Cichlid Tank - never clean

[piranha45]

I do 90% water changes every week, the bigger fish have a little trouble staying upright for 5 minutes before the water comes back in. I'd hardly call that cruel treatment

nitrate is the food source of aquatic plants. beyond that, i dont know how it works. the plants-in-sump seems sorta reasonable, but hopefully someone with some more knowledge could tell us if that actually works or not.

 

[trogdor1980]

Thanks Piranha45! Sounds good...

BTW, how big is your tank & whats the bioload & filtration. If you look lengthwise down it can you clearly see through it?

 

[piranha45]

my tank is kept inside in a fairly dark room, not exposed to any sunlight or high-powered lighting whatsoever, so algae is almost nonexistent on it; very clear. perhaps once every couple of months ill have a little brown algae to scrape off.

my tank is visible by checking Personal Gallery http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/gallery/showgallery.php/cat/500/ppuser/20

its a 200g stocked with about 25 different fish ranging from 3" to 8" in length. also have a 55g, no pics of it tho

 

[trogdor1980]

Hey Pirhana, thats a cool tank!

I was meaning to ask - the substrate looks like sand. How do you find sand as opposed to gravel for showing up dirt, and retaining dirt? What size sand do you use?

I want sand for my new tank (imo looks way better) but wanted some opinions before ordering bags upon bags of the stuff!

Any advice on this?

Thanks agaiN!

 

[piranha45]

fish crap rests on top of the sand. If there's no/few decorations for the water current (that which is created by the filtration) to make the crap collect around, it'll be very visible. its very easy to suck up though; no thorough digging like you'd have to do with gravel.

if you have a ton of decorations, like myself, you can hardly ever vacuum the sand at all and still not notice the waste.

 

[sleepyflight]

Ok, not that I'm disagreeing but 90% changes every week??????? Damn!!!! I'll just say whats happening in my many tanks.... I've had succesful breeding in each (I love bying by the pair) and for the most part I've been able to transfer to any tank before the fry are free swimming and have had no issues. I pretty much refill once a week and do a 25 to 50% water change a month or sometimes closer to 3 weeks. If fry to well and colors are good and nothing looks dingy it can't be so bad. I do keep a couple inches of gravel on the bottom (2-4) so maybe lotta gravel helps. Anyways, fish waste through the cycle process will contribute to algea....I've always cut down on the feed a bit, lessen light time(in your case I say you have too little already) and hit it with some Algea Fix. It has never wacked the live plants I've kept as long as used in correct dosage(if you have live plants). Not sure what huge and many water changes will do for algea but has never made a difference either way. Algea is a type of plant from my knowledge that large water changes probably won't help anyways simply because you have to kill the bloom or it will continue and contaminate all that freshly changed water in a day or so anyways. And I thought UV ster. were supposed to help with this sort of thing.

 

[piranha45]

Changing 90% of your water is an extremely difficult, challenging endeavour; you must leave the siphon in the tank for 5-30 minutes longer than normal.

 

[WckedMidas]

100% Incorrect.




BTW- Please disregaurd all the above posts. They are all incorrect, except for the recomendation to cover the tank up completely.

Now how can you make a statement or coment like that?
Its proven to much light will cause floating algea blooms for one. Second if he does have a floating algea bloom . Doing mad watter changes just feeds the problem. And only prolongs it from clearing up.

 

[PeacockBass]

Now how can you make a statement or coment like that?
Its proven to much light will cause floating algea blooms for one. Second if he does have a floating algea bloom . Doing mad watter changes just feeds the problem. And only prolongs it from clearing up.

Oh? Please, explain to me exactly what happens.

How does a water change FEED the problem? WHAT is FEEDING the algae? WHAT is it EATING thats in the "new" water? HOW is it prolonging the problem? Oh? Oh?

Please, elaborate.

 

[buddah101]

dude chill with the watter changes. cut the lights off for a couple days on the tank. Let it finish its cycle if you dont cut off the lights it will never stop . Same with the watter changes you feed the algea bloom thats growing in the watter every time you do a change on the tank. One of the causes could be direct sunlight on the tank. Or even to much light from your light strips. I dont no if it in front a window or what.

How long has it been set up and running

Agreed. You have an algae bloom. turn off your lights for a few days.