water clarifier?

[Rolance]

What is the best water clarifier?

 

[DanTheGuppyMan]

Personally, I do not like to use any "clarifiers" or any med type thing in my tanks, but what I have found in the past with my turtle tanks is that Acurel-F was the only off the shelf product that actually cleared up the water crystal like it says, unlike other brands.

 

[ArtesiaWells]

I agree with Dan about most of these so-called "clarifiers;" what they do is bunch up the particles in your water to be able to be sucked into the filter -- you should be getting clear water just by doing regular water changes, or if you want really pristine water conditions, drop some Seachem Purigen into your filters...but as far as water clarifiers, believe it or not I tend to stay away from, in particular, Seachem's CLARITY. This is probably the only Seachem product that I have found not to "work" all that well; it really turns your water an awful color at first before it begins "grabbing" the debris to be sucked into the filter and then at the end, after a day or so, it seems the water is only as good as it was prior to getting the stuff in there -- not really all that "crystal clear" to be honest...

But in general, stay away from medicines, water clarifiers, pH adjusters, kits that claim they will balance your water parameters for you, etc. etc...just use a good dechlorinator like Seachem's PRIME and do water changes, water changes, water changes...it's the best thing for your fish, no matter what kind of a pain in the you-know-what the changes are!

 

[DanTheGuppyMan]

Just listen to Artesia lol. Good advice. When I totally re-did my tank with new filters and all, I popped in 2 bags of purigen and put in 2 UV Sterilizers and BAM that water was crystal and I have never had any cloudy or foggy water at all since October when I did my remodel. I find UV Sterilizers are good for any tank, even though they are recommended for an algae bloom, i have two running in my tank and what they do is kill all the little microscopic bacteria and parasites and junk in the water column and spit it back out into the tank. Keeps the water clean and clear haha. Purigen also is the best thing to put in a cycled filter if you want good water qualitiy.

Yup, stay away from everything except Prime - tha is the only thing I put in my tanks other than the fertilizers!

 

[ArtesiaWells]

Absolutely, positively agreed 100-percent!

 

[Rolance]

Then prime it is!! Maybe I should try smaller water changes. Had been doing 50% often

 

[Rivercats]

Is this a newer set up tank? Does the cloudiness come back after WC's? If so you are most likely experiencing a bacterial bloom. WC's won't help but you should still do your weekly WC as normal. Usually bacterial blooms clear up on their own but if you have a persistant one a small UV sterilizer like this one.... petco.com - Green Killing Machine Internal UV Sterilizer with Power Head customer reviews - product reviews - read top consumer ratings will clear up a bacterial bloom within about 24 hours.

 

[ArtesiaWells]

Then prime it is!! Maybe I should try smaller water changes. Had been doing 50% often

Once the tank is established, you CAN stick to 50% weekly; but I think what Dan and I were saying here is that water clarifiers aren't really going to do anything...it's like putting a band-aid on a water problem (i.e. not really "solving" the issue)...

Still, if this is a bacteria bloom as suggested by 'Cats, something else is going on such as your bacteria attempting to establish itself, overfeeding...this list is almost infinite if you start considering every possibility...in these cases, water changes, as suggested, would probably not crystalize the water into pristine characteristics UNTIL things stabilize...but they couldn't hurt, per se...