changing the filter/keeping the aquarium clean?

[dannyboy]

I have a 60 gallon aquarium with two turtles in it. I feed them dog food. In three weeks the tank is cloudy and green.
I also try to take the top of the filter off and water spills out. The filter is a large Magnum, but I'm not sure which model. What am I doing wrong?
P.S. I inherited these animals in my classroom, and I want to keep them.

 

[dannyboy]

 

[Allivymar]

I am unfamiliar with how the Magnum works specifically, but my guess if you are only cleaning the filters once every 3 weeks, its probably often not enough and the filter media has clogged up long before. Maybe cleaning it out once a week would help?

 

[Terry]

The dog food thing i haven't heard of before, there are loads of Turtle foods on the market and some of the bigger lfs might stock them. I would have thought that dog food would be very heavy on your filter system if they are not eating it all. I agree with Allivymar that it probably needs cleaning more often.

 

[tkos]

I would suggest that you definately get to the LFS and buy some proper turtle food for these guys. It will help the turtles live a better life anyway. Ans yes, do clean that filter at least every week. That means taking the filter media out and rinsing it off to get rid of the gunk. But do not change the media as that is where all the good bacteria that help to keep the water clean are living. And change at least 30% of the water in the tank everyweek as well. Turtles are very messy critters and you will be doing them a world of good by changing that water more often.

The cloudy green water is possibly a combination of a bacterial bloom and maybe an algae bloom, or could be just too much excess materials floating in the water.