How Often do you water change>?

[bigspizz]

Pics of the setups my roomie and I have going, have a few not shown that I will add later because believe it or not the pics were even worse than the ones I am going to show you lol .

These are our adult Rosy barbs and the tank they live in, they're probably moving to the show tank soon since we wont be spawning them any time soon and we need to sort some fry .

This is our newly set up 55 gallon tank with 4 cons as well as pics of each of the females in their respective hideouts.

These are my Endlers, only one good pic of a male. The tank is going to be re-done to better reflect them soon but we haven't got all the deco together yet .

Guppies

Some baby swords in a box

Our smallest Rosy barb fry, maybe you can make some out .

The adult swords

The tank we house the larger guppy platy and sword fry we have in

A cute tank filled with our medium Livebearing fry

Our display tank with 6 Bolivian Rams, 7 Neon Tetras and 6 Harlequin Rasboras

No monsters, but something different I guess Hope you enjoyed.

Sorry for paying attention.... This ^^ Is what I meant by "small fish"...You mean to tell me all of those are still alive? What about the guppies that do not exist? Stop dreaming and just post real life....I do...How am I to know you have other fish when all I have seen you post/discuss are the above fish....Next time you choose someone to blast, pick someone who has not read 95% of all text on this site...........

 

[ironmunki]

25-30% water changes weekly. I do gravel vacs with my wc as well. My water stays clear and my fish hate big water changes anyway.

 

[Tigerfish908]

50% weekly is good I think....Thats what I do anyway...

 

[navygirl76]

i do about 50-60 percent every other weekend. what fun!! lol

 

[Alistriwen]

Yes Bigspizz, you're a real nice guy and your first post to me was put in such a nice way that it was definetely me who started this... *rolls eyes* In fact, when I saw your name attached to this thread the first thing I thought was, "hey there's that guy again wonder what he's blabbing about now. You did a good job of dredging up pictures that are over a year old. I dont even live in the same place anymore. I couldn't keep larger tanks in an apartment so I kept the sizes I could. The fish pictured there were the first fish we had when we had all of 4 tanks going..

My signature hasnt been updated in months either. Perhaps because I was busy taking care of my fish instead of wasting my life away on the internet? I have 3 tanks over 100 gallons in my basement in addition to the 600 gallons worth of small tanks. I also have 11 different species of fish, none of which are guppies. You sir, need to find a life and stop trying to have pissing contests on the internet.

If you want to know why doing 50% water changes at once are bad practice I'll give you a list of reasons instead of just one.

First and foremost changing 50% of the water constitutes a rapid environmental change. You are removing half of the aged water from the tank and replacing it with tap water which contains many different additives aside from chlorine or chloramine which are either harmful or at least not beneficial to your fish. At the same time you are removing vital minerals and trace elements that develop as an aquarium matures. Another problem with changing such large amounts of water at once is temperature shift. You can try and match the temperature of the aquarium water as closely as possible but unless you have a direct guage temperature control you will be shifting the temperature of the tank rapidly and even if it is only 2 - 3 degrees it puts the fish through stress and just like a human walking from the heat into air conditioning or vice versa it has additional negative effects on the fish's natural functions and metabolism. Changing 50% of your water is usually also unneccessary in order to maintain ammonia and nitrites at 0ppm so it is bad practice simply because you are wasting water.

Will changing 50% of your tank water at once kill your fish ? Probably not. Will it have detrimental effects? Definetely. Is it neccessary? Absolutely not. If you have a tank that is so underfiltered and overstocked that 50% of the water needs to be changed every single week then the best way is to do 2 x 25% changes a few days apart.

To be perfectly honest though, I made it clear in my post that it was all my personal opinions and the question was how each person does things. No one asked you to comment on my post, and your beligerent assault on my character served no purpose other than to prove that you are indeed a jerk. You should have simply stated what you do and why you do it as I did, but you chose to start up with me as you have multiple times in the past and as usual for no reason.

If you've read 95% of this site... well that's sad and pathetic.. but obviously the 5% you didn't read were my posts in the discus section, or the african cichlid section, or the breeding section where I have countless times discussed the fish I own. I think it's great though that you adore me so much as to "pay attention" to my posts, but I really don't want your admiration.

 

[SteveR]

First and foremost changing 50% of the water constitutes a rapid environmental change. You are removing half of the aged water from the tank and replacing it with tap water which contains many different additives aside from chlorine or chloramine which are either harmful or at least not beneficial to your fish. At the same time you are removing vital minerals and trace elements that develop as an aquarium matures. Another problem with changing such large amounts of water at once is temperature shift. You can try and match the temperature of the aquarium water as closely as possible but unless you have a direct guage temperature control you will be shifting the temperature of the tank rapidly and even if it is only 2 - 3 degrees it puts the fish through stress and just like a human walking from the heat into air conditioning or vice versa it has additional negative effects on the fish's natural functions and metabolism. Changing 50% of your water is usually also unneccessary in order to maintain ammonia and nitrites at 0ppm so it is bad practice simply because you are wasting water.

Heard of stress coat? Removes chlorine and cholarmine and various other hard minerals.

