Hello all --
I have a 55 gallon tank thats 4' long and about 20" high. I've got various cichlids (about 11) in there that are about 2.5" - 5" long in there along with a Pleco, a catfish thats about 6" long, and a crawfish.
It was my ex wifes tank and when the divorce started she stopped caring for the tank. As soon as she moved out I started taking care of it about 5 months ago. It went without care for so long, the nitrate levels were out of this world and off the charts. Nothing died - which is amazing. But now that I'm giving the tank attention, I cannot for the life of me get the nitrate levels down to a respectable level. I've done vacuuming, and water changes. I've done probably 5-6 50% water changes over the past 2 months.
The problem is that there is so much waste in the gravel that any time I move anything around in the tank, it stirs up more nitrates that are embedded in the gravel. It's pretty nasty. Every time I touch anything in the tank I think the stuff that gets stirred up just pollutes the tank again. She let it go for so long that I think something drastic needs to happen to fix it.
This has got to get under control now. What I want to do is completely clean ALL the gravel to get all that dirty stuff out of there so that I can manage it like a regular tank would be managed including all of the chemicals in the water so they can be monitored and be seen within normal ranges.
I want to take all of the fish out of the tank somehow, remove all the water, take the tank into the back yard and use the hose to literally wash all the gravel until the water runs crystal clear and then set the tank up again in the house after the water temp has come back to the right temp.
How can I do this without killing my fish? Since it will be 100% new water, can I just get the water temp up to where it should be and add conditioners and then put the fish back in?
I just have to do this right and get this tank clean and the nitrate levels under control.
I was thinking of taking all the fish out of the tank into fish bags like you do at the fish store and setting them into the top of a 10 gallon tank so they won't change temp too much while I do this. Is there any better way to do this?
If anyone has any tips for me I would appreciate it.
-Alli
I have a 55 gallon tank thats 4' long and about 20" high. I've got various cichlids (about 11) in there that are about 2.5" - 5" long in there along with a Pleco, a catfish thats about 6" long, and a crawfish.
It was my ex wifes tank and when the divorce started she stopped caring for the tank. As soon as she moved out I started taking care of it about 5 months ago. It went without care for so long, the nitrate levels were out of this world and off the charts. Nothing died - which is amazing. But now that I'm giving the tank attention, I cannot for the life of me get the nitrate levels down to a respectable level. I've done vacuuming, and water changes. I've done probably 5-6 50% water changes over the past 2 months.
The problem is that there is so much waste in the gravel that any time I move anything around in the tank, it stirs up more nitrates that are embedded in the gravel. It's pretty nasty. Every time I touch anything in the tank I think the stuff that gets stirred up just pollutes the tank again. She let it go for so long that I think something drastic needs to happen to fix it.
This has got to get under control now. What I want to do is completely clean ALL the gravel to get all that dirty stuff out of there so that I can manage it like a regular tank would be managed including all of the chemicals in the water so they can be monitored and be seen within normal ranges.
I want to take all of the fish out of the tank somehow, remove all the water, take the tank into the back yard and use the hose to literally wash all the gravel until the water runs crystal clear and then set the tank up again in the house after the water temp has come back to the right temp.
How can I do this without killing my fish? Since it will be 100% new water, can I just get the water temp up to where it should be and add conditioners and then put the fish back in?
I just have to do this right and get this tank clean and the nitrate levels under control.
I was thinking of taking all the fish out of the tank into fish bags like you do at the fish store and setting them into the top of a 10 gallon tank so they won't change temp too much while I do this. Is there any better way to do this?
If anyone has any tips for me I would appreciate it.
-Alli