How do you do water changes?

[xraycer]

I noticed a few of your don't actually vacuum your substrate. Why is that? I have BB in my HOB filter, canister filter & sponge filters. As it is I would be concerned that I may have too much BB which could be costing me oxygen saturation levels if it wasn't for how much surface disturbance I get from all of the aforementioned items. Are you not worried about what's building up in your substrate?

I do vacuum the substrate but not as frequently as wc. All my tanks are sand and the poo sits right on top, so most of the poo will get disintegrated by the fish sifting around while searching for food. The disintegrated food gets broken down into fine particles where it is light enough to float around in the tanks current most will ultimately end up getting sucked into the filters

 

[LS2012]

Here's the info on the python. http://www.pythonproducts.com/products.html

 

[TimnKasey]

Thanks! I only have 1 120g tank right now. My hose to faucet adapter and expanding hose will probably do.
For draining water I do use a vacuum/siphon hose.
Im not a big vacuumer either, and I have about 2 inches gravel for substrate. Never had any issues with nitrate/nitrite/ph levels and weve had tanks for about 8 yrs now.
Guess weve been lucky? Lol

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[Jer]

Thanks! I only have 1 120g tank right now. My hose to faucet adapter and expanding hose will probably do.
For draining water I do use a vacuum/siphon hose.
Im not a big vacuumer either, and I have about 2 inches gravel for substrate. Never had any issues with nitrate/nitrite/ph levels and weve had tanks for about 8 yrs now.
Guess weve been lucky? Lol

You'll probably be alright. When I finally broke down my 55gal I had it set up for over a decade and even still had an undergravel filter. Over the years I wasn't aware of how much sludge was actually underneath that thing until I tore it all down. It was fine back when that was part of my primary filtration system (and a canister or HOB as I recall) and so the BB (Beneficial Bacteria) all lived down there but you can actually have too much BB and it will cause your oxygen levels in your water to decrease which makes it harder for your fish to 'breath' which can be evidenced by visually opening and closing their mouths more in an effort to take in more water. There are tons of factors that add or subtract for this though (water temps for instance) so it's difficult to say if this is your cause or not. All I know is that contrary to popular belief you can actually have too much BB which is one thing I was guilty of for a long time.

I also saw someone mention replacing their water with R.O. water which I would warn against. We have a whole-house RO system and I used this for quite some time to replace my aquarium water until I learned that RO strips everything out which sounds good on the surface but there's a lot of things in there you actually want. You need a buffer in the water to help avoid spikes in certain other elements. It's complicated to explain quickly but I now just use tap water (lucky enough to have great city water) which I treat for chlorine/chloramine and I feel like my water conditions and fish are much healthier as a result. I also use much less water since RO systems waste a substantial amount of water to make RO water. As I recall it dumps about 3gal to every gallon of processed water. If you multiple this over the size of most of our aquariums several times a month that's a LOT of money wasted. Now, our city captures this waste water and treats it so I use the term 'waste' loosely as it just means that it costs more money since it's not being ruined or anything like that.

 

[Woefulrelic]

I noticed a few of your don't actually vacuum your substrate. Why is that? I have BB in my HOB filter, canister filter & sponge filters. As it is I would be concerned that I may have too much BB which could be costing me oxygen saturation levels if it wasn't for how much surface disturbance I get from all of the aforementioned items. Are you not worried about what's building up in your substrate?

Sand is a bit more forgiving in these regards. I run PFS with geos, sand sifters, and they constantly remodel the tank as they see fit. I rarely do too much vacuuming because of this, but I'm over filtered and have a large pothos plant. My biggest concern is that my BB might not be building up to a desirable level because the pothos eats so many nutrients.

This is what it looked like about 2 months ago, now it's even bigger. I could snap a pic of growth if anyone is interested lol.

I also saw someone mention replacing their water with R.O. water which I would warn against. We have a whole-house RO system and I used this for quite some time to replace my aquarium water until I learned that RO strips everything out which sounds good on the surface but there's a lot of things in there you actually want. You need a buffer in the water to help avoid spikes in certain other elements. It's complicated to explain quickly but I now just use tap water (lucky enough to have great city water) which I treat for chlorine/chloramine and I feel like my water conditions and fish are much healthier as a result. I also use much less water since RO systems waste a substantial amount of water to make RO water. As I recall it dumps about 3gal to every gallon of processed water. If you multiple this over the size of most of our aquariums several times a month that's a LOT of money wasted. Now, our city captures this waste water and treats it so I use the term 'waste' loosely as it just means that it costs more money since it's not being ruined or anything like that.

If your looking to filter your water without losing the valuable elements you could look into an HMA filter. (heavy metal filter) They do a similar job but don't take out the parts that you want in a freshwater tank. It's very similar to an RO unit, just does not include the RO membrane as far as I know.

 

[Jer]

Thanks for the heads up but I'm pretty content with my current setup as I'm fortune we have good water. I may look into doing a plant like that though. I've tried them in the past but they were all in-tank & my cichlids would make pretty quick work of them unfortunately so I gave up on doing live plants.

 

[Woefulrelic]

Thanks for the heads up but I'm pretty content with my current setup as I'm fortune we have good water. I may look into doing a plant like that though. I've tried them in the past but they were all in-tank & my cichlids would make pretty quick work of them unfortunately so I gave up on doing live plants.

I use the aqueon quietflow 55/75 with walmart brand pothos. I'm going to experiment with pond plants this winter, the floating kind that cannot survive winter, watter lettuce and such. Pothos works pretty well because it is low light, the other plants I try will be under a window sill to hopefully make it work and survive until winter so I don't have to buy new plants. With the filter I mentioned you cut out some of the air holes to make a small area for the pothos plant to stand out of. The roots easily reach the water, and the leaves never submerge. No chance of them getting torn up, and it cuts through all the nitrates, to the point where I'm worried it's too effective. My water changes so far are a bit superficial because I don't have a TDS reader, and that will tell me if anything gets to a level of toxicity I should be worried about. It is easily one of the best investments in my fishkeeping career, it's a highflow filter that will run you ~30 and an area you can easily cut out for pothos. Water based plants won't work so well, and with the high success rate of pothos I have had no need to extend my search. In the event I intended to set up a terrarium I would probably experiment, but for now I will test water based plants on top the water with decent flow.
I learned it from a filter I already had from a post from the same person that predates this one a bit. http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/f...s-going-on!!&p=7004818&viewfull=1#post7004818

 

[xraycer]

If you don't mind the look, you can use these suction-cup shower accessories (got mine at Walmart)

 

[mudbuttjones]

Pothos on deck!



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[pops]

I siphon all tanks out the window or sliding glass door, 180g,90g,75g,75g. I use the passive pump on the python to do the 40g grow out. and fill them all with it.