New Driftwood in Planted Tank

[Ac30fan]

I purchased some driftwood online (from Drs Foster & Smith) and have been soaking it for several weeks - an attempt to minimize staining my tank with unwanted tea colored water.

The wood has been soaking in water removed from my tank during PWC.

I'm concerned about undesirable bacteria or other "nasties" that might have bloomed in the container holding the driftwood while soaking.

Is this a reasonable concern? What extra precautions should I follow before introducing the driftwood into my tank?

Thanks!!

 

[Ian086]

If possible, you could boil it. Also to get rid of tannins you could use some Seachem Purigen in your filter....

 

[Ac30fan]

If possible, you could boil it. Also to get rid of tannins you could use some Seachem Purigen in your filter....

Thanks, I did the boil & already have the Purigen. The boiling will hopefully help!

 

[bcarl_10gal]

What type of wood did you buy?

 

[Ac30fan]

What type of wood did you buy?

Mopani from Dr Foster & Smith

 

[angelmisty]

Boiling does help alot. I had pretty dark wood and i boiled it three times in one day. Resoaked for a week. Reboiled one last time. Very lil tannin. None since

 

[bcarl_10gal]

Mopani tends to leach more than the other types of wood. I had a piece that I boiled several times and soaked for months. I could never get it to stop leaching. Some people like the yellowish tint to the water though. Malaysian and manzanita are great options that don't leach as much as mopani. good luck!

 

[Ac30fan]

Mopani tends to leach more than the other types of wood. I had a piece that I boiled several times and soaked for months. I could never get it to stop leaching. Some people like the yellowish tint to the water though. Malaysian and manzanita are great options that don't leach as much as mopani. good luck!

Yeah, I was hoping to avoid tea water.... Maybe I'll soak & boil once more to be sure

The surprise arrival of baby Cory Cats today has postponed my aqua scape plans.

 

[Mebbid]

Mopani will turn all water tea colored. It doesn't matter much if it's boiled or not

But since you have purigen it will remove all the tannins in the water amazingly well so theres nothing to worry about.

Other things of note:

Mopani tends to get a white fungus looking growth on it after it sits in a tank for a while. This is perfectly safe, you can remove it but it will usually go away on its own.

Holding the wood at boiling temperatures for 5 - 10 minutes is going to be enough to kill everything on it.

Soaking the wood helps but after soaking my mopani for 3 weeks it still continued to turn my water brown for months afterwards. Carbon or purigen will combat this.