i have had the oscars a few days now, i changed the bottom to sand just before getting them and added more( washed properly) while they were in there
the tank has gone really cloudy, i did a large water change on it last night and cleaned the filter etc but its not going a away,what the hell is it,cos its so bad i can hardley see the fish ( ok slight exaduration)

shelagh xxx

Its prob from the sand. Did it get worse from last night? It may be the oscars digging and rearranging the sand that kicked up alot of silt to make the water cloudy. The sand naturally will have very fine particles that just need time to settle. If you have a large amount of flow through the tank (either through a powerhead or strong filter return), then you will see it take longer to settle out

bacterial bloom, alga bloom, sand kick up.....more info required

YES THERE IS RATHER A LOT OF FLOW GOING THRU IT.4 FT AIR CURTAIN ,FILTERS,( oops soz caps)
yeah i reckon it could be that they are messing about too much in there and kicking it up as you put it
yes it was quite clear last night ,as i did the wc, but was pretty much the same before it

i wont do the wc tonigt,as i may be making it worse doing it everyday for them... will cloudy water ( even if its sand) do them any harm?
shelagh xx

This post has been edited by shelaghfishface: May 7 2008, 06:24 PM

naw, should be fine. Im sure if the water got heavily clogged with debris, it might start effecting their gills ability to extract O2 from the water, but that would have to be some soupy water (look at the amazon river.... less than a foot ro so visibility and fish live fine in the river...)