MICEY
Aquarium Advice Freak
boy I drained one of my tanks that has not had any fish in it since the winter when I lost power for a week , and I cleaned the gravel while draining it , this is a deep tank and removing the sand to wash it in a bucket is difficut without scratching the tank , the sand(white quartz) is only 1-11/2 " deep and I stirred it up while draining the tank ,
when I refilled the tank boy was I surprised at how much dirt was left
I figure all the organics have been broken down , so I just put a huge sponge filter on my canister (gal size sponge good for a 74 gal tank) intake and hope it will suck it all up
I keep stirring the sand every few hours and it is not deep enough for anaerobic bacteria to build up
after the tank clears I will clean the filter
and let it run a week or so to settle and get the temp adjusted and check the water chemistry before putting some fish in to cycle it
im running a dyi canister that should be able to handle a tank at least 3 times my tanks size , it is filled with 6 " sponge 6" pot scrubbers, 3 ft(over 1 gal ) of 1/4-1/2" lava rock , with a 250 gal/ hr pump , the canister is at the top of the tank and the pump is at mid level so it should be pumping close to capacity
do you think this plan will work ok or should I drain the tank
was thinking of doing a partial water change with a gravel cleaner
funny when I started raising fish 50 years ago , it was thought that it was better to have dirt on the bottom (mum) and that water changes where bad old water was better , lots of fish where lost before we learned better how to care for out fish
when I refilled the tank boy was I surprised at how much dirt was left
I figure all the organics have been broken down , so I just put a huge sponge filter on my canister (gal size sponge good for a 74 gal tank) intake and hope it will suck it all up
I keep stirring the sand every few hours and it is not deep enough for anaerobic bacteria to build up
after the tank clears I will clean the filter
and let it run a week or so to settle and get the temp adjusted and check the water chemistry before putting some fish in to cycle it
im running a dyi canister that should be able to handle a tank at least 3 times my tanks size , it is filled with 6 " sponge 6" pot scrubbers, 3 ft(over 1 gal ) of 1/4-1/2" lava rock , with a 250 gal/ hr pump , the canister is at the top of the tank and the pump is at mid level so it should be pumping close to capacity
do you think this plan will work ok or should I drain the tank
was thinking of doing a partial water change with a gravel cleaner
funny when I started raising fish 50 years ago , it was thought that it was better to have dirt on the bottom (mum) and that water changes where bad old water was better , lots of fish where lost before we learned better how to care for out fish
