Weekly mantainence

[BmxBandGeek]

OKAY!..reading on this board i found weekly water changes are a must..can anyone type out a weekly mantainence, or send me a site for mantainence?...im gonna print out the list and tape it to the side of my hood..its a 40gal eclipse, unplanted, with 12 fish and gravel substraight

 

[MikeWinLDS]

All I do is gravel vacuum and change out the water. That's it.

While I'm vacuuming, water will automatically be sucked out, so I gotta replace it. At most, I change out 50% of the water. What other maintenance is there? I clean out my filter media when it gets too dirty, not on a schedule. If you feed your fish on a weekly basis, well, that's probably a problem.

 

[BmxBandGeek]

what do u mean cleaning the filter?..just wipe off all the crud on the pad? or actually replace the media?

 

[MikeWinLDS]

Currently (it's not my tank, but my parents, although I probably "mess" with it the most), I have a Whisper 30-60, which has two compartments and each compartment holds a floss-bag and a black sponge. When the floss bag gets too dirty, I take it over to the sink and thouroughly rinse it out so that it's white again and not dirty brown. The reason behind only doing one of them instead of both of them is that I don't destroy all my beneficial bacteria.

I did an experiment one day and rinsed out all of the filter media, and nothing bad happened (tested the water parameters after a while). I'm guessing the bacteria in other places in my tank, such as in the substrate and decorations quickly re-colonized the filter media. Take of it what you will, but to be safe, don't clean or change out all your filter media at one time. I find cleaning my filter media under the sink, rather than in spent tank water (so your bacteria doesn't die), is a lot faster and convenient for me.

 

[Menagerie]

OKAY!..reading on this board i found weekly water changes are a must..can anyone type out a weekly mantainence....

I do not recommend a 50% water change, unless there is an emergency with high nitrites or ammonia.
For a 40 gal, doing 25% water change weekly:
~Remove 10 gals while vacuuming the gravel.
~If you are siphoning out the water into a bucket, clean the filter pad once a month in the bucket of dirty water. Simply shake the pad side to side, it should still look "dirty," but the big crud will fall off. Rinsing under tap water is fine, but don't excessively rinse, there is no need to remove EVERYTHING from the media pad. ~Replace the media pad in the filter when it starts to fall apart.
~Temperature macth the tap water and add enough dechlor to take care of 10 gals.
~Add the tap water.
~Sit back and enjoy your fish

 

[LAGlocker]

Thats about the easiest. And if you do replace filter media, I suggest placing the extra media into your filter(if you have the room to do so) into the filter for about a week or so before you change the old set out. This works great if you are using floss or one of those sponge pads. If not, and you have a extra filter laying around, hook it up and let it run for a week or so, this gets the floss or pad colonized with bacteria so you dont have spikes once you change out the media. If you are using carbon in your filter, replace it once a month of so is what most do, but again do not replace all filter media at the same time.

 

[Christmasfish]

I do 50% weekly on all my tanks. I do TWO 50% changes on my overstock tank.
WE do 20% as needeed but the 50's remain fixedd in schedule. Even if the readings are fine the water will be stale and used up. Specially soft water like mine.

It really depends on how many fish you have and how sensetive they are to water quality......... And how large a body of water you have to work with. Smaller tank=more frequent changes. Overstock=frequent changes. Sensetive fish=frequent changes. Heh....get the gist?

My 20 long with 3 5 inch fish gets one 50% per week.

My 40 gallon gets 2 50s and some 20s. It has at this moment 27 fish.

 

[BmxBandGeek]

ok..getting this straight..25% water changes weekly...then rinse off the filter pad?

then monthly change filter (i dont have a refillible one)?

since my fish are hardie i think rinsing the filter in tap water wont hurt

is this right? 1/4 water change weekly, while thats happenin, clean my filter pad, then monthly put in new filters?

 

[LAGlocker]

You dont have to change the filter out really, unless it starts falling apart, at least with the floss type filters or sponges. IF you are using carbon media, and you really want to keep using carbon, then that needs to be changed. Other than that, just rinse the filter media in the used tank water and put it back into the filter itself.

 

[Menagerie]

I meant for you to clean the filter pads monthly. They shouldn't get so gross on a weekly basis. Only replace the pads when they are falling apart.

 

[Christmasfish]

since my fish are hardie I think rinsing the filter in tap water wont hurt

?

Eek! The chlorine will kill your bacterial media!!

Just swish it in tank water til the chunks come off..which should be quite some time in the future...I barely had to swish my one pad now at month 6!
My sponge flter gets a cleaning every other month or as needed.I check my parameters before getting to excited about that one tho.

And you put a term in there that just didn't look good as used. What "HARDY" fish are these? How do you know they are hardy? Hardy to what conditions? Some fish that seem to survive being kept in an ammonia bottle will totally succumb to a mere trace of NitrAte. You never know....
And who told you that in what context? Hardy first fish is not the same as guinea pig for hellish conditions.Sounds almost like you picked something "hardy" to cycle your tank. Or cheap like feeder golds or feeder guppies. Not nice, if so. Labyrinths also (gourami/betta/paradise) are not hardy fish.they are evolved to hot muddy soft deoxygenated water parameters.. but not venusian conditions...!

 

[shawmutt]

Here's my routine for my 30 gallon, (my 10 gallon is very similiar except for the filter routine):

Daily:
Make sure there's water in the tank
Check water temp
Check operation of equipment
Sit and enjoy fish, and check for injury/illness
Feed fish (skip one day a week)

Weekly:
20% water change (I siphon about a gallon in a bucket, and use that water to swish the filter pads around in, getting rid of any major dirt and sludge. Then put the filter pads back in and close the filter. Then I vaccuum the sand to get rid of all the detritus until the 5 gallon bucket is full.)
Clean algae off glass
Clean the hood

Monthly:
Change the micron filter pad
Test water parameters

Quarterly:
Replace the carbon insert

Semi-Annually:
Replace the two foam filter inserts

Yearly:
Replace the light

 

[LAGlocker]

Yours is close to mine shawmutt. I test weekly though, around the time I do the water change and gravel vac(which aint easy with all the plants). I change out carbon on the tanks I use it on twice a month also.