300GALLON TANKS AND UP!
- Thread starter pbass510
- Start date
pbass510;5133879; said:For all those people that have 300 gallon tanks and bigger how does it feel and do you guys put most of your money into that? Like i see monster fish tanks that are like 10,000gallons how much would their bills cost?
Fishkeeping should be funded by discretionary income. As far as "how does it feel", when our fish were moved into their 300 gallon tank, we had a great sense of relief. My husband picked up this 55 gallon tank with fish at a moving away yard sale.
When we learned about the nitrogen cycle, we had to change out about 60 gallons, (two 5 gallon buckets at a time) EVERY DAY to keep the nitrates at a reasonable level. We spent 1 - 1 1/2 hours every day sucking up fish poop. We learned our lesson well, and set up our bare floor 300 gallon tank with extreme mechanical filtration, and plumbed to do easy water changes. In 5 1/2 years, there has been nothing to vacuum out of the tank.
The larger the water volume, the easier it is to maintain good water parameters.
THe biggest thing I notice about "monster sized" tank vs standard size is the planning and prep people usually put into the bigger tanks. with the larger water volume owners generally plan out their filtration and water changeing/cleaning in advance.
So in those aspects the larger tanks are usually easier to maintain over-all because it was built-into the design/idea of the tank to begin with.
my 20 gallons are pretty easy.. 1 - 5 gallon bucket out and one in a week. nothing special, nothing complicated. It works.
imo the inbetween sizes are the worst.. where doing a 25% WC is a pita to do with buckets, but most people can't justify spending the money on a python or similar.
properly filtering a tank can also make a huge impact of general maitence.
atm my largest tank is a 75 at home but I've cared for larger tanks in the past. It always boiled down to how they where ste-up as to how much a pita they where to maintain.
So in those aspects the larger tanks are usually easier to maintain over-all because it was built-into the design/idea of the tank to begin with.
my 20 gallons are pretty easy.. 1 - 5 gallon bucket out and one in a week. nothing special, nothing complicated. It works.
imo the inbetween sizes are the worst.. where doing a 25% WC is a pita to do with buckets, but most people can't justify spending the money on a python or similar.
properly filtering a tank can also make a huge impact of general maitence.
atm my largest tank is a 75 at home but I've cared for larger tanks in the past. It always boiled down to how they where ste-up as to how much a pita they where to maintain.
If anyone remembers the 50000G tank set up by a fellow MFK member, he said he spent about 3000 dollars a month to keep it heated, filtered etc...
300G isn't too much different than the average 200 in terms of operating costs, because a sump could be used in either case just as easily... but when you start getting up into the thousands, then you're talking a whole other ball game.
300G isn't too much different than the average 200 in terms of operating costs, because a sump could be used in either case just as easily... but when you start getting up into the thousands, then you're talking a whole other ball game.
pbass510;5142079; said:
I think he's referring to the actual time spent getting things ready to do the water change. Sort of like when I change water out of my 240, all I do is stick a garden hose in it, take it out off the back porch and start a syphon. In the mean time, I clean or replace my mechanical filtration. When I do w/c on the weekend, I often clean up the house. It's more or less a waiting game when you change water via a syphon on a large tank.
