Am I working too hard?

[Joshuakahan]

I have a heavily stocked 120 4x2x2
1 Senegal bichir
1 Delhezi
1 elingatus shovelnose
1 belly crawler pike
1 Warmouth
1 green severum
1 African leaf fish
All fish are in the 6-10” range except the leaf fish which is about 4”
Filters are 2 AC70
1 biowheel 350
1 fluval 306
I do 50% WC weekly and do a rotation on cleaning the filters weekly
My parameters are good,
Do I need to continue as I’m doing or am I over doing it? Tanks been running with the current stock for about 1.5 yrs.
I know I could have fewer larger filters but I get most of my equipment thru trades with other hobbyists.
Thanks for any input
I have 7 other tanks running as well, but they’re not over stocked

 

[twentyleagues]

I have a heavily stocked 120 4x2x2
1 Senegal bichir
1 Delhezi
1 elingatus shovelnose
1 belly crawler pike
1 Warmouth
1 green severum
1 African leaf fish
All fish are in the 6-10” range except the leaf fish which is about 4”
Filters are 2 AC70
1 biowheel 350
1 fluval 306
I do 50% WC weekly and do a rotation on cleaning the filters weekly
My parameters are good,
Do I need to continue as I’m doing or am I over doing it? Tanks been running with the current stock for about 1.5 yrs.
I know I could have fewer larger filters but I get most of my equipment thru trades with other hobbyists.
Thanks for any input
I have 7 other tanks running as well, but they’re not over stocked

Well it sounds like all is well. What do tests say? I started testing weekly again as I felt as you do. Some of my tanks can go two or three weeks before a water change is necessary. Others need weekly waterchange. Testing is the only way to be sure, otherwise I'd stay the course it seems to be working for you.

 

[dr exum]

sounds like you got it dialed in...

i suppose heaps of plants up top or nitrate reactor....

pics?

 

[Joshuakahan]

Well it sounds like all is well. What do tests say? I started testing weekly again as I felt as you do. Some of my tanks can go two or three weeks before a water change is necessary. Others need weekly waterchange. Testing is the only way to be sure, otherwise I'd stay the course it seems to be working for you.

I test every two or three weeks, zero ammonia and nitrite and around 10 on the nitrate. I can keep doing what I’m doing, I just didn’t feel like doing it today lol but I’m pretty religious about my WC schedule, maybe I’ll skip the next week and see what the test says, do you think my filtration is good for the load?

 

[Joshuakahan]

sounds like you got it dialed in...

i suppose heaps of plants up top or nitrate reactor....

pics?

I’ve thought about some easy plants for that purpose ,like Brazilian waterweed, I just thought the severum might rip them up. My nitrates are usually around 10ppm
Here’s a pic from a couple months ago. I have two biowheels here, but I’ve since replaced one BW with two AC70s

 

[esoxlucius]

I have a heavily stocked 120 4x2x2
1 Senegal bichir
1 Delhezi
1 elingatus shovelnose
1 belly crawler pike
1 Warmouth
1 green severum
1 African leaf fish
All fish are in the 6-10” range except the leaf fish which is about 4”
Filters are 2 AC70
1 biowheel 350
1 fluval 306
I do 50% WC weekly and do a rotation on cleaning the filters weekly
My parameters are good,
Do I need to continue as I’m doing or am I over doing it? Tanks been running with the current stock for about 1.5 yrs.
I know I could have fewer larger filters but I get most of my equipment thru trades with other hobbyists.
Thanks for any input
I have 7 other tanks running as well, but they’re not over stocked

Heavier stocked tanks require more work and it looks like your extra work on yours is paying off because you're keeping your parameters good. Your comment about doing your water changes religiously but you just didn't feel like doing it today? Is it getting a bit much for you? You have multiple tanks, is there a possibility you could thin out your stock thus reducing maintainance on your 120g?

 

[Joshuakahan]

Heavier stocked tanks require more work and it looks like your extra work on yours is paying off because you're keeping your parameters good. Your comment about doing your water changes religiously but you just didn't feel like doing it today? Is it getting a bit much for you? You have multiple tanks, is there a possibility you could thin out your stock thus reducing maintainance on your 120g?

I think I was just having a moment when I posted this lol . I love this hobby, I had just did my maintenance on 4 tanks in the garage, I’m in Phoenix and my garage is 110f and very humid from the fans. But I did my 120 WC anyway. I may skip a week and test my parameters tho. If I have to do weekly, it is what it is, I love how my 120 is stocked. Maybe I should invest in a bucketless system

 

[jjohnwm]

I completely agree with twentyleagues and esoxlucius on this; the price to be paid for high stocking densities is always more effort and work expended on maintenance, especially water changes. Plenty of people say they want all those fish, and they don't mind the work, and it's worth it to them...but after days stretch into months and months stretch into years it becomes tempting to say "Nah...I'll skip a week...what can it hurt?"

And if that trend continues, they inevitably find out "what it can hurt"...

Congrats on your commitment to the hobby and on achieving a nice balance with this tank. Don't mess it up. Keep on keeping on, and if you do start to falter, just remember that reducing your stocking density will allow you to relax your pace a bit and will still make for attractive and interesting tanks. They don't all need to be seething with fish. Good luck!

 

[Joshuakahan]

Well it sounds like all is well. What do tests say? I started testing weekly again as I felt as you do. Some of my tanks can go two or three weeks before a water change is necessary. Others need weekly waterchange. Testing is the only way to be sure, otherwise I'd stay the course it seems to be working for you.

Here’s a very late update to my post, but when I posted this I was doing my WCs using a bucket, i since got a water changer and that has totally eliminated days like this lol why did I wait so long

 

[duanes]

To me a 50% water change is not much effort, I tend to do a 30-40% water change every other day on heavily stocked tanks, and considered that normal.
All your fish at this point are relatively small so your current regime may work for a while, but as the fish grow, it would seem to me your water change schedule and volume may need to be up graded..
Although filtration may help, it really does nothing to reduce nitrate, so as soon as you see nitrate rise, if numbers start to creep above 10 ppm, or you see pH numbers fluctuate a point (ex a drop of 7.5 to 6.5) or more between water changes, I believe it will be time to consider a twice per week 50% schedule as being more adequate.