Brown cloudy water

[Opheliac]

Hi, my 55 gallon tank that has a 5 inch syndontis catfish, chocolate albino pleco and two claris catfish. The claris catfish like to burrow in the substrate. My question is would the claris catfish be making the water brown so soon after a water change. Like in two to three days the water gets brown and cloudy? How do I keep the water crystal clear like I see on here from other people's tanks.

 

[Woody83]

Any driftwood in there?

 

[Opheliac]

Hi, there's a piece of wood in there but not driftwood. It's called something else. Just don't remember the name of the wood. Bought it several months ago at Petsmart.

 

[Woody83]

I would bet on it being that leaking tannins. You can try taking it out and boiling it to see if it stops.

 

[neilanh]

Does the water appear to be stained/brown, or is there stuff floating in the water making it brown?

Tannins will stain the water, making it a tea color. Most woods will leach tannins for a while. Boiling is a process to basically force the tannins out of the wood faster.

 

[Opheliac]

The wood I purchased almost a year ago. I soaked it in water and salt for 24 hours prior to putting it in the tank. It is stained brown and nothing is floating in the water. Does anyone know anything about Claris catfish. They burrow in the substrate. Like they move the substrate around and covers themselves with it. That is what they do. I use a top fin 40 and a aquatech 30 -60 filters on this 55 gallon tank. I rinse the filters out with their tank water. The filters appear to be still intact. So I am still using them however they have been in there for over a month. However there is brown stuff like gunk in the tubing. I should add there is only a small amount of brown gunk where the water runs over the spout of the filters.