So I currently in my 220 gallon I have 3 juvenile kelberi, (3-4”) a juvie jardini, (4-5”) a spotted gar (5”) and one male true hystrix and a female coming in, (both around 4.5”) I know the issues I’m going to have down the road with the jardini I have an empty 180 If I need to move, and I’m planning a larger tank next year to keep more monsters. Currently for my 220, I use a sapphire 39 sump, 3 filter socks (I rotate with 6 others every 3rd day) two 8x4x4 marine pure bio blocks, two boxes of the marine pure bio balls, and a random large bag of a ton of ceramics rings and denitrate. I use a 1900gph return pump. I also rotate 3 bags of purigen at a time. Would you say my bio filtration is sufficient? My plan is to move the fish when they get larger and keep the rays in there long term. I know there is debate if 24” is wide enough, which if they truly ok crowded I will move.
Questions on bio filtration...
- Thread starter Jayday
- Start date
Welcome aboard
It sounds sufficient but it depends on various factors.
How much do you feed each day.
How often do you do water changes and what % do you remove weekly.
As the fish grow monitoring parameters will be an indicater if you need to add more bio or not.
I feed 2-3 times a day depending. Currently the bass eat anything, the gar only eats black worms, and I have the ray eating, black worms, chopped up red and earth worms and krill. I’m slowly expanded his diet. Currently since it’s such a large volume of water in comparison to the current bio load I only do a weekly 40-50%. I test a lot because I know I will have to adapt my w/c schedule to the size of the fish.Welcome aboard
It sounds sufficient but it depends on various factors.
How much do you feed each day.
How often do you do water changes and what % do you remove weekly.
As the fish grow monitoring parameters will be an indicater if you need to add more bio or not.
I have a 220G with a sump, with media ceramic rings and bioballs, in my 220 I am having one Asian Arowana around 2feet in size. I also use 3 filter socks for mechanical filtration and change them weekly once, along with 40-50% water changes weekly. My feeding is once per day.
I feel your bio filtration is sufficient. But best way to conclude that is with testing parameters. What's your reading?
There are some YouTube videos for marinepure usage testing, just watch that.
My parameters are ammonia/nitrite=0 nitrates haven’t been above 10. But like I said all the fish are juvies and aren’t producing a fraction of their expected bio load. So It’s hard to anticipate. Especially with how fast these peacocks are growing.
Bio media sounds sufficient to me for now. I think you’re going to have more problems with aggression before you have problems with bio media. I have a 220 with a 55 gallon sump. I have three fire eels (23”, 22”, 16”), two vulture catfish (14”, 13”), and an endli poly (9”). I only feed once every three days and I do weekly water changes of about 100%.
Are you referring to the jardini aggression or.....? Luckily I am prepared to either a) rehouse the jardini or b) my LFS and I have a very good relationship and already said if I have issues and didn’t want it they’ll take him in on store credit. Yes it’s so hard to figure out how much bio media I need, the blocks said one is good for 250, and one is good for 100 gal denitratifcation. So I bought two, and I got a gallon of the marine pure bio balls, which I forget how many it claims to handle.
I’m mainly referring to having a lot of large fish in a tank where they will be bumping into each other a lot. Even fish that aren’t aggressive by nature can become aggressive if they are too crowded with other large fish.