Gravel Change?

[follicle]

Well, after numerous treatments and a few weeks worth of water changes, my water is still mildly cloudy. It's not horrible, but it's still annoying to look at. I know for a fact that it isn't algae bloom or anything like that, because it has no color. I've even filled a glass with the tank water and it looks fine. I've determined that I think a gravel change will do the trick, as my gravel has been in the tank for close to four years now.

Heres are my questions:

• To avoid recycling the tank, should I leave some of the old gravel in the tank (like 25% or so)?
• When changing the gravel, how much water should I remove? I have a 55 gallon, so would it be all right to remove about 50-75% of the water, or do I have to completely empty the tank?
• Any other pointers?

Thanks for any replies!

 

[angeltank]

i had this problem at one time for about a weak and half i tried everything i even did the glass thing to and sure enough it looked fine. i finaly found some stuff that takes all those little particles and clumps them together so the filter can ketch them i think its called clear water or some thing.
just wondering if you have tried some thing like that?

 

[follicle]

i had this problem at one time for about a weak and half i tried everything i even did the glass thing to and sure enough it looked fine. i finaly found some stuff that takes all those little particles and clumps them together so the filter can ketch them i think its called clear water or some thing.
just wondering if you have tried some thing like that?

Well, at first I thought it was algae, so I got these little packets by Al-Gone that you place in your filter weekly. I've been doing that now for close to a month with no results, so I'm sure it's not algae.

I also been using Tank Buddies "Water Clear" for about a week now. It seems to do something for the first hour or so, but then it coulds right back up, so I'm thinking it's stuff rising up from the gravel.

 

[jsoong]

The water clear products just clump the particles together so your filter can catch it. Some people think that the chemical might clump & clog fish's gills as well.

To avoid recycling the tank, you might want to take out maybe a 1/4 of the gravel every week. Since it is old gravel, there might be a lot of muck in it. You might stir up anoxic pockets & release poisonous gases if the gravel is deep & had not been vacuumed regularly. At the very least, doing a change will really stir up the dirt & create a big mess in the tank.

To prevent problems, I would suggest taking out all your fish & a good portion of tank water. <Put in clean buckets or rubbermaid containers.> After you redo the portion of the gravel, drain off the now mucky water from the tank, then refill with clean water & the saved tank water & fish.

That is a lot of work to go through. You might be better off if you can borrow a diatom filter (or a Magnum with the water polishing cartridge). These do a great job of removing suspended particles. And if you do through gravel vacs weekly, you might keep it clean enough to prevent more clouding.

 

[lionheart]

place a genuine polyester filter medium to your filter but dont leave it in for no longer than a week 2 weeks max then discard it, i had same problem with my gravel and this did the trick has it will trap the very fine particles which are clouding your water

 

[asudavew]

load your filter with fresh carbon

I mean LOAD it.

That should do the trick.
Carbon is safe, makes water quality better, and is cheap.

my 2 cents.