New flourite is murky; Do I keep running the filter? Help!

[betowess]

I am about 2.5 weeks through the nitrogen cycle of a new26 gallon tank. I rinsed 45 lbs of flourite three times in a 5 gallon bucket (one 15 lb. bag at a time). Boy it is murky stuff. I have added it to the tank.

I assume it would settle down alot faster without running the filter, but I am afraid if I shut down the power filter I might knock out what progress I have made thus far in the nitrogen cycle. Can I turn it off for a day or two without affecting the cycle or just should I just let the filter run? Thanks Betowess

 

[Guest]

Is it the Flourite red or the standard? And it really sounds like you did not rinse it enough or correctly.

 

[betowess]

Rex, Its standard. But I added it to a tank full of h20. That was probably my biggest mistake... Maybe I didn't rinse it enough, but I didn't want to wash away all the "good stuff". Do you think I ought to keep running the filter? Or just start over. Or wait and see what happens (letting the filter run.)

 

[Guest]

Get it out and wash it. If you want go ahead and post my PM to you here. That will help other people with how to best wash Flourite.

 

[crocodylus]

Fluorite should be rinse IMO until the water is semi clear, because if you keep washing it you will remove the iron from it, then put in the tank, cover it with a layer of regular gravel and gently pour the water into the tank. If you add it after the tank has been filled, you should keep the filter running until the water clears, it might take a few days, but it will settle. You can try putting one of those cheap corner filters with only floss in it to help out

 

[justDIY]

I don't know about washing flourite much - i've tried, and it just keeps coming out cloudy (flourite red) ... so when I setup a 10 gallon tank with it, I stopped rinsing after about 30min and just added it to the tank.

then I used a large dinner plate on top of the gravel (which is about 4" deep), and used a small water pump bring water up from a bucket and onto the dinner plate - I found that pouring the water by hand was causing way to much comotion.

anyway, after I had the tank about 80% full the water is so cloudy I could not see my hand through it. Running the filter with a fresh carbon cartridge, about 6 hours later the water was almost clear, so I planted my plants and it got all stirred up again. But this time it only took about 3 hrs to clear.

The next day it was crystal clear, so I replaced the cartridge with a plain floss (no carbon), and added a few fish.

Now a few months later, I can play with the plants no problem, and there is barely any mess, all the fine grains either sunk to the bottom of the substrate or are bound up by bacteria.

for what it's worth, this is my experience with flourite.

schultz profile is a lot less cloudy, and kitty litter is a lot more cloudy - it took my litter and gravel tank nearly a 3 days to clear.

 

[talenzmeier]

Stop Rinsing

Do not continue rinsing the flourite. As someone else said, it will dilute the effectiveness of the substrate. The murkiness ought to dissapate after a while and I would also suggest that you keep your filter running. The addition of the gravel on top of the flourite should also facilitate the settling of the water. I have flourite in one of my tanks and the cloudiness disappeared within one hour and I didn't rinse any of it.

 

[betowess]

I went ahead and rinsed the heck out of it. It took about 1 hour to get it to be quite clean (45lbs of flourite). Now the tank is clean with some Val , lloydiella, and Wisteria planted. I hope I didn't loose too much Iron. I figure it will continue to break down. Also got some 9 baby Danios and 9 young neons as starter fish. Everything is cool now! They seem to be adjusting great so far.

One other question? should I get rid of the activated carbon? Seems I have heard that the plants do better without it? Thanks for all your replies! Betowess

 

[talenzmeier]

You Can If You Want To

You can if you want to. Plants, of course, are an additional source of filtration so they may supplement the carbon.

I run carbon through my Fluval 304 and it has not had any detrimental effect that I can see. I may be wrong, but I don't think there's any harm in having it. I also regularly add plant food to my tank. I've been using Kent's product, but of course there are many out there.

 

[Guest]

Standard procedure for planted tanks is no carbon. carbon will remove trace elements your plants need to really thrive. Of course, as in all aq stuff there are exceptions. TZmeier, if you are doing fine with the carbon, good for you! All I know is I've never used any carbon in my planted tanks, fish and plants do great.

Betowess, neons were prolly not the best choice to start out with, they might not make it through the cycle. the dannios are tough little buggers, they should be fine. For the beggining stage, you should have a LOT of bunch/stem plants, they use up ammonia like crazy, should keep your fish healthy.

 

[Guest]

Fluorite should be rinse IMO until the water is semi clear, because if you keep washing it you will remove the iron from it, then put in the tank, cover it with a layer of regular gravel and gently pour the water into the tank.

And where did you get this nonsense? The only way you could "rinse" the iron out of the Flourite would be to rinse till the Flourite is dissolved. And that would take hundreds if not thousands of years.

 

[Punkymom]

I just added this stuff last night to my 55 gal. I rinsed it until I could see the stuff through the water (the water was still red, but you could see through it) then I added it to my 55 gal and my 2.5 gal. Both have completely cleared over night.

 

[justDIY]

And where did you get this nonsense? The only way you could "rinse" the iron out of the Flourite would be to rinse till the Flourite is dissolved. And that would take hundreds if not thousands of years.

I agree ... flourite and I believe profile are both pure substances, each 'grain' contains the minerals that make up the entire 'pebble' of the gravel.

I something like 1st layer laterite contains a finite amount of minerals trapped inside an inert clay, so it can 'wear out' - maybe that's were the "phobia" of washing a plant gravel too much got started!

I try not to wash mine, that is, throughly scrubbing and rinsing at nausiem, instead just rinsing lightly. I believe the smaller particles can be of some benefit, but don't know if that's based on science or frugalness