You are removing half of the aged water from the tank

Yes, and probably half of it contains waste and hormones, so why not?

If I am vacing the gravel and stuff is coming up, im not gonna go right "thats 25percent CANT GO ANY FURTHER" haha.

What works for you doesn't mean it's right either, we all have our own opinion on it.

 

[Oddball]

Just to clear up a few points

At the same time you are removing vital minerals and trace elements that develop as an aquarium matures.

*exactly which trace elements and minerals develop in an aging aquarium?


Another problem with changing such large amounts of water at once is temperature shift. You can try and match the temperature of the aquarium water as closely as possible but unless you have a direct guage temperature control you will be shifting the temperature of the tank rapidly and even if it is only 2 - 3 degrees it puts the fish through stress and just like a human walking from the heat into air conditioning or vice versa it has additional negative effects on the fish's natural functions and metabolism.

*The key is pre-mixing. Alot of our members use water storage tanks in the same room(s) as the aquariums. Therefore, same temp. And, unless there are severe plumbing problems in the home, a simple thermometer can assure exact temperature matching. Direct guaging shouldn't be necessary for every fish. Just for the ones that can't survive rainfall.


Changing 50% of your water is usually also unneccessary in order to maintain ammonia and nitrites at 0ppm so it is bad practice simply because you are wasting water.

* yet, you provide no magical alternative. Keeping captive fish densities at the same levels as in the wild, along with natural aerobic and anaerobic filtration and natural aeration, are the only ways to negate necessary water changes. Otherwise, public aquariums, research aquariums, and hobbyists have all been led down the same delusional path.


If you have a tank that is so underfiltered and overstocked that 50% of the water needs to be changed every single week then the best way is to do 2 x 25% changes a few days apart.

* mathematically, 2 25% changes don't remove the same concentrations of any solution that a 50% change can due to dilution.

 

[bigspizz]

Yes Bigspizz, you're a real nice guy and your first post to me was put in such a nice way that it was definetely me who started this... *rolls eyes* In fact, when I saw your name attached to this thread the first thing I thought was, "hey there's that guy again wonder what he's blabbing about now. You did a good job of dredging up pictures that are over a year old. I dont even live in the same place anymore. I couldn't keep larger tanks in an apartment so I kept the sizes I could. The fish pictured there were the first fish we had when we had all of 4 tanks going..

My signature hasnt been updated in months either. Perhaps because I was busy taking care of my fish instead of wasting my life away on the internet? I have 3 tanks over 100 gallons in my basement in addition to the 600 gallons worth of small tanks. I also have 11 different species of fish, none of which are guppies. You sir, need to find a life and stop trying to have pissing contests on the internet.

If you want to know why doing 50% water changes at once are bad practice I'll give you a list of reasons instead of just one.

First and foremost changing 50% of the water constitutes a rapid environmental change. You are removing half of the aged water from the tank and replacing it with tap water which contains many different additives aside from chlorine or chloramine which are either harmful or at least not beneficial to your fish. At the same time you are removing vital minerals and trace elements that develop as an aquarium matures. Another problem with changing such large amounts of water at once is temperature shift. You can try and match the temperature of the aquarium water as closely as possible but unless you have a direct guage temperature control you will be shifting the temperature of the tank rapidly and even if it is only 2 - 3 degrees it puts the fish through stress and just like a human walking from the heat into air conditioning or vice versa it has additional negative effects on the fish's natural functions and metabolism. Changing 50% of your water is usually also unneccessary in order to maintain ammonia and nitrites at 0ppm so it is bad practice simply because you are wasting water.

Will changing 50% of your tank water at once kill your fish ? Probably not. Will it have detrimental effects? Definetely. Is it neccessary? Absolutely not. If you have a tank that is so underfiltered and overstocked that 50% of the water needs to be changed every single week then the best way is to do 2 x 25% changes a few days apart.

To be perfectly honest though, I made it clear in my post that it was all my personal opinions and the question was how each person does things. No one asked you to comment on my post, and your beligerent assault on my character served no purpose other than to prove that you are indeed a jerk. You should have simply stated what you do and why you do it as I did, but you chose to start up with me as you have multiple times in the past and as usual for no reason.

If you've read 95% of this site... well that's sad and pathetic.. but obviously the 5% you didn't read were my posts in the discus section, or the african cichlid section, or the breeding section where I have countless times discussed the fish I own. I think it's great though that you adore me so much as to "pay attention" to my posts, but I really don't want your admiration.

Your whole post is an opion...Based on 0 fact.....I asked you to use your theory and dismiss the practicality of constant drip...Then I asked how with all of those sword tail mollies and guppies, you only lost 2....I don't care what you say, there is no way you only lost 2 of those....Stop spamming/trolling....My post was on topic, you brought this to the gutter where you hang out....

 

[Hawkfish3.0]

Looks like Phil turned Alistriwen's water change theories into Swiss Cheese!

Thank you, come again!

 

[Bethany]

i say 20-30 weekly, just so you don't throw off the amount of water that has good nitrite levels and such and stress the fish. also, if you have good filtration, any more seems to be a waste of water, tank additives and effort.