gallons is the limit. But if you can't take it, don't want to give anything away, and aren't sure your family has the knowledge to maintain it, you could try looking for someone in your area in the hobby who would do at least the weekly cleaning and PWC for some cash. Also, if someone else is feeding my fish I premeasure everything into weekly pill boxes. Best of luck!

 

[dalto]

it totally depends clean up wise you wont see a ton of difference but in a small tank, when and if things go wrong you have much less time to find it amd get it under control

Why do you believe this, can you give some examples? Which things can go wrong?

I think where many of us digress is what the OP meant by easier.

Good point, the OPs original question, at least how I interpreted it was more about ease of maintenance than ease of maintaining stable water parameters.

Also, if someone else is feeding my fish I premeasure everything into weekly pill boxes. Best of luck!

I do the same thing! The only way I have found that keeps other from overfeeding the fish.

Honestly, I cannot speak for anyone else but I am not arguing just to be a troll or because I am mad about what someone said. I am doing it because I believe that there are an unreasonably large number of fish keeping myths out there and that it is important to question things that don't make sense or I don't yet understand the reasoning for. I have made the same statement about smaller tanks that I am now arguing against many times over the years. However, after thinking about it, I no longer believe it to be true. I am legitimately trying to be educated here and would gladly change my opinion if facts came to light to support it.

The problem I have in this particular case is that the primary counter arguments seem to be that it is true because many people say it is true or people have read that it is true. IMO, this is not a meaningful reason.

The primary thing that is being stated is that "parameters" either are difficult to maintain or swing too fast in smaller tanks. So, here is my reasoning for why I think this is mostly a myth. Here are the parameters that I typically track in a freshwater aquarium.

Ammonia - It should be 0 in a cycled aquarium regardless of size.
Nitrite - It should be 0 in a cycled aquarium regardless of size.
Nitrate - The nitrate growth rate is almost entirely based on stocking levels regardless of tank size.
GH - I cannot think of any reason why GH management would be different in a small tank. The only possible reason would be if you were dosing additives to alter GH. However, given the quantity that GH additives are dosed I don't think this would be an issue even a 10g tank.
Temperature - The rate at which temperature changes due to external factors varies pretty greatly with aquarium shape and thickness. The thicker glass present in large tanks can help serve as an insulator. However, since most people use heaters with built in thermostats I really have never seen this as a practical issue. The one exception to this I might bring up is very small aquariums where a standard heater will not fit inside them. But now we are getting in the ~2g tank range.
KH - See GH above. I believe the same rationale holds true.
pH - pH is the one place I can see that there could be an legitimate difficulty in keeping smaller tanks. However, this would only be in situations where you are dosing chemicals to maintain very low pH and KH. That being said, I don't think this is a very common situation. In more typical situations as long as your bio-load/stocking level is appropriate you should not have any more or less issues than with larger tanks.

Now if we switch away from stable water parameters for a minute and start talking about maintenance, it is definitely more work to maintain bigger tanks. Especially when the size difference becomes extreme. For example, maintaining a 10g tank and a 20g tank is pretty much the same effort. But comparing the 10g to a 200g is a lot different. It is partially because of the water volume difference but the bigger issue by far is that it gets hard to reach things in taller tanks.

Now, the real issue I have see smaller tanks is that people tend to overstock them more. Either because the fish they want are too big or they decide to put too many in there. When people ask me what the ideal size first tank is I almost always point them to the standard 75g. It just presents the widest variety of stocking options at a reasonable cost.

These opinions form the basis for my above statements. I hope that it at least helps clarify *why* I am making the statements I am making.

I would love to hear the counter arguments and have a civil discussion on the topic.

 

[bigdaddymagnum]

+1 with the pill box idea.... my thought that larger would be more stable is based simply on the fact i believe a larger amount of water would take larger quantity of heat, time, or chemical to change things such as temp and ph rendering them easier to handle... for instance if the PH up bottle reads 10 drops per gallon... that few extra drops if amistake is made should in theory make a more dramatic difference in a 10 gallon vs a 90 ... i believe the same for heating the tank if your heater breaks temp drops should take longer to change in a 90 vs a 10.... i could be wrong, however....

 

[Ricky 1]

Relatively large home aquaria resist rapid fluctuations of temperature and pH, allowing for greater system stability. Large volumes of water enable more stability in a tank by diluting effects from death or contamination events that push an aquarium away from equilibrium. The bigger the tank, the easier such a systemic shock is to absorb, because the effects of that event are diluted. For example, the death of the only fish in a 11 litres (3 US gal) causes dramatic changes in the system, while the death of that same fish in a 400 litres (110 US gal) tank with many other fish in it represents only a minor change. For this reason, hobbyists often favor larger tanks, as they require less attention. Ricky 